714 



Yearboo\ of Agriculture 1949 



Act of 1937 was aimed mainly at im- 

 proving forestry practices on the many 

 small farm woodlands. It authorized 

 appropriations up to $2,500,000 a 

 year to provide advice, investigation, 

 and plants for farmers, in cooperation 

 with the States. In the fiscal year 1948 

 the Forest Service cooperated in 173 

 farm-forestry projects, located in some 

 650 counties in 40 States. Besides, 

 about 65 forestry extension specialists 

 worked in 45 States and 2 Territories. 



In March 1938, President Franklin 

 D. Roosevelt sent a special message to 

 Congress recommending a study of the 

 forest situation by a joint committee 

 of both Houses, to form a basis for 

 policy legislation relating to coopera- 

 tion of the Federal Government and 

 the States with private forest owners. 

 He also proposed that the committee 

 consider the need for regulatory con- 

 trols and the extension of public own- 

 ership. The committee was appointed, 

 held hearings at various places, and 

 produced a report in 1941. Among 

 other things, the report recommended 

 Federal financial assistance to the 

 States for regulation of forestry prac- 

 tices, but it did not suggest additional 

 Federal acquisition of forest land. 



The Forest Service undertook to 

 make a new reappraisal of the situa- 

 tion in 1945 in order to bring up to 

 date and amplify basic information on 

 our timber resources, to interpret this 

 information in relation to the national 

 economy, and to reexamine national 

 needs in forest conservation. 



This study brought out that the crux 

 of the forestry problem now is not the 

 large tracts owned by industries but 

 the small holdings of farmers and other 

 tracts of similar size. 



Many of the larger owners, particu- 

 larly in the South and the Northwest, 

 have been developing an interest in 

 forestry for a considerable period. Ac- 

 cording to the Society of American 

 Foresters, more than 2,500 trained 

 foresters were employed by private in- 

 dustries in 1948, although there had 

 been fewer than 400 in 1930 and only 

 about 1,000 in 1940. 



Meanwhile, several States, notably 

 Oregon in the West, Maryland in the 

 East, and Mississippi in the South, 

 have enacted laws that provide for 

 some form of regulation of cutting 

 practices on private lands mandatory 

 in some States, optional in others. 



Summing up the situation today, it 

 can be said that although our forests 

 as a whole are poorer in quantity and 

 quality than they were 30 years ago, the 

 stage is set for a reversal of the down- 

 ward trend. The basic principles of 

 forestry are better understood by more 

 people than ever before. More and 

 more timberland owners seem to be ac- 

 quiring a sense of stewardship a 

 conviction that it is their duty to leave 

 their land at least as productive as they 

 found it. Furthermore, people are 

 coming to realize that if our forests are 

 destroyed we cannot expect the rest of 

 the world to supply us with timber. 



W. N. SPARHAWK is a native of New 

 Hampshire and a graduate of Yale 

 University. He joined the Forest Serv- 

 ice in 1910. After almost 6 years on 

 timber reconnaissance and in various 

 research assignments in the western 

 national forests, he was transferred to 

 Washington, where his first assignment 

 was a Nation-wide study of fire hazard 

 and protection. As a forest economist, 

 he participated in the preparation of 

 numerous reports and bulletins that 

 dealt with economic problems in for- 

 estry. He is joint author with Raphael 

 Zon of the two-volume work on Forest 

 Resources of the World, 1923. During 

 the Second World War he was consult- 

 ant to military agencies on foreign for- 

 estry. Mr. Sparhawk is a fellow of the 

 American Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science and the Society 

 of American Foresters, and a member 

 of the Washington Academy of Sci- 

 ences. He is editor of the forestry sec- 

 tion of Biological Abstracts, and was 

 associate editor of the Journal of For- 

 estry from 1936 to 1948. Mr. Spar- 

 hawk retired from the Forest Service 

 in 1948 and is now living in New 

 Hampshire. 



