PULP, PAPER, AND BY-PRODUCTS 



years that we have just been living through, and he 

 peered ahead prophetically into the years ahead of us. 



"The world will not buy our cotton," he began, "if it 

 can buy cheaper from Brazil or China or India. Rich as 

 we are, the American people cannot afford indefinitely 

 to tax themselves to maintain a position of economic 

 isolation in one of the world's great commodities. In- 

 evitably, our cotton acreage must be reduced, and surely 

 the first acres to go will be those where costs are high 

 and yields low; the worn-out fields of the coastal plain 

 from North Carolina through to Mississippi. 



"Here is the very country," he exclaimed, leaning 

 forward eagerly, "where all species of Southern pine 

 grow most readily and most quickly. To replace the 

 cotton crop with a wood crop is the simplest solution. 



"Those depleted acres seldom produce more than 

 half a bale of cotton. At the rapid rate of growth of pine 

 in this section, they can produce, year after year, half a 

 cord of pulpwood. Half a bale of cotton equals, say, two 

 hundred and fifty pounds of pure cellulose; half a cord 

 of pulpwood, about five hundred pounds. Planting, 

 chopping, and picking are a lot more work than fire 

 protection and selective cutting. By creating a steady 

 demand for an annual crop of pulpwood, the paper mills 

 will automatically solve the cotton problem in the very 

 sections where it is hardest to solve. That's why I want 

 to see Southern pulp made into newsprint, as well as 

 kraft, so as to increase and stabilize that demand." 



155 



