Uses of Lumber 



By Warren B. Bullock 





OXE of the biggest educational movements in 

 America today is the teaching of the man who 

 uses wood, the proper use of lumber for struc- 

 tural work in the factory, house or farm building, or any 

 of the thousand and one purposes for which wood may be 

 used. Every part of the country is feeling the impetus 

 of the new movement, fostered by the national manufac- 

 turers of all kinds of lumber, and spreading down 

 through the wholesalers, jobbers and retailers to the 

 every-day man on the job. Even the schools have taken 

 up the movement. The organization by the University of 

 Wisconsin of an extension course for users of lumber 

 to teach the natural properties and best uses of wood, a 

 course which has in its first year included hundreds of 

 correspondence students all over the country, with sixty- 

 three men in regular classes in Milwaukee, has spread to 

 twelve other educational institutions, State universities^ 

 State colleges of agriculture, and private educational in- 

 stitutions. A dozen others will institute the course in 

 another year, according to plans being made by various 

 extension course leaders. 



The theory back of the whole movement is that wood 

 "the indispensable," is the best material for many kinds 

 of construction work, and that the lumber industry 

 should not try to force the use of lumber where it does 

 not fully meet all requirements, but should concentrate 

 its efforts on the education of the public to use wood 

 where wood is best. 



This national movement, backed by the trade exten- 

 sion department of the National Lumber Manufacturers 

 Association, has its local manifestations in the Southern 

 pine, and cypress men in the South, the Douglas fir and 

 redwood men in the West, the hemlock manufacturers in 

 Wisconsin, and so on all over the country, until the 

 national movement has been taken up in a dozen ways by 

 associations representing district or species, which first 

 study the qualities of their own output and then prepare 

 educational literature plans and specifications for the use 

 of architects, engineers and consumers, to show where 

 and for what purjK>ses specfiic woods are the best. 



There is no longer any excuse for the ignorant use of 

 wood in any work, and any prejudice which may exist 

 against the use of wood is due to lack of knowledge of 

 now to build well with wood. Every one of a dozen or so 

 organizations is ready to provide any builder with de- 

 tailed general or technical information as to how best to 

 use wood, and what woods to use for special purposes. 



( >ne of the great problems of the lumberman today is 

 that of tire, not only the fires in the forest, but the fires 

 in buildings, and there has been an enormous amount of 

 work done throughout the country in studying the prob- 

 lem of how to build structures so as to minimize the 

 danger of damage from fire. The whole question is be- 



ing worked out on the basis of proper construction, ade- 

 quate safeguards, elimination of hazardous contents and 

 carelessness, and the use of automatic sprinklers. A 

 great many reports on fire prevention and the use of 

 structural material in buildings, state that a carefully de- 

 signed timber structure is as safe against fire as any 

 other type of structure if all floors are isolated, elevators 

 and stairways enclosed in fireproof shafts with all open- 

 ings protected by self-closing doors, and proper sprink- 

 ler systems used throughout. A heavy timber which has 

 been charred by fire becomes of slow burning nature 

 due to the charred coating, in the same manner that a 

 solid log burns slowly. 



This is only one of the phases of education being de- 

 veloped by engineers on behalf of the campaign for the 

 use of wood where wood is best. 



THE immense possibilities of developing southern 

 pine and Douglas fir waste into wrapping paper 

 have been reviewed for the members of the United 

 States Senate Committee which has under discussion the 

 proposal to increase the scope of the laboratory investiga- 

 tions, in the following memorandum on the production 

 of Kraft wrapping paper from southern pine and Doug- 

 las fir, by Chief Forester Henry S. Graves: 



"The waste incident to the production of southern pine 

 lumber is of sufficient quantity to produce the enormous 

 amount of approximately 20,000 tons of paper per day. 

 Laboratory experiments have determined the suitability 

 of this material for the manufacture of Kraft wrapping 

 paper by the sulphate process and it now only remains 

 to determine to what extent the laboratory results are ap- 

 plicable on a commercial basas. 



"What has been said of the possibilities of southern 

 pine is largely applicable to Douglas fir. While the 

 Laboratory experiments with this species have not 

 progressed to the same point as with the southern pine, 

 the indications are that Douglas fir is also well adapted 

 for production of Kraft paper and subsequent to the 

 completion of the suggested work on pine, it would be 

 my idea to utilize the experimental equipment secured for 

 this purpose in similar work in the West with Douglas 

 fir. Wrapping paper in this territory is at present se- 

 cured from either western paper mills using sulphite pulp 

 or from eastern and European mills supplying either sul- 

 phite or Kraft wrappings. In the latter case, it is of 

 course necessary for the western consumer to pay freight 

 charges amounting to about $1.5 per ton. The Laboratory 

 recently made paper of Douglas fir which tested a point 

 to the pound, putting it in the class with the strongest 

 wrapping papers made in the United States." 



239 



