March 10, 1918 



HARDWOOD RECOKU 



33 



(Continued from page 23) 



The Georgia-Florida Yellow Pine Emergency Bureau reports 

 the receipt of orders recently for 1,000,000 feet of ties and 1,000,- 

 000 feet of timber for government work at Fort Navassah, N. C, 

 and 1,000,000 for government construction in this city, also 3,200,- 

 000 feet for Hog Island and other projects. 



The Alabama-Mississippi Emergency Bureau has received orders 

 for 3,000,000 feet of lumber for camps and is in line for 12,000,000 

 or 15,000,000 feet each for the Nashville and Charleston powder 

 plants. 



The North Carolina Pine Bureau recently received orders for 

 six to seven million feet of lumber for camps, for animal embarka- 

 tion facilities at Newport News, for a government ammonia plant 

 at Perryville, Md., and for other work. 



The capacity of army hospitals is to be doubled and the aviation 

 fields to be made larger, according to information obtained in offi- 

 cial circles here, thus increasing the demand for lumber. 



Bepresentatives of the aircraft board, shipping board, navy de- 

 partment, cantonment division and signal corps of the war depart- 

 ment, war industries board, and Pacific coast lumbermen have 

 formed a conference to keep in close touch with the Pacific coast 

 lumber production, and the situation as regards the needs for ship- 

 ping and aircraft. Capt. A. E. Self ridge of the lumber director's 

 office has been appointed Washington representative of th^ west 

 coast lumber interests. Howard Coffin of the aircraft board is 

 chairman of the conference. J. H. Bloedel, H. B. VanDuzer and 

 Col. Bisque are the Pacific coast members of the conference. Col. 

 Bisque has been here recently. Under the new scheme the West 

 Coast lumber emergency bureau has been merged into the govern- 

 ment service, with Lynde Palmer still in charge of its office here. 



Messrs. Coffin, Selfridge and Palmer are members of the West 

 Coast lumber conference, which also includes H. F. Howe and 

 Capt. H. M. Barling of the aircraft board; James O. Heyworth of 

 the shipping board wooden ship division, Major Durant and Capt. 

 Dorsey of the cantonment division of the war department; M. 

 Boubleday of the Navy Department. The conference disposes of 

 questions arising in connection with the government orders here 

 and the lumber production of the West. 



A hearing before the federal trade commission on the cost of 

 producing southern pine has been set for this city, March 12, when 

 efforts will be made to settle the question whether prices on lumber 

 orders of the government during the last three months shall be 

 raised, and what the future price wiU be. 



A freight embargo has been imposed on all shipments north of 

 Potomac Yards, Va. Lumber can't be moved except with the 

 special order of the government officer in charge of work for which 

 it is needed. 



It has been announced that the shipping board has sent James 

 Bentley and Wood Beal to Jacksonville and New Orleans, re- 

 spectively, to take charge of the work of locating and getting out 

 big timbers from the southern pine forests which the board officials 

 say they have not been able to get from the southern lumbermen, 

 owing to the expense and delay involved in the production of these 

 timbers. Bentley and Beal have sent timber cruisers to look over 

 the southern forests and Bentley has reported that in Florida and 

 Georgia they have discovered 400,000 trees suitable for making big 

 ship timbers. Similar reports are expected on the forests of other 

 southern states. 



James Heyworth, in charge of wooden shipbuilding for the ship- 

 ping board, says that Bentley has arranged to get a number of 

 logging crews and teaming outfits to go into the woods and cut the 

 timber that is being" marked by government experts, dnd also to 

 haul it to mills where it will be manufactured for the government, 

 the timber and mill owners being compensated by Uncle Sam 

 at reasonable prices. The government will commandeer the timber 

 if necessary, it is stated. Heyworth says that there were still 10,- 

 000,000 feet of southern pine big ship timber due from the South 



February 1, out of 101,000,000 feet originally ordered. Twenty- 

 five million feet have been furnished from that section, and 65,- 

 000,000 feet have been ordered from the Pacific Coast for wooden 

 ship building in the South and East. 



Shipbuilding contracts for 24 wooden ships held by the Southern 

 Shipbuilding Company, Charleston, S. C.', and Hampton Shipbuilding 

 Company, Norfolk, Va., have been cancelled by the shipping board 

 because the companies have not begun work on the vessels yet. 

 The government may take over the shipyards and build ships itself. 

 It is stated that building of steel and wooden ships on the Pacific 

 Coast is beating eastern and southern records. 



Organized labor is getting active in efforts to direct the wooden 

 shipbuilding program. John J. McGee of New York has submitted 

 to the President a plan involving the government's taking over all 

 the shipyards. If this is done he says labor can produce 750,000 

 tons of wooden shipping every sixty days, or 5,000,000 a j'ear, after 

 they get started. Many new yards would be built under the plan 

 also. 



Mr. McGee, who formerly headed the skilled labor bureau of the 

 emergency fleet corporation, says that difficulty in obtaining big 

 timber has caused delay in the wooden shipbuilding. He favors the 

 abandonment of the Ferris type and the building of many 5,000- 

 ton wooden ships of the Hough, Donnelly, Hawks and similar de- 

 signs. 



Mr. McGee is reported to have been offered an appointment by the 

 Canadian Munitions Department to take charge of shipbuilding in 

 Canada, and invited to take 5,000 carpenters and woodworkers be- 

 sides other workmen with him. According to William L. Hutche- 

 son, president of the Brotherhood of Carpenters, Mr. McGee has ac- 

 cepted the proposition. 



Huteheson declares that there are 50,000 carpenters idle who 

 could be used in shipbuilding if the material, especially big timbers, 

 were on hand. This statement was made at a conference between 

 Huteheson and representatives of the navy department and ship- 

 ping board and metal trades union. It w'as added that wooden 

 ships of other types than the Ferris type do not require timbers 

 hea%-ier than 8 by 12 and that such ships are being built on the 

 Pacific Coast for the French government One company is said to 

 have a contract for 59 ships of this type. 



Government housing preparations are proceeding rapidly. The 

 President has approved the bill providing $50,000,000 for the ship- 

 ping board for housing shipyard workers, and $8,000,000 has been 

 allotted for housing operations at Hog Island shipyard. Other 

 allotments of millions are to be made for shipbuilding towns along 

 the Atlantic coast. Much of the housing will be frame construction 

 in the form of portable houses, barracks, and permanent dwellings. 



A general housing bill providing for housing workers in muni- 

 tion plants, etc., at a cost of another $50,000,000 has been reported 

 favorably by the house committee on public buildings and grounds, 

 and will pass the house of representatives at the first opportunity. 



To provide for housing government employees in the District of 

 Columbia a bill has been introduced by Representative Mapes of 

 Michigan making $10,000,000 available. Extensive construction 

 operations have been undertaken here and others are planned to 

 accommodate government departments and offices and in them 

 large quantities of lumber are needed. 



Harold P. Plummer, Union Lumber Company of Los Angeles, 

 Cal., and the Union Steamship Company, has joined the United 

 States food administration as a volunteer in connection with the 

 handling of marine transportation problems falling within the 

 scope of the food administration's activities. He will aid in co- 

 ordinating the work of the administration, the war trade board, 

 and the shipping board. 



Secretary of the Interior Lane has ordered the sale of 70,000,- 

 000 feet of timber located on lands in Oregon formerly included 

 in the land grant to the Oregon & California Railroad Co., which 

 was declared forfeited to the government a couple of years ago. 



