HARDWOOD RECORD 



31 



W. A. Bennett : I think we should take some 

 action in regard to the recommendation of tlie 

 inspection Iniieau regarding the location of a 

 man abroad to take care of our business. I think 

 it is a very important matter that this 

 be attended to. We need an inspector abroad as 

 much as we need them in the Knited States. 

 There is a worid of lumber going over there, 

 and every once in a while there is some trouble 

 about it. We have no one there to inspect the 

 lumber, consequently we have no protection. I 

 would like to hear from our brothers here on 

 this sub,iect. 



President Palmer : Will you make a motion 

 to that effect? 



Mr. Bennett : Yes. sir. I move that we rec- 

 ommend to the bureau of inspection the ap- 

 pointment of a salaried inspector abroad. I 

 will not say at what port, hut that can be 

 agreed upon by the people interested. The peo- 

 ple who ship abroad are as much entitled to 

 protection there as we in this country. The fact 

 of the business is that if a shipment goes over 

 there it cannot be inspected: consequently we 

 Iiave no protection. We are spending our money 

 for inspectitni and protection here, and what 

 might be done over there is absolutely neces- 

 sary. 



The motion was seconded. 



President Palmer: Are there any fiu-ther re- 

 marks : 



ilr. Bennett's motion was amended by refer- 

 ring the matter of the appointment of a licensed 

 inspector abroad to the Kxecutive Committee. 



C. E. Lloyd, Jr.. then read the report of the 

 Committee on Forestry, with the accompanying 

 resolution, as follows : 



Report of Committee on Forestry Report. 



ilembers of the National Ilai'dwood Lumber 

 Association ; Your committee has carefully con- 

 sidered the report of Mr. Wall of the Forestry 

 Committee, and heartily congratulates him on 

 the able and thorough work shown in the prep- 

 aration of liis paper. 



We would recommend that this paper be 

 printed in a special bulletin to be issued by 

 our secretary and so brought before every mem- 

 ber of the association : and we also recommend 

 that the resolution herewith be printed with 

 said bulletin, and we ask our members to write 

 to their national and state representatives urg- 

 ing proper legislation on this subject. 



We further recommend that our standing for- 

 estry committee be empowered to represent this 

 association on forestry subjects when necessary. 

 C. E. Llovd, Jk., Chairman. 



Upon motion, duly seconded, tlie report and 

 resolution were adopted. 



T. J. Moffett : Mr. Chairman, this question 

 of forestry is so important that I feel we 

 should not leave it as it is. As you no doubt 

 know, some states have taken the initiatory 

 steps looking toward the ideal that Mr. Lloyd 

 has presented to us, notably New York. New 

 York has probably made greater progress than 

 any other state. Next comes the grand old 

 state of Indiana. If Dr. C. A. Schenck is in the 

 audience I would like to ask that we give him 

 the privilege of the floor. Ue, as you know, 

 represents Mr. A'anderbilt at Billmore, and no 

 doubt he can give us some information. 



Dr. Schenck : Mr. President and gentlemen, 

 I thank you for this opportunity of relieving my 

 brains, if 1 have any. Eleven j-ears ago I came 

 over to .Vnicrica on a pleasure tour, so to speak, 

 Invited by -Mr. Vanderbilt to take charge of his 

 forestry tindertakiug at IJiltmore, N. C. I did 

 not Imow much of the language, and I knew less 

 of the American liunber business ; and conse- 

 quently Mr. Vanderbilt and 1 tnade a mess of 

 the lumber business. I Laughter, j It has not 

 broken Mr. N'anderbilt and has not broken me, 

 but it has given me a chance, I dare say, to 

 gather an unusual experience while I was get- 

 ting Americanized. Gentlemen, it is a much 

 greater task. I think, for a young fellow to 

 discard ideas with which he was impressed from 

 his boyhood days tm than to gather new ideas, 

 and 1 liad to get rid of my European impres- 

 sions. I happened to be chairman of a forestry 

 school which is entitled (Jrossherzoglich Iles- 



sische OberfiJrsterei (and any stenographer who 

 can put that in print will get from me ten gold 

 dollars). I dare say I had to undo a lot of my 

 primary teachings in German forestry. Wo have 

 no more room in this country for German for- 

 estry than for Chinese forestry, because our 

 local conditions, our economic conditions are so 

 much at variance with those which prevail in 

 my dear Fatherland. I set out to develop 

 American forestry, very much aided by prior 

 experience in the lumber business. I believe the 

 report whidi has been submitted here is more 

 than excellent. It is brilliant. It strikes me 

 exactly. The keynotes of the forestry problem 

 are two, one of them safety of your investment, 

 and tite second, remunerative investment. For- 

 estry is merely an investment in timberland, 

 and there will be no investment unless it is 

 remunerative and safe. You are all good busi- 

 ness men. the best upon whom the American 

 sun ever shone, and you should be practitioners 

 of conservative forestry today. Here these con- 

 ditions have not prevailed and these conditions 

 are particularly absent in my beloved state of 

 North Carolina, where the tarheels grow and 

 the moonshine springs. [Laughter.] The main 

 problem for us hardwood men is safety from 

 forest fires, and my experience with forest fires 

 has lieen a disheartening one. It is expensive 

 to fight tliem : it is disheartening ; and it is a 

 liard job. I would rather pile lumber twenty 

 feet high than to fight forest fires. What sense, 

 I ask, is there to leave on a certain tract the 

 smaller oaks and poplar, if I am pretty cock- 

 damnsnre that the next forest fire will devour 

 my small yellow poplar and will eat up or 

 checkmate and jeopardize in their growth my 

 dear little white oaks, until they are changed 

 into absolutely nothing : that is the condition 

 confronting us. It is nonsense to leave any 

 assets in young timber in the woods until these 

 assets are absolutely safe from fire. Mr. Moffett 

 has alluded to the fire laws of New York. Wis- 

 consin and Indiana. There is not a state that 

 does not have fire laws, but including New York, 

 Minnesota. Wisconsin, Indiana, these fire laws 

 do not give the owner of second growths, or a 

 young growth, a seedling growth, that degree of 

 protection which I demand for my investment. 

 \Miat farmer would plant wheat if he thought 

 on the l.">th of every June his wheat would be 

 destroyed by fire? It is just as nonsensical to 

 invest in second growth if that second growth 

 is to lie destroyed by fire. I am absolutely 

 s\ii-e. in spite of the fact that we spend 

 thousands of dollars to keep fires out. that my 

 young regenerations of poplar — regeneration 

 means young growth — will not prove to be 

 valuable in the future, valuable (o Mr. Vander- 

 bilt and valuable to the nation, unless I am 

 cocksure they will be allowed to develop into 

 trees. This is particularly so where you do 

 not only foster a second growth, where you do 

 not only leave something for a second growth, 

 but where you drop something in young growth 

 by way of planting. We do not do that at all 

 at Hilt more, in the backwoods, because it would 

 be an unsafe investment to plant trees at about 

 l..")00 to the acre. I have planted about l.l^uo 

 acres at this time, and we have at Biltmore 

 about '-'.OOO acres of planted forests and I know 

 what 1 am talking *-ibout. Rut this investment 

 was made only in the settled part of the state, 

 where we controlled absolutely every tenant, 

 every hand, and where consequently we had 

 continuously a fire guard ready to move at a 

 second's notice. There alone I can make these 

 investments on 5,0(10 acres ; I can plant and 

 invest in second growth. On the balance, all 

 I can do is to give Nature a little cjiance, be- 

 cause I would not dare to spend more money 

 on it. It would be an unsafe investment. I 

 miglit add that, as a matter of fact, what we 

 want above all, is safety from fires. Whatever 

 you do. however lieavy you log in hardwoods — 

 I emphasize the word hardwoods — if you keep 

 fires out there will be a second growth sure. 

 There must be a second growth. Nature will 



furnish it, unless you bar Nature by allowing 

 the grounds to be fired. The primeval trees 

 which we now cut were second growtli trees 

 once. They had been able to come tip because 

 there were no fires. But at present, with forest 

 fires, second growth is impossible. Keep the 

 fires out and the second growth must follow. 

 It might not be a second growtli on which yel- 

 low poplars grow at the rate of .500 to the 

 acre, but it is good enough for me. under the 

 present conditions, to have a second growth of 

 fifteen good yellow poplars to the acre. Nature 

 will cause that second growth as sure as the 

 sun shines, because trees are nothing but air 

 and rainfall solidified by sunshine. You cannot 

 stop' the sun from shining nor the rain from 

 falling nor the wind from blowing, and you 

 cannot stop .second growth coming up in Iiard- 

 woods except by forest fires : and I want to 

 emphasize that, in order to prove that our 

 forestry problem on private estates is prac- 

 tically identical with the forest fire problem. 

 Keep forest fires out and you can keep any 

 American forest, and you can keep in prospect 

 a second growth, which your children and your 

 grandchildren will have running through their ' 

 midst. [Applause.] 



The second important financial pr()blem is 

 taxation. So far, in the South, taxes have not 

 been very heavy on us ; but these miserable 

 county commissioners [laughter] — I hope I do 

 not insult any one of you, because I myself 

 was a county commissioner once — I have to deal 

 with in four counties, and they don't care a 

 snap for the future of the county. They want 

 as high a revenue for the county as they can 

 get, and they say, "Mr. Schenck." catching me 

 b.v my ears, whicli is an easy task [laughter] — 

 they say, "Mr. Schenck, you are practicing con- 

 servative forestry. Y'ou leave something on 

 your land. You improve your land, and conse- 

 quently we charge you a higher tax than any- 

 body else." [Laughter. I They say, "Here is 

 the constitution of the state of North Carolina 

 which states, 'the more value land has, the 

 higher shall be the taxes on that land.' You 

 don't cut your timber and you don't spoil your 

 forests by fires and you don't need every bit 

 of vegetation on your land. Consequently it is 

 more valuable, and we assess you three times 

 as high as anybody else." [Laughter.] Now, 

 what can I do'.' What I should like to do is — 

 very much — I should like to buy the county, 

 so as to elect my own county commissioners. 

 [Laughter.] If all our lands were situated in 

 one county the task would not be so dithcult, 

 but because we are split up into four counties. I 

 am simply powerless. These fellows — these 

 gentlemen — representing the welfare of their 

 counties, represent above all their own welfare. 

 They want to get high taxes in order to im- 

 prove the county'; No. In order to improve 

 the value of their own farms : want to build 

 a new schoolhouse ; want to build a new court- 

 house, which is no advantage to me, because I 

 always lose my suit in the courthouse. [Laughter 

 and applause.] And they make me pay the 

 bill. You see it is not quite easy to practice 

 forestry in the United States, and particularly 

 not In western North Carolina or in the Appa- 

 lachian mountains, or wliere we have a back- 

 woods ])opulation, and there, according to the. 

 American standpoint of the forestry business, 

 is all that is necessary — there lie the headwaters 

 of our streams. There lies unlimited water 

 power, hidden, protected to a certain extent by 

 the forest. I would not advocate for a minute 

 conservative forestry on land which will pay 

 better with the plow. When we have any land 

 that is fit for farming I do what everybody 

 else does that has common sense — I cut the trees 

 down as (|Uick as I can. and convert the lands 

 into farms and especially in the mountains, at 

 five or six thousand feet elevation, where the 

 wind sweeps, and where, consequently, the trees 

 cannot attain any greater height than this room, , 

 when they are tipped over. There you have fine, 

 pastures, and there I have pastures. There my 



