HARDWOOD RECORD 



from returns received by this department, that 4,534 people found em- 

 ployment in this industry in Montana during tlie winter season of 1913- 

 1914. These figures would indicate a steady growth and improvement 

 since the last United States census period. The lumber and timber in- 

 dustry is, to a considerable extent, a seasonable industry both for logging 

 and milling operations. Many logging concerns do not attempt to operate 

 during the summer season, and a number of mills, especially the smaller 

 ones, are idle during that period of the year. 



In the table given, figures are not included for mills idle and not in 

 operation. Most of the lumbering operations are carried on In the western 

 part of the state, although a number of small active mills were found 

 on the eastern slope of the continental divide, particularly in Gallatin and 

 Park counties. It is estimated that the merchantable timber uncut in 

 Montana approximates 05,000,000,000 feet. Computing the value of the 

 stumpage at $3.00 per thousand feet, it would indicate that the standing 

 saw timber of the state is worth $19.t.OOO,000, or when reduced to lumber 

 at the sawmill, the value would be $975.000,000 — twice the value of the 

 output of Montana mines, since gold was first discovered. 



If the 97 mills operating in the state in 1913 cut close to their 

 capacity, 531,964.000 feet were manufactured into lumber during the 

 twelve months of that period alone. Conditions in many of the larger 

 mills of the state are improving, many of them having adopted the nine- 

 hour work day, whereas a few years ago, the ten-hour day was universal. 

 Wages, too, have increased to an appreciable extent, safety appliances 

 have been installed in many plants, and sanitary and general conditions 

 have shown improvement. Much of the lumber milled is pine and larch, 

 and in the production of the latter, Montana is said to be the leading 

 state. 



Famous Arkansas Case Nears Settlement 



That the famous -irkansas rate cases, which have been in the courts 

 for more than six years, may soon be terminated, so far as the Iron 

 Mountain and the Cotton Belt railroads are concerned, is the belief of 

 many people here at present. The following letter which is being sent 

 out by the members of the Arkansas Railroad Commission to the inter- 

 ested shippers and consignees perhaps explains the status as well as the 

 case might be put : 



The master in the rate cases of the St. Ixiuis, Iron Mountain & Southern 

 Railway Company and the St. Louis Southwestern Railway Company filed 

 his report in December, allowing over a million doll.nrs freight and passenger 

 claims against those roads as overcharge during the time the state freight 

 and passenger rates were under injunction, and disallowing two or three 

 hundred thousand dollars claims, to which disallowance numerous exceptions 

 have been filed. 



The railroad companies iiave filed exceptions to all of the claims allowed 

 by the master, denying liability on all of them on many grounds and ques- 

 tioning the sufficiency of the proof in many cases, and also on the ground 

 that many of the shipments were interstate and not intrastate shipments. 

 The state has intervened and prays that from the refunds allowed It 

 be reimbursed for the .?()5.000.00 which it has expended in defense of the 

 rate suits and for such further sums it has incurred for counsel. 



The following offer of compromise has been made : The railroads will, 

 first, pay $85,000.00 to the state in ninety days : second, pay all expenses 

 of the master's oflnce and court costs : third, pay all passenger claims in full, 

 without interest, in transferable intrastate mileage, good for two years ; 

 fourth, pay fifty per cent of the principal of all freight claims allowtxl bv 

 the master, in transferable scrip, good for two years for intrastate freight 

 charges, except (a) the railroads will reserve the right to try all exceptions 

 as to duplications and clerical errors, the decision of the District Court on 

 these exceptions to be final, and (h) the railroads will reserve the right to 

 try exceptions as to rough material claims and all exceptions as to claims 

 as intrastate ; fifth, the right is reserved to holders of all rejected claims 

 who have excepted to them to contest the disallowances. The contested 

 claims are not included in the settlement. If the claimants win, they will 

 get full payment : if they lose, they will get nothing. 



The commission desires that all interested passengers and shippers ap- 

 pear before it on February 15, 1915. at 10 o'clock a. m., when a full hear- 

 ing will be had as to the advisability of accepting the said compromise. 

 This proposition has been approved by the governor and attorney general 

 on behalf of the state's claim for reimbursement, and the commission 

 will, if it is approved by the shippers and passengers, present it to the 

 court for consummation. 



Spokes for Gun Carriages 



Arkansas hickory will help make a noise on the Europe battlefields in the 

 near future. An order for 50,000 spokes for gun carriages is now being 

 filled at Pine Bluff. This supply should be sufficient to equip GOO guns, 

 with an extra wheel for each carriage. Tough American hickory may be 

 expected to stand the strain if any wood will do it. In Belgium the Ger- 

 mans have been cutting down the elms and oaks for gun wheels and 

 foundations. There were some small but very fine forests in Belgium, some 

 of which came down with scarcely a stick amiss from the time of Caesar. 

 If accounts are correct, these venerable forests are now being cut for mili- 

 tary work by the Germans. Xone of this timber is equal as wheel stock 

 to the hickory which is now going forward from Arkansas. Some of the 

 hickory spokes are for the French and others for the English armies. 



National Forest Fire Loss In 1914 



Fire on the national forests of the West in 1914 caused a loss to the 

 government of not quite 340.000,000 board feet of merchantable timber, 

 valued at $307,303, and of rcpro<iuction, or young growth of trees, valued 

 at .fl92,40S. according to statistics just compiled by the Forest Service. 

 There were 6,605 fires, of which only 1,54.') burned over an area of ten 

 acres or more. About 77 per cent of all the fires did damage of less than 

 $100 each. In addition to the losses suffered by the government, timber 

 on state and private lands within the forests, totaling 228,008,000 board 



feet and valued at $175,302, was lost. The total area burned over was 

 690,240 acres, of which 310,583 acres were state and private lands. 



Notwithstanding that it was an exceptionally bad year for fires, on 

 account of high temperatures, heavy winds, and prolonged drought, the 

 average loss per fire was $10.3, as against $131 In 1911, when there were 

 only about half as many fires. Eighty-five per cent of the total loss was 

 caused by fires in Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington, where more 

 than half the timber In all the national forests stands. Less than one- 

 tenth of one per cent of this timber was airecte<l. Of the 6,005 Arcs 

 reported, 3,691, or 55.9 per cent, occurred In these states, and of the 90 

 fires causing losses of more than $1,000 each, 81 were In this region. 



Ijghtning was the chief cause, starting 2,032 fires ; campers came next 

 with 1,126, followed closely by railroad locomotives, with 1,110. Incen- 

 diaries lighted 470 and the rest were attributed to brush burning, saw- 

 mills, etc., or their origin was unknown. 



Alliance Winter Fires 



The figures showing fire losses for December and January have been 

 published by the Lumbermen's Underwriting .\IIiance. with headquarters 

 at Kansas City, Slo. The records show small losses on the manufactur- 

 ing divisions of lumber plants, but relatively large losses on lumber. The 

 total reported loss was $30,906, and was scattered through Louisiana, 

 Alabama, Mississippi, Texas and Wisconsin. 



Car Stake Allowances 



-■Vt a meeting of the Southern Classification Committee at Atlanta, Ga., 

 in February, W. S. Phippen, traffic manager of the National Wholesale 

 Lumber Dealers' Association, represented that association and the North 

 Carolina Pine Association and urged the classification committee to In- 

 corporate in the Southern Classification the following provision covering 

 the car stake allowance of 500 pounds on open cars : 



An allowance of 500 pounds per car will be made to cover weight of 

 racks, standards, strips, braces and supports used on flat, gondola or coal 

 cars when loaded with carload shipments of logs, lumber, or other forest 

 products, except that in no case shall less than the established minimum 

 car weight he charged. 



Some of the railroads of the country formerly allowed offsets similar 

 to what is here asked, while others did not. There has recently been an 

 inclination on the part of some of the roads to get away from this allow- 

 ance, but where shippers load forest products on open cars' and have to 

 stake these cars in order to load up to the minimum required by the 

 railroads, it is certainly unreasonable to expect a shipper to pay freight 

 on the stakes and binders which are used as a part of the car equipment. 



Statement of Car Statistics 



Statistical bulletin No. 1 issued by the .\merican Itailway .Association, 

 through its committee on relations between railroads, says that on Feb- 

 ruary 1, 1915, the total surplus of freight cars was 227,473 as against 

 172,325 on November 1, 1914. Surplus on February 1 a year ago, was 

 211,960, showing the situation as Indicated in this manner is not so 

 bad as it might appear to be. 



The figures for February 1 were, however, received from 159 roads 

 as against 192 roads reporting on November 1, 1914. The report esti- 

 mates that 50,000 cars should be added to the figure for February 1, 1915. 



The shortage February 1 of this year was practically negligible, there 

 being reported only 832 cars short as against 2,229 on November 1, 1914. 



Dense Stands of Pine 

 .V bulletin dealing with the life history of lodgepole pine among the 

 Rocky Mountains, written by D. T. Mason of the United States Forest 

 Service, contains a number of interesting facts. Few species Will pro- 

 duce larger numbers per acre. On an area In Montana a stand was 

 counted which contained 101,000 living trees seventy years old per acre, 

 besides 79,000 dead trees. This was a pure stand of lodgepole pine which 

 took possession of the tract after fire had killed all the old growth. 

 Though the trees had been growing for seventy years, they were still 

 so small that they could be grasped by their tops and uprooted like 

 weeds. The average diameter of the trunks of these seventy-year-old 

 trees was less than one-third of an Inch, and the average height four 

 feet. They were so crowded together that they had no room to grow. 

 Few kinds of trees will live through such severe crowding for so long 

 a time. This pine may finally reach a size from one to three feet In 

 trunk diameter. Its cones sometimes hang on the tree seventy-five years, 

 and a considerable number of the seeds remain In the cone without 

 losing their power of germination during all that time. 



The Trees of Pennsylvania 



The Pennsylvania Department of Forestry has published a report on 

 the forest trees of that state. The work covers 231 pages and is from 

 the pen of J. S. Ullck, professor of dendrology In the State Forest 

 Academy. 



Pennsylvania usually does well what It undertakes, and this report Is 

 no exception to that rule, .\bout the only way of Improving the work 

 would be to make a larger book. About one-half of the work Is devoted 

 to forestry rather than to descriptions of Individual tree spedcs. 



Pennsylvania Is doing a great work for the purpose of saving such 

 remnants of Us forests as remain and of reforesting the broad expanses 

 where trees once grew abundantly but where ax and the match united 

 to make a desolation. The state has 5,000,000 acres of stumps. Lumber- 

 ing began 200 years ago In the eastern part and It Is going on yet. 

 The state has produced mnrvelousl.v. The history of lumbering In Penn- 

 sylvania, If fully and adequately written, would read like a romance ; 



