1906 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



41 



rivers and carried to the sea by devas- 

 tating floods, not to consider the de- 

 struction of crops, houses, and ani- 

 mals. Forest conservation will pre- 

 vent increase of, and wise reforesta- 

 tion will diminish, this tremendous 

 loss. 



Forest conservation means a perpet- 

 ual supply of wood for manufactures. 

 Furniture factories, box factories, bar- 

 rel and tub factories, woodpulp and 

 paper mills will need timber hereafter 

 as well as now, which can be supplied 

 only by a wise system of forest con- 

 servation. 



It means a perpetual lumber supply 

 for building purposes. Houses, ships, 

 cars, bridges, mines, and other struc- 

 tures will always need wood. The rail- 

 roads alone are consuming annually 

 over one million acres of forests. 

 Without forest conservation the supply 

 will soon be exhausted. 



Forest conservation means a maxi- 

 mum of forest yield, a maximum of 

 lumber, of water, of agriculture. De- 

 forestation means destruction of lum- 

 ber, of water, and of agriculture. 



In the language of President Roose- 

 velt, "Use the forests for grazing, for 

 farming, for lumber, for whatever they 

 are best adapted ; but so use them that 

 you will not destroy their usefulness 

 for future generations." 



Forest conservation, by keeping the 

 forests and using them too, will be an 

 unanswerable demonstration that a 

 wise people may "eat their cake and 

 keep it too." 



Forest conservation should be taught 

 in every school and college. The na- 

 tional government should give a great 

 lesson in forest conservation to sixty 

 million people by establishing the Ap- 

 palachian Forest Reserve. The United 

 States owns sixty forest reserves, of 



about 100,000,000 acres, worth $250,- 

 000,000. Not one is east of the Missis- 

 sippi River. The proposed Appala- 

 chian Reserve will contain four million 

 acres and cost ten million dollars. 



Every mountain system west of the 

 Mississippi River contains a forest re- 

 serve. The Appalachian Mountains, 

 extending from Pennsylvania to Ala- 

 bama, are, from every point of view, 

 the most important system on the con- 

 tinent. To crown their summits with 

 a national forest reserve the largest, 

 the grandest, the most useful on the 

 continent would complete the system 

 of national forest reserves. 



The Appalachian Forest Reserve is 

 located in seven states with 13,000,000 

 inhabitants and is within twenty-four 

 hours of 60,000,000 people. It is, par 

 excellence, the health and pleasure re- 

 gion for all the states east of the Mis- 

 sissippi River. 



Over one million horse power yet 

 remains to be developed in this region, 

 provided a steady stream-flow can be 

 maintained. To do this, the forests 

 must be preserved. Continued defor- 

 esting will destroy much water power 

 that is already developed. 



In the Appalachian Mountains rise 

 many great rivers, flowing through 

 many great states, whose waters, for 

 power, for commerce, for health, for 

 water supply to cities, and food fishes 

 should be guarded with the utmost 

 care from contamination and diminu- 

 tion. 



The matchless flora and fauna and 

 natural scenery of the Appalachian 

 Forest Reserve would be a sufficient 

 reason for their preservation, forming 

 in the heart of the East Mississippi 

 country a perpetual paradise of health 

 and pleasure, where weary mortals 

 may go for all ages and become strong 

 again on the bosom of Mother Earth. 



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