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Yearbook of Agriculture 1949 



eastern seaports of Wilmington, Phila- 

 delphia, and New York, and forwarded 

 to England for distillation. The tech- 

 nique in the woods consisted in what 

 is known as the "boxing" system. By 

 that system, a cavity or "box" was cut 

 into the base of the tree to catch and 

 hold the crude gum as it flowed down 

 the trunk of the tree after scarification 

 or "chipping," which, then as now, was 

 performed with a chipping tool or hack 

 on each tree or "face" weekly from 

 about March 15 until October or No- 

 vember. The boxing type of operation 

 continued until the early part of the 

 twentieth century. It was then found 

 that, because of the smaller diameter 

 of the second-growth pines, some im- 

 provements would have to be made. 



Experiments conducted in 1901 and 

 1902 by Dr. Charles H. Herty led to 

 the adoption of the cup and gutter 

 system, which is still being used. Ante- 

 dating the work of Dr. Herty, W. W. 

 Ashe conducted experiments at Bla- 

 denboro, N. C., in 1894 in an effort to 

 demonstrate the advantages of using 

 cups and gutters over the practice of 

 boxing the trees. 



The crude cast-iron retorts that were 

 used in the early distillation process 

 gave a poor quality of product because 

 of the reaction from the iron and be- 

 cause no water was added to the gum. 

 About 1834 copper-pot stills were in- 

 troduced. They were partly enclosed by 

 brick work and the heat was applied 

 directly from wood fires. Water was 

 added to the gum; when heat was ap- 

 plied a separation of the gum took 

 place. The condensed vapors produced 

 the turpentine, and the residue in the 

 still produced rosin. The turpentine, 

 combined with water, was drawn off 

 from the still and was passed through 

 a simple dehydrator that contained 

 rock salt. After this separation, the tur- 

 pentine was run into barrels or tank 

 cars for shipment, or into large tanks 

 for storage. The melted rosin was then 

 drawn off from the base of the still and 

 passed through the wire strainers and 

 layers of cotton batting attached to the 

 wire screen. The rosin, still hot, was 



packed in barrels or drums, or in thick 

 paper bags for marketing. 



A naval stores experiment station 

 under the supervision of the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture was established at 

 Olustee, Fla., in 1932. The station 

 has developed better gum-distillation 

 methods and has done much to foster 

 the establishment of large central dis- 

 tillation plants, an idea that originated 

 with McGarvey Gline, a former direc- 

 tor of the Forest Products Laboratory. 

 The first central plant was completed 

 by the Glidden Co., in 1934, in Jack- 

 sonville, Fla. In 1948 about 30 such 

 plants, strategically located through 

 the naval stores belt, processed more 

 than 80 percent of all the gum. They 

 have displaced all but about 100 of the 

 small old-time backwoods fire stills, 

 about 1,300 of which were scattered 

 throughout the piney woods in 1933. 



CENTRAL DISTILLATION means a more 

 uniform product, better packaging, 

 and improved facilities for distribu- 

 tion. The central plants, by providing 

 a ready cash market, have opened the 

 way for the smaller owner of timber to 

 work his own timber rather than lease 

 it to the old-time large commercial 

 operators. The owner thus gets a better 

 profit from this byproduct of his forest. 

 Forest conservation is another result. 



The change to central distillation 

 has had a part also in breaking down 

 the old factorage system of financing. 

 Because working out a turpentine place 

 took many years, an operator rarely 

 could get credit from the commercial 

 banks. Usually the large amounts of 

 money required to set up and maintain 

 a commercial turpentine operation 

 were supplied by a few large quasi- 

 banking institutions known as factors, 

 who extended credit for the payment 

 of leases on turpentine timber (usually 

 for a minimum of 4 years) , for the pur- 

 chase of livestock, trucks, cups, tins, 

 and for advances to pay wages. 



Most of the factors also operated 

 wholesale grocery and supply depart- 

 ments from which food, stock feed, 

 clothing, and other supplies were fur- 



