668 AMERICAN FOREST TREES 



This tree was not much thought of by eastern people who had 

 plenty of other kinds of wood, but pioneers on the plains who had a hard 

 time to get any, found cottonwood useful. It made fences, corncribs, 

 stables, cabins, ox yokes, and fuel. The first canoes made by white 

 men on the upper Missouri river were of cottonwood. Lumber cut from 

 this tree is inclined to warp and check unless carefully handled, and this 

 prejudiced it in the eyes of many; but difficulties of that kind were 

 easily mastered, and instead of being a neglected wood it became 

 popular. Some of the largest early orders came from Germany. Vehicle 

 makers in this country employed it for wagon beds, as a substitute for 

 yellow poplar when that wood's cost advanced. Manufacturers of 

 agricultural implements were pioneers in its use, it being excellent ma- 

 terial for hoppers, chutes, and boxes. 



Cottonwood weighs 24.24 pounds per cubic foot, which is approx- 

 imately the weight of white pine. It has about the stiffness of white 

 oak, but only about eighty per cent of white oak's strength, and fifty 

 per cent of its fuel value. The wood is very porous, but the pores are 

 small, usually invisible to the naked eye. The medullary rays are small 

 and obscure. The appearance of the wood is not improved by quarter- 

 sawing. The summerwood forms a thin, dark line, so faint that the 

 annual rings are often scarcely distinguishable. The tree is generally a 

 rapid grower; heartwood is brown, sapwood lighter, but as a whole, this 

 tree produces white wood. 



The annual cut is declining. It was little more than half in 1910 

 what it was in 1899. Some regions where large trees were once abundant 

 now have few. The sawmill output in 1910 for the United States 

 including several species was 220,000,000 feet. The veneer cut was 

 33,000,000 feet, log measure; the slack cooperage staves, chiefly for 

 flour barrels, numbered 44,000,000; and pulpwood amounted to about 

 18,000,000 feet. The lumber cut was largest in the following states in 

 the order named : Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee, 

 Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, Oklahoma, and Minnesota. The tree was 

 lumbered in forty-one states. 



Cottonwood is a standard material in several lines of manu- 

 facturing. It is made into nearly every kind of box that goes on the 

 market, from the cigar box to those in which pianos are shipped. 

 Manufacturers of food products are particularly anxious to procure this 

 wood, and it is one of the best for woodenware, such as dough boards, 

 ironing boards, and cloth boards. It is used by manufacturers of agri- 

 cultural implements, interior finish, bank and office fixtures, musical 

 instruments, furniture, vehicle tops, trunks, excelsior, saddle trees, 

 caskets and coffins, and numerous others. 



