UNCLE SAM'S BIGGEST BANK ACCOUNT 21 



out waste for the benefit, of the greatest number of 

 people for the longest possible time. 



Need of Conservation. That conservation is sorely 

 needed is clearly brought out by Gifford Pinchot in hi& 

 splendid book "The Fight for Conservation. " He 

 arrays striking instances of prodigal waste and shows, 

 the crying need of prudence, thrift and foresight in the 

 management of our national riches. 



The question of the forests how they have been 

 handled in the past and how they must be handled in 

 the future to supply a rapidly growing population with 

 material absolutely necessary to our civilization will 

 be considered elsewhere. It is sufficient to say now 

 that since the first Colonists felled the forest to make 

 room for their fields of maize the total present stand 

 of timber plus 200,000,000,000 board feet has been con- 

 sumed, either as lumber or by the ravenous but avoid- 

 able forest fires. Regarding other resources the figures 

 quoted to prove waste are equally startling. Of the 

 total coal deposits as a rule only one-half is removed 

 from the ground, leaving the remainder to be buried in 

 the abandoned tunnels and workings, to be recovered 

 at a prohibitive price if at all. Concerning the coal 

 used, only five per cent of the total energy is utilized 

 on the average and the most economical systems now in 

 use obtain but twenty per cent of the total energy. 

 There is certainly a possibility for vast improvement 

 in the management of our fuel supply. Once it was 

 thought to be inexhaustible, but already the coal fields 

 in certain parts of Iowa and Missouri are exhausted. 

 While it is believed that the supply of bituminous coal 

 will last about two hundred years, the end of the anthra- 

 cite deposits will be reached in from fifty to seventy-five- 

 years. 



