14 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



right, honorable men, who disparage any 

 attempt at chieauery of any sort in their 

 calling, and if having an association guar- 

 antee a grade mark will assist to that end, 

 the Hardwood Record is strongly in favor 

 of having every piece of lumber that goes 

 into the English market so branded. In 

 this connection, good advice to both Ameri- 

 can shippers and to English buyers would be 

 to know your men before you deal with 

 them. The Record is entirely in sympathy 

 with the efforts that have been made by the 

 Timber Trades Journal in depreciating the 

 miscellaneous consignments of American 

 hardwoods to the other side, that in no 

 wise meet the requirements of the English 

 market. Such rash business methods can 

 result only in financial loss to the partici- 

 pants, and also preclude the possibility of 

 legitimate exporters and importers receiving 

 their just dues. 



To tell our foreign contemporary about 

 the varying qualities of poplar growth in 

 this country, it is only necessary to state 

 that the standard manufactured commodity 

 known as yellow poplar is the only one 

 recognized as being a legitimate wood for 

 export purposes. Before being denuded it 

 grew in large quantities in Ohio, Indiana 

 and parts of Illinois, but at the present time 

 its range of growth lies very largely in 

 West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, western 

 North Carolina and Tennessee. In poor 

 soil along ridges at an altitude of about 

 1,500 feet, in parts of Kentucky and Ten- 

 nessee, there is a scattering growth of white 

 poplar of inferior size, which, in the trade, 

 is usually known as hickory poplar. This 

 lumber ordinarily does nol show the yellow 

 tinge, is comparatively hard and flinty and 

 partakes of what our English contemporary 



calls a "birchy" texture. Such of this 

 wood as is free from knots is not worth 

 more than twenty-five per cent as much as 

 yellow poplar, and for many uses not that 

 much. Again, abounding in the tide level 

 fringe of country about the lower Atlantic 

 coast and running clear over to the north 

 of t he Gulf of Mexico, is a growth of poplar 

 that is hypermature in its character. In 

 place of possessing the handsome yellow 

 tone of yellow poplar, the heart wood is 

 brown in color. This wood lacks in many 

 essentials the splendid physics possessed by 

 yellow poplar, and like hickorj- poplar, is 

 sold for approximately twenty-five per cent 

 less than yellow poplar. 



The Hardwood Record will venture the 

 assertion that no such lumber as is cited 

 by the Timber Trades Journal, varying in 

 thickness in a single piece from three- 

 fourths in some parts to one and a quarter 

 in others, has ever passed the official in- 

 spection of either the American Hardwood 

 Exporters' Association, the Hardwood Man- 

 ufacturers' Association or the National 

 Hardwood Lumber Association, as it lacks 

 one of the first essentials of correct manu- 

 facture, and an inspector of any of these 

 associations would promptly relegate the 

 lot to saw culls, where it justly belongs. 



To reiterate the advice contained in the 

 foregoing the Hardwood Record would coun- 

 sel the American lumberman, before enter- 

 ing into the export business, to thoroughly 

 learn the requirements of the English trade; 

 and the English merchant before buying to 

 acquaint himself more thoroughly with the 

 facts ri'LM ding American wood growth and 

 physics and of the possibility of the lum- 

 ber manufactured from such timber meeting 

 his requirements. 



Builders of Lumber History. 



Hon. Arthur Hill. 



It is with no ordinary degr f pleasure 



that the Hardwood Record presents as its 

 duotone gravure supplement to this issue a 

 counterfeit presentment which has rarely been 

 eeen by readers of cither the lumber or the 

 secular press. The portrait is that of Hon. 

 Vrthnr Hill of Saginaw, Mich., who, in many 

 respects, is the foremost lumberman of the 

 Wolverine state. 



Mr. Hill was born fifty-eight years ago at 

 St. Clair, Mich., in sight of the great rafts 

 of white pine logs which were floated down 

 the historic river of that name. His fathei 

 v. .is engaged in the vessel and lumber busi- 

 ness, the former occupying the summers and 

 the latter the winter period. Early in life 

 Mr. Hill acquired a taste for these lines of 

 business, and he has made them his principal 

 I ions. 



The Hill family moved to Saginaw in 1858, 

 and the young man, eVrthur, there gained a 

 preliminary education that enabled him to 

 . i.ii i the University of Michigan in the soph 



NUMBER XV. 



Course, and was graduated in engineering in 

 1865. Such was young Hill's desire to engage 

 promptly upon his life work that without 

 waiting for a visit home he started for Chi 

 eago, where he hoped to obtain a position as 

 engineer with some one of the railroad Hues 

 then being built out of that city. In this 

 endeavor he was unsuccessful, and learning of 

 a road being pushed from St. Paul to Du- 

 luth, he went to the former city, only to 

 again fail in securing the coveted position. 

 However, he did get a place as chainman with 

 the Duluth railroad engineering corps. 

 Within thirty days he was advanced to the 

 charge of a transit. When work ceased in 

 the fall he was advised by the chief engi- 

 neer to take up some line of business which 

 offered more -advantages for a young man. 

 Uthough he has lost his diploma from the 

 great university, Mr. Hill has carefully pre 

 served as one of his proudest possessions a 

 letter from this engineer, saying that his 

 work was Ln every way satisfactory, and that 

 In- could have a position at any time he 



[ass of 1862. lie chose a scientific chose to apply for it. 



Mr. Hill returned to the university and 

 remained the rest of the year studying law. 

 He then went to Saginaw and engaged in the 

 employment of landlooker, in both the upper 

 and lower peninsulas of Michigan. He car- 

 ried on this work for seven years for the 

 usual one-fourth interest in the lands when 

 they were purchased. Later he formed a 

 partnership with his brother in the firm of 

 Hill Brothers, manufacturing lumber. This 

 firm was later changed to J. H. Hill & Sons, 

 the father taking an interest in the business. 



During this time, and when twenty-two 

 years old, he was commissioned to go to Wis- 

 consin and look up trespass eases on govern- 

 ment lands. He spent a hundred days at this 

 work, which was not only entirely satisfac- 

 tory to the authorities, but gave him an ex- 

 cellent insight into the forest liches of the 

 Badger state. 



About 1890 Mr. Hill organized the Sag- 

 inaw Steel Steamship Company, building two 

 boats at the Wheeler yards at Bay City and 

 sending them to the Pacific coast. This com- 

 pany is now known as the Michigan Steam- 

 ship Company, with headquarters at New 

 York, and a fleet of freighters on both the 

 Atlantic and Pacific. Mr. Hill's lumber in- 

 terests have also grown with time, and today 

 they are conducted on a large scale in Cali- 

 fornia, Oregon and Canada. 



This dual interest of ship owner and lum- 

 berman has not absorbed all Mr. Hill's busy 

 life. He has been a student of many sub- 

 jects, involving political and commercial 

 economics, from the time he first engaged in 

 achieving an education. For the past fifteen 

 years he has devoted particular attention to 

 forestry from a practical standpoint. He 

 has studied the forests of this country and of 

 Europe, and has noted every means employed 

 toward their rehabilitation. Thus, it hap- 

 pens that a few days ago he interrupted his 

 busy and strenuous life to assume the chair- 

 manship and assist in the successful organi- 

 zation of the Michigan Forestry Association 

 at Grand Rapids. Mr. Hill is a writer of 

 note on forestry laws and methods and has 

 delivered valuable addresses on this subject 

 before the Michigan Political Science Asso- 

 ciation, of which he was president in 1902. 



In politics Mr. Hill has found time to 

 serve only his community. For three terms 

 he was mayor of the city of Saginaw, five 

 years president of the local school board, and 

 is now serving his second term as regent of 

 the University of Michigan. It was largely 

 through his instrumentality that a chair of 

 forestry was established there. He recently 

 purchased and donated to this great school of 

 learning a farm near Ann Arbor, for the use 

 of the forestry department. It was thus pe- 

 culiarly appropriate that he should preside at 

 the first meeting of the Michigan Forestry 

 Association. 



Perhaps Hon. Arthur Hill is less known by 

 the general public tiian any lumberman pos- 

 sessing even a modicum of his talent, attain- 

 ments and wealth, within the state of Michi- 

 gan. He is an exceptionally retiring man, 



