1902, 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION. 



215 



RELATION OF FORESTS TO THE MANUFACTURING 

 INDUSTRIES OF TENNESSEE. 



By R. W. Powell, 



President of the Powell L,uniber and Mining Company. 



THE figures for the wood-working 

 industries of the state for the 

 year 1900 are not yet available from the 

 Census Bureau, and I have not been 

 able to obtain from any of the chambers 

 of commerce of the four large cities of 

 this state any statistics which would 

 show the rate of increase in manufactur- 

 ing from forest products, but which it 

 is quite certain is rapidly growing. I 

 will therefore devote most of my paper 

 to a few things which have come under 

 my personal obser\^ation or through cor- 

 respondence with those who have taken 

 some interest in these matters. 



The great and almost unequaled nat- 

 ural resources of Tennessee have been 

 testified to by such men as Abram S. 

 Hewitt, Edward Atkinson, Professor N. 

 S. Shaler, and Col. Geo. B. Cowlam, but 

 they have also called attention to the 

 fact that these resources are not yet 

 utilized in such a way as to make this 

 great commonwealth what it should be. 

 In these days of fierce industrial com- 

 petition, no communit}' which permits 

 waste to go unchecked, or neglects the 

 future of its citizens, can maintain a 

 good relative position. Argument is 

 not needed here in this matter, and it 

 will not be disputed that our forests 

 might be so utlilized as to bring more 

 money to us now and at the same time 

 be better conserved for the future. 



Between the years 1830 and 1S40 the 

 State of Tennessee actually gave away, 

 in seven counties alone, coal lands fully 

 equal in quality of product to those of 

 the Connellsville region of Pennsylva- 

 nia, and which, if situated in that re- 

 gion, would now be worth not less than 

 $50,000,000. These lands should have 

 been reser\'ed for the future of the state, 

 and if so reserved would have gone a 

 long way toward making this common- 

 wealth free of taxation for state pur- 

 poses for all time to come. It will prob- 



ably be many 3'ears before public senti- 

 ment will demand that the state exercise 

 its right of eminent domain and resumes 

 its ownership of the coal-fields or of the 

 great forests which are now being so 

 badly administered, but it ought not to 

 be long before action of some kind is 

 taken toward state supervision of forest 

 lands which are at the headwaters of 

 our magnificent rivers. In the mean- 

 time let us ask ourselves if there are not 

 now some ways by which private land- 

 owners may help themselves and at the 

 same time aid in the general welfare. 



During the months of November and 

 December, 1898, I made a thorough 

 personal examination of the Chestnut 

 Oak regions of North Carolina, Georgia, 

 Alabama, and this state with a view to 

 the establishment of a certain business 

 connected with the tanning industry. 

 A reference to careful notes then made, 

 and since then added to, indicates that 

 the tanners of the State of Tennessee 

 and one other in the immediate neigh- 

 borhood of Chattanooga are now using 

 about 75,000 cords of bark a year, and 

 this is mostly from Chestnut Oak. To 

 furnish this amount of bark, the amount 

 of timber required is probabl}^ not less 

 than 150,000,000 feet, b. m. The gen- 

 eral practice has been to fell this kind of 

 timber for the sake of the bark alone and 

 leave the trunks of the trees to decay in 

 the woods. This may be partly owing 

 to the fact that the trees have to be felled , 

 if taken for bark, at a time when the sap 

 is rising, and therefore not the best time 

 to make good lumber. I believe that 

 there are ways by which this kind of 

 timber could be cheaply treated, and 

 while in the woods, in such a way as to 

 produce a very much better quality of 

 lumber and make it worth while for the 

 lumbermen to handle it in larger 

 amounts and to their greater satisfaction . 

 It might also be used much more exten- 



