HARDWOOD RECORD 



13 



Suppose it is on its way to a furniture factory. When it leaves 

 the mill yard it changes hands and becomes property of the furniture 

 maker. He pays freight and other expenses incurred in bringing it 

 to his place of business. After tliat he pays wages to those who 

 manufacture the lumber into furniture and he pays salesmen to go 

 on the road and sell it. The wholesaler becomes the owner, and he 

 pays another profit, and then passes it to the retailer, who con- 

 tributes still another profit, and when he finally sells the furniture 

 to the ultimate consumer, still another profit is paid. 



The nub of the whole argument is that the lumber exported makes 

 no further business for Americans, while that which is disposed of in 

 the home market continues to pass through successive stages of manu- 

 facturing and handling until it finally enters into ultimate use, and it 

 creates business along its whole journey, and all the business for the 

 benefit of home people. 



In that view of the case, it is apparent that the lumber which 

 stays at home is worth much more per thousand feet than that which 

 leaves us. Though the value of export lumber is placed at one-eighth 

 of the amount of that which stays with us, that figure is wholly 

 misleading, unless it is amended by adding to our home supply the 

 value produced by further manufacturing, sales, commissions, and 

 trading. It is true in nearly all lines that the best business is the 

 home business. If we sell lumber at home, Americans receive the pay 

 for the lumber and all the profits from handling and manufacturing, 

 and Americans finally get the use of the lumber. This is not an 

 argument against trying to build up foreign trade. We ought to 

 build it up if we can; but if, in times like these, we see it disap- 

 pearing, we should not conclude that we are losing more than we are 

 keeping. By all odds, the best i)art of the lumber business remains 

 with us, and the beauty of it is, the part that we hold cannot be 

 taken from us by the misfortunes of foreign wars. l)ut can lie im- 

 proved and increased by our own industry. 



December export figures show that our foreign lumber trade lias 

 been badly cut.- That has happened not only in countries which are 

 at war, but also with countries at peace. The only two countries on 

 earth that bought more lumber from us in December, 1914, than in the 

 corresponding month in 191.3 were Brazil and British Honduras. In 

 nine countries imports of lumber or logs from the United States 

 disappeared entirely in December. Even our exports to the Philip- 

 pines wholly vanished. 



Our loss on account of falling lumber exports is considerable, and 

 regrettable, but why overestimate it? The city of Chicago alone 

 provides a yearly market for 485,637,000 feet more lumber than the 

 United States exported to the whole world in 1914. And the same 

 city of Chicago manufactured into finished commodities, such as fur- 

 niture, vehicles, boxes, etc., in the year 1909, more wood than this 

 country sold in 1913 (a good year) to all the countries of Asia, 

 Africa, South America, and all the islands of Oceana combined. 



Figures like these ought to raise our opinion of our own home 

 markets. When a single city in our midst over-balances four-fifths 

 of the outside world, there is little excuse for discouragement over 

 the decline of some branches of our foreign lumber trade. 



Where Blue Sky Is Expensive 



BLUE SKY IS A BLESSED THING in its place, but it is a 

 monstrously expensive roof for agricultural machinery, live stock, 

 and hanested farm crops. 



Good shelter for everything that needs it is the surest and most 

 constant money maker that the farmer can call to his assistance. 

 The rains that fall, the sun's heat that accompanies the summer, and 

 the dews and fogs which descend upon or hover over the places 

 beneath, are the allies of the agriculturist while the crops are grow- 

 ing, but they are enemies after the harvests are ended. An invest- 

 ment in roofs to shelter machinery and crops is the safest and sanest 

 outlay for the farm. It is to the gathered crop what fertilizers 

 are to the growing crop. 



The shingle, the weatherboard, and the paint brush are the three 

 chief signs of progressiveness in rural communities. They indicate 

 prosperity. The story which they tell points a moral wholly different 

 from that pointed by rusty mowing machines, warped hay rakes. 



ramshackle wagons, sprouting grain ricks, raw-boned cattle, long- 

 haired horses, squaling shoats, and the signs of general shiftlessness 

 painfully visible about the bamless and shedless premises of the 

 farmer who docs not [latronize tho lumVier vard. 



The Theme of the Massmeeting 



'-pHE PROMULGATION OF BIG THOUGHT.S and far-reaching 

 ■•• plans characterized the two days ' session of the Forest Products 

 Federation massmeeting held at Chicago this week The underly- 

 ing theme of all the discussions, the thread of thought which was 

 carried through the entire meeting was characteristic of the lum- 

 bermen 's desire to always fight fair. 



Something big is coming of this conference, something of im- 

 mense moment to the entire lumber trade, but it can be confi- 

 dently anticipated that any fight instituted by lumbermen will be 

 along the lines of right, and will not be carried on with the assist- 

 ance of false propaganda endeavoring to belittle or disparage the 

 competing materials in the legitimate uses. The campaign will be 

 of increased weight and effectiveness because it will carry with 

 it the stamp of genuineness and sincerity. 



Do Lumbermen Take Themselves Too Seriously ? 



'T~'HERE IS NO BETTER crowd of good fellows in the world 

 •1 than the lumbermen of this country. They are men of broad 

 minds and big, sympathetic hearts. They are men who as a class 

 have accomplished big things and whose line of vision is broad. 

 They are sociable and convivial, and while thej- probably have 

 not co-operated in a business way in the past as closely as the best 

 interests of the whole trade would dictate, in their social gather- 

 ings nothing but a spirit of genuine and sincere good fellowship 

 and camaraderie has been apparent. Yet we see periodically evi- 

 dences of the impossibility of permanence of any purely social 

 organization of lumbermen. 



The latest disorganization is that of the Lumbermen's Club of 

 (;hicago, a body of local lumbermen and others affiliated through 

 non-resident membership in different parts of the country. It is 

 true that the club is dissolving with all honor, and with every 

 appearance of having run a successful course. The fact neverthe- 

 less remains that any organization which becomes indispensable 

 is going to endure regardless of outside circumstances. The trouble 

 has not been with the management of the various clubs which have 

 ceased to exist, as in every case the management has been com- 

 petent and efficient to the highest degree. 



It would appear on analysis that the fundamental reason is that 

 the lumbermen as a whole take their work a little too seriously. 

 It might be urged against this that the lumbermen have a general 

 reputation of being good fellows, of easy-going dispositions, and 

 this argument might have some weight if it had proven capable of 

 holding such an organization together. 



It is .iust possible that the trade as a whole is over-organized 

 in this way, at least that there are too many varied associations 

 that are open for membership to any one individual. The average 

 lumberman may feel that as long as he has to join organizations he 

 might as well spend his money for those that offer him a direct 

 opiportunity of getting value received. This policy may be alto- 

 gether wise, but nevertheless it is a relief to get together with a 

 party of good, whole-souled lumbermen under circumstances which 

 taboo trade talk and which bring all of them out on a strictly social 

 level and show up the man side rather than the business side. 



No matter how genuine a man is, an almost imperceptible bar- 

 rier of recognized competition is necessarily raised in his inter- 

 course with his competitors when such intercourse is under circum- 

 stances which necessarily turn his mind toward thoughts of 

 business. It is a good thing for everj-body in every line of trade 

 to be able to get absolutely away from business thoughts and to 

 be able to give himself up for a certain length of time every day 

 to unalloyed social intercourse with fellow businessmen. Thia is 

 just the function served by a purely social lumber club, and the 

 lumber trade suffers a genuine loss whenever such an organization 

 is disbanded. 



