REFLECTIONS OF A LIFE DIRECTOR 347 



gaged Mr. S. T. Dana to prepare the editorials, which service was then 

 resumed after a two years' break, and continued until March, 1921, 

 when Mr. Dana delined to act in this capacity any longer. No desirfe 

 was ever expressed to deprive the Secretary of credit for these edi- 

 torials written by others, as the service was for forestry. 



That this fundamental weakness of position was due to the Board 

 members is evident, for Mr. Ridsdale in one sense is an exemplary 

 executive in that he scrupulously carries out instructions and takes no 

 risks of publishing anything which would meet with the disapproval of 

 the Board. 



What do these Board members stand for in American forest policy ? 



Charles Lathrop Pack was president for many years of the Pack 

 Woods Company of Michigan, and was for 25 years one of the largest 

 manufacturers of lumber in this country. According to the Bureau 

 of Corporation's report on timber published in ] 913-14, he was then 

 one of the largest owners of pine timber in this country. Mr. Pack 

 bought vast quantities of longleaf pine situated in Mississippi and 

 Louisiana in 1883 to 1885, at a price of $1.25 per acre for timber and 

 land. This pine, running from 10,000 to 30,000 board feet per acre, 

 increased in value on the stump to from $5 to $7 per thousand feet, or 

 a value per acre of from $50 to $200. The cutting methods employed 

 in stripping this long-leaf timber from Mr. Pack's lands as witnessed 

 in the vicinity of Jena, \Mnn Parish, Louisiana, and photographed by 

 mc, constitute the worst examples of complete forest denudation in 

 the South and cannot be exceeded in complete destructiveness any- 

 where in the United States. So bad has this condition become in' the 

 South that the State of Louisiana in the Spring of 1920 passed a law, 

 the first of its kind in America, compelling such operators to leave seed 

 trees, at the time of logging, in order to provide for reforestation. This 

 practical and simple measure Air. Pack had no hand in advocating, nor 

 did the American Forestry Association lend any support in the passage 

 of this bill. During the present spring, a similar bill proposed in Texas 

 was defeated by the lumbermen of that State in the legislature, the 

 American Forestry Association taking no part to assist the State 

 Forester to secure his conservation measure, which is a practical appli- 

 cation of the principles of the Snell P.ill for which the Association is 

 supposed to stand. 



