590 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



the Growth of Timber." In 1799 the federal government recognized the 

 necessity and passed public laws dealing with the timber supply of the 

 country. Congress also appropriated $200,000 for the purchase of standing 

 timber, especially forest lands on which timber suitable for the navy was 

 growing. The selection of these tracts was left to the president, and 

 under this act 19,000 acres was reserved on islands off the coast of Louisi- 

 ana and the Gulf states. In 1818 congress made another ap- 

 propriation of $100,000 for the purchase of land on Santa Rosa Sound, 

 Florida, where seeding and planting was first attempted. In 1831 provision 

 was made for the punishment of anyone destroying live oak, cedar or any 

 other tree growing on public lands of the United States. At this time 

 244,000 acres of land was reserved in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and 

 Mississippi. It was not the conception of a need of a national forestry 

 policy that caused the enactment of these laws, but the real incentive 

 was the saving of special kinds of timber necessary in the navy. 



As late as 1840 lumbering operations such as we have today were 

 never dreamed of. At this time the value of the total annual cut was 

 about $13,000,000. Fifty years later it had increased to over thirty-one 

 times that amount. The rapid consumption of forest supplies, coupled 

 with wastefulness and destruction by fires with no attention paid to re- 

 production caused considerable agitation on the part of many citizens who 

 gave vent to their opinions through the daily press. Two important publi- 

 cations that helped to shape public opinion were Dr. Warden's report on 

 "Methods used Abroad in Forests," and Marsh's work "Earth as Modified 

 by Human Action." 



Only thirty-two years ago the first canvass of the United States forest 

 reserves was made by Prof. Brewer of Yale. His report was published in 

 the census of 1870. In 1873 the American Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science presented congress with a memorial and as an outcome 

 three years later, August 15, 1876, an agency of forestry was established 

 in the United States department of agriculture. This in a few years be- 

 came a division, and in July, 1901, a bureau. Under the provision of the 

 act which established an agency. In 1876 Franklin B. Hough of Lowville, 

 New York, was appointed an agent to make a special report to congress 

 of the forest resources of the United States. This act was the first to 

 give the subject of forestry a place in the government departments and 

 insure for it public recognition. 



Prior to 1876 a number of states had begun forestry movements. In 

 1867 Wisconsin appointed a commissioner to report on the disastrous 

 effect of forest destruction. Two years later Maine appointed a board 

 of men to report on a forest policy for that state. Shortly after this laws 

 encouraging timber planting either under bounty or exemption from taxes 

 were passed in Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, New York, Missouri, Minnesota, 

 Illinois, North Dakota and Connecticut. The government then joined in 

 the legislation and the timber culture act was passed March 3, 1873. By 

 this act the planting of timber on forty acres of land in a treeless terri- 

 tory conferred title to 160 acres of public domain. Amendments to this 

 were made in 1876 and 1877, but like the state laws it had little effect. 



