MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS 



THE GROVES GOD'S 



FIRST TEMPLES 



(Address of E. W. Barber, of Jackson, before 

 Michigan Forestry Association at Jackson.) 



It is my privilege, especially on behalf of 

 its Chambe'r of Commerce, to welcome you 

 to Jackson on the occasion of this fourth 

 annual meeting of public-spirited citizens, 

 whose interest in the subject you have 

 assembled here to consider springs from the 

 fact that it relates exclusively to the future 

 welfare and permanent prosperity of the state. 



No question is of more far-reaching im- 

 portance than that of conservation, restoration 

 and preservation of the forests. 



Jackson is the summit city of the southern 

 half of the lower peninsula of Michigan. 

 Within or close to the southern line cf Jack- 

 son county four important rivers the Raisin, 

 the St. Joseph, the Kalamazoo and the Grand 

 have their origin in an area smaller than that 

 of a single township. These high lands and 

 the streams that flow from them need forest 

 protection. In this matter, about twenty 

 counties watered by these rivers and their 

 tributaries are directly interested. And yet 

 less than twelve per cent of the surface of 

 Jackson county is covered with forest trees, 

 while eighteen per cent of the entire area ot 

 France is forest land, and in Germany a still 

 larger proportion of the soil, about one- 

 quarter, has a legally protected forest cover. 



Pause a moment and think of this! The 

 German empire has a total area of 208,830 

 square miles; our state of Texas has 265,780 

 square miles, 56,950 more than Germany; and 

 yet Germany, where the conservation of the 

 forests is carefully guarded by the govern- 

 ment, had, on June 30, 1909, a population of 

 63,886,000, a gain in one year of 896,000, and 

 since the formation of the present empire in 

 1871 of about 23,000,000. Self-preservation re- 

 quires the protection of its forests. 



A country thus densely populated, and show- 

 ing such a remarkable growth, has one-quarter 

 of its area in forests, while in Jackson county 

 less than one-eighth of its 720 square miles 

 is forest land. What is true of Jackson county 

 is closely true of all the counties of southern 

 Michigan. 



France has an area of 204,092 square miles, 

 about forty million thrifty inhabitants, and 

 has eighteen per cent of its surface covered 

 with forests, many of which have been planted 

 to produce the best agricultural and horti- 

 cultural results. With about three and a half 

 times the area of Michigan, with its forests 

 protected from waste and destruction by la-w, 

 France normally raises half as much wheat 

 as the United States, although we have 

 3,600,000 square miles of territory, and has 

 saved much of her soil from ruin by planting 

 and preserving her forests. 



We are confronted by a condition not a 

 theory. The forestry question is not a new 

 one. It is as old as civilization. Countries 

 are prospering the most and have prospered 

 the most that are doing the most to save their 

 forests from destruction. 



It is not the expenditure of millions upon 

 millions of money every year for coast de- 

 fenses, ships of war, cannon and torpedoes 

 that this country needs for its preservation 

 and welfare; but it does need, first of all, 

 forest protection and restoration. There is 

 peace on the lakes surrounding Michigan; no 

 money for war needs to be spent on them; 

 but the forests of the state need protection 

 for its future and highest welfare. 



Since the time of Abraham Lincoln no 

 president of the United States has done so 



much good to this country as was accom- 

 plished by President Roosevelt in the steps 

 taken for the conservation of our forests and 

 other natural resources. His successor made 

 a mistake, in this regard, when he placed Mr. 

 Ballinger at the head of the interior depart- 

 ment. 



Man Nature's Enemy. 



Too long man has been the enemy of the 

 best in nature. Fcr centuries it has been the 

 fashion to place the world, the flesh and the 

 devil in the same bad category. Out of this 

 pernicious idea sprang a hydra brood of evils. 

 The practice grew among men of maltreating 

 their bodies, hating the world in which we 

 live, and turning both over to the devil. Na- 

 ture hating became a part of religious teach- 

 ing and duty. 



What has been the consequence? In many 

 instances where men have been the most mis- 

 takenly religious, devotees of a world-hating 

 asceticism, nature has been blighted and deso- 

 lated the most cruelly by them. Palestine, 

 Persia, Asia Minor, Greece, portions of Italy 

 and Spain, Cyprus and Ceylon, the north pi 

 Africa regions once famous for agriculture, 

 commerce and sylvan attractions, and sup- 

 porting a large population are now classed 

 among the most barren portions of the globe. 

 In every instance the forests were destroyed 

 the lungs of nature removed. 



The relations between the wooded areas of 

 a country and its welfare are too close and 

 too important to be overlooked and ignored. 

 Destruction of the forests invites permanent 

 deterioration and disaster. In the interior of 

 every continent, to get the best agricultural 

 results, at least one-third of the area should 

 be woodland. Mountain sides and summits 

 should never be denuded. Timber should be 

 cut to save it and the number of trees never 

 be reduced. Where stripped the forests should 

 be restored. Hillsides and summits should be 

 reforested. Governments can engage in no 

 more laudable efforts. Private and co-opera- 

 tive action among land owners, and the gen- 

 eral and persistent policy of the state should 

 thus be directed towards saving the country 

 and insuring a prosperous and contented citi- 

 zenship. 



Humboldt, the great student and lover of 

 nature, once said: "In felling trees growing 

 on trie sides and summits of mountains, men 

 under all climes prepare for subsequent ca- 

 lamities at once a lack of fuel and a lack of 

 water." 



This eminent scientist and observer might 

 have added that stripping the sides and sum- 

 mits of the hills and mountains causes more 

 destructive floods in the fertile valleys during 

 the seasons of melting snows and falling rains, 

 rendering them less fit for agriculture and the 

 support of a large and contented population. 

 Avoidable Calamities. 



Experience and history alike teach the same 

 lesson the wide world over. The water that 

 falls on the barren mountain and steep hill- 

 sides rushes rapidly down the gullies and 

 ravines into the rivers, which overflow their 

 banks, causing fearful floods and great destruc- 

 tion of property. Year after year this occurs. 

 The calamity is avoidable if men will co- 

 operate with nature in saving and restoring 

 the forests. 



If the mountains and hills were covered 

 with trees, the falling rain and melting snow 

 would not form such destructive torrents, for 

 much of the water would be caught and held 

 back by the mosses, the leaves, the roots, 

 the fallen logs and brush, and would trickle 

 away .gradually to the valleys, mitigating both 

 the severity *of the spring floods and the sum- 

 mer drouths. 



It is a pity aye, a calamity so far as the 

 welfare of future generations is concerned, 

 that an acre of mountain and hill land, from 

 the rock-ribbed Adirondacks of the north to 

 the piney woods of Alabama in the south, 



embracing the great Appalachian range, the 

 source of so many rivers, the waterpowers of 

 all of which will be needed for all time to gen- 

 erate electricity and furnish heat, light and 

 power for an incalculable period, has ever 

 been sold to the forest-destroying speculator, 

 and that the entire area had not long ago been 

 placed in charge of an intelligent Forest Serv- 

 ice the timber cut to save it and not to de- 

 stroy it. 



By such means, and such only, could the 

 valleys of the Atlantic slope, and the greater 

 valleys of the Ohio, the Cumberland, and the 

 Tennessee rivers, which with their tributaries 

 drain an empire in area, have been protected 

 from elemental ravage and continued forever 

 the golden land of America. 



The Servians have a proverb that is worth 

 repeating: "Whoever kills a tree kills a 

 Servian." The once populous regions of 

 western Asia and northern Africa, the deso- 

 late places of southeastern Europe, the barren 

 wastes of Spain, once splendidly prolific, and 

 that historic land, formerly "flowing with milk 

 and honey," and later an "abomination of 

 desolation," prove the truth of the proverb as 

 to other people than those of Servia. 



By the destruction and doing nothing for 

 the replacement of the forests, man has been 

 and still is the enemy of nature, and nature 

 has retaliated by ceasing to minister to human 

 needs. 



Such are the lessons of science and of his 

 tory. Even he who runs may read. And we 

 are going substantially the same way, not 

 only here in Jackson county, but all over 

 Michigan, and throughout the United States. 

 In the larger sense, as well as on the smaller 

 scale, cause and consequence are the same. 

 The frequent overflows of rivers, occurring 

 annually, with the resultant loss of life and 

 destruction of property, and the arrest and 

 depression of business, are often traceable 

 to the extirpation of the forests at their 

 sources and along their courses. 



Like results have been realized from strip- 

 ping the watersheds of New England. 

 Brooks in which I fished in my boyhood, 

 seventy to seventy-five years ago, during the 

 summer months do net now carry a drop of 

 water from the unwooded hills to river, lake, 

 and thence on to the ocean, except during 

 the' spring freshets, and then they bear away 

 much of the best of the soil. The sources of 

 the streams have been ruined; the springs that 

 fed them are dried up; no longer do they fur- 

 nish drink for the herds in the pastures, or 

 meander lazily through the meadows. The 

 streams of Michigan that once ran brown 

 from the stains of 'fallen leaves, now run gray 

 with the soil that they transport to the lak 

 in which it is deposited. 



Causes and Consequences. 



What has taken place in other lands mil 

 also come to pass here, unless we take 

 proper steps to save and restore our fores 

 Cause and effect are the same the whole wor 

 over. As men sow, so must they reap. Ma 

 ing due allowance for the waste, destructi< 

 and depopulation of countries by war and 

 consequent crushing burdens of taxation, 

 is now seen, in the true light of econc 

 history, that the depeopling of the once faire 

 portions of the old world, the decline in 

 litical and commercial influence of once powe 

 ful and progressive nations, the lapse of pro 

 perous communities into squalid and degrade_ 

 hamlets, because nature's yields were insuffi- 

 cient for anything better fruitful yields hav- 

 ing been changed into fruitless solitui 

 have had the extermination of the forest 

 one of the most efficient causes and potent 

 agencies in bringing about such lamentab 

 results. 



The evils of deforestation have been ma 

 times rehearsed. They need repetition. Th 

 are conspicuous events in the world's histor t 

 and men are educated by events rather than 

 by arguments. More than a quarter of a cen- 



