May 2.-. lOlS 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



37 



a meeting made up of hardwood people from everywhere witliout 

 bouncing the missilo off the distinguished persons of three or four 

 products of the Hoosier state. 



There is a certain quality about Indiana lumbermen, as there 

 is about Indiana lumber, that seems to insure favorable impressions 



on the part of those who como in contact with them. Certain it jp 

 that Indiana products "get along" in other states as well as the 

 homo state, and are welcomed heartily, because they are usually 

 100 per cent right. 

 Here's to Indiana! 



Where the Hardwood Goes 



The bulletin published a short time ago by tlio Korest Service, 

 with the title '.'Lumber Used in the Manufacture of Wooden Prod- 

 ucts," gives some interesting details as to the ultimate destination 

 of certain kinds of wood supplying the various industries which 

 use lumber as raw material. Fifty-three wood-using industries are 

 listed. The hardwoods are distributed among all of these indus- 

 tries, but it is very unequally distributed. Some industries take 

 large amounts of it, others very little. A chief point of interest, 

 and that which may surprise some people, is that sixty per cent of 

 all hardwood is consumed by only four industries, and the remain- 

 ing forty per cent is distributed among the 49 remaining. The 

 four which account for 60 per cent of the hardwood are planing 

 mill products, boxes, furniture, and railway cars. These are here 

 named in the order of the size, based on tlieir consumption of 

 hardwood. 



The total annual supply of hardwood going to all factories in 

 the I'nited States is approximately 7,300,000,000 feet. Of this, 

 1,600,000,000 feet goes to planing mills; 1,412,000,000 feet to box 

 factories; 888,000,000 to furniture factories, and 488,000,000 to 

 car shops. That which is sent to planing mills is mostly converted 

 into interior house finish and flooring. In the foregoing figures, 

 chairs are not counted as furniture, although no good reason can 

 be shown for listing them separately, but that was the way the 

 government did it in compiling the statistics. About 200,000,000 

 feet of hardwoods go to chair factories annually. 



The hardwood in largest use for furniture is oak; that in most 

 demand for boxes is red gum; that for railway cars is oak; and 

 also oak for mill stuff. About 27 per cent of all hardwoods going 

 to factories is oak, and that next in importance is maple. 



Woods for "Poker Work" 



All resinous woods are rejected for pyrography work because 

 the sharp metal point used in burning is quickly ruined by con- 

 tact with burning resin, besides the resin causes the wood to char 

 irregularly and spoils the work. 



More basswood is used in pyrography than any other. It is soft, 

 of uniform texture without hard and soft streaks, is white in color, 

 thus securing sharp contrasts where the hot needle touches, and 

 the wood chars easily without much danger of kindling into flame. 

 These are the qualities desired. 



Cottonwood measures up favorably with basswood, particularly 

 the two species of cottonwood known as aspen and balm of gilead. 

 French poplar, which closely resembles Lombardy poplar that has 

 been widely planted in this country, is excellent wood for pyrography. 

 Yellow poplar is well liked for certain kinds of work, but its color 

 is not uniform, there being too much contrast between the heart- 

 wood and the sapwood. If yellow poplar is carefully selected it is 

 satisfactory. It chars as evenly as basswood. 



Holly is the whitest American wood and it has an even, fine 

 texture, just suited to the hot needle; but holly is tolerably ex- 

 pensive and that bars it from extensive use. Besides, it is fairly 

 hard and the process of burning is correspondingly slow and 

 tedious. 



Very fine pyrography is produced on orange wood. It is so 

 hard, so even-grained, and possesses such admirable burning quali- 

 ties that some of the best results are obtained by using this ma- 

 terial. Finer lines can be made on no other wood, with the possible 

 exception of Turkish boxwood which costs so much that it is out 

 of the (juestion. Orange wood is expensive too, and for that rea- 

 son is not much in evidence in pj'rography shops. 



The wood has much to do with the tone or color of the finished 

 work. Soft maple takes on a golden brown under the touch of 



the hot needle, ami cherry becomes gray-brown. Though the whit- 

 est woods are usually preferred, yet for certain kinds of work 

 woods that are naturally colored are best. Among such are cedar, 

 yew, and the heartwood of yellow poplar. These may be used for 

 borders of jianels of whiter woods. 



The Cut-Over Land Problems 



Instead of one iirohlem, there are several connected with cut- 

 over land, and the solution of some of the problems is being sought 

 by publishing a 32-pagc paper at St. Louis, with the name Cut- 

 Over Lands. It is edited by James E. Gatewood, who for many 

 years was connected with the St. Louis Lumberman as editor and 

 otherwise. 



The initial number of the paper appeared on April 15, and other 

 numbers are promised once each month in the future. The field 

 is as wide as the United States, but most attention will be given 

 *o those regions where lumbering is being carried on in an ex- 

 tensive way and where much land is being stripped of its timber 

 and left a prey to fire and erosion. The principal regions falling 

 m this class lie in the pine belts of the South, in the pine and 

 hardwood country of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan, and in 

 the pine and fir lands between the northern Rocky Mountains and 

 the Pacific. 



These three regions constitute a rather large and promising field. 

 The problem is not the same everywhere; but in most cases the idea 

 is to convert cut-over lands into farms. In some sections the most 

 promising crop will be corn and other grains; elsewhere fruits and 

 vegetables will receive most attention, while in still other locali- 

 ties cattle, sheep, hogs, and horses will hold chief place. 



The whole movement has as its basic idea the conversion of forest 

 land into agricultural property; the land which lately grew timber 

 is to be made to produce farm crops. Nobody seems to be paying 

 much attention to the matter of putting the land to growing trees 

 again. Most people who have plans and theories for handling cut- 

 over lands ignore the fact that much of the area should again grow 

 timber. Some of it is not well suited to agriculture or to stock 

 raising, but will produce forests. The ordinary land owner does not 

 take kindly to tree planting. He looks upon that as the duty of 

 the government, some state or municipal authority. He does not 

 care to invest his money and labor in young trees. Nevertheless, 

 that is one feature, and quite an important feature, for the returns 

 are so long coming in that the individual land owner does not 

 quickly become interested in the cut-over land problem. 



A Question of Turn Over 



One of the intercstin;; and important things in connection with 

 cost accounting and profit figuring in the veneer and panel business 

 is the matter of turn over. The Federal Trade Commission has 

 become so impressed with this factor that it now constitutes one of 

 the invariable questions in seeking for cost and profit information 

 in any line of business. 



What the Federal Trade Commission seeks to get at, and what ' 

 every man should strive to know for his own guidance, is how often 

 you turn over your product or output in the course of a year. It 

 is found that some people may turn over their stock two, three or 

 a half dozen times in the course of a year, while others will only 

 make one general turn over in a year, and too many are not able 

 to say definitely when or how frequently they make a complete turn 

 over of stock. 



Turn over is a factor in profit figuring, and the first essential to 

 the clear understanding of net profits of a business is to get at the 

 frequency of turn over. At times it is confusing, but this merely 

 adds to the work and does not remove the necessity for getting 

 light on the matter. 



