could never put it over without more backing than we could expect 

 to get unless . . Wonder if the newspaper could be made to see this?" 1 

 Suppose the price of newsprint went on up to five cents and then 

 seven cents a pound iand the newspapers did see it and the fire job 

 was really taken hold of and was working out, the receiver's next job 

 would be to get an inventory of his layout. Maybe he could get again 

 into life the old act that passed the Legislature and received the Gov- 

 ernor's signature and then died. Then there would be crews out in 

 the brush, running lines, taking soil samples, mapping the old timber 

 and the young timber and the brush areas and the farm and grazing 

 lands and generally taking stock of what there is in the shop. 



GOOD FARMING LAND, 



When the reports came in and were worked up, the receiver could 

 open a tract-book and say: "There's 9,000 acres of really good land 

 which, right now, as things are, could be farmed profitably. Ought to 

 be farmed. Jake, look up this tract and find out why it isn't being 

 farmed and dope me out a good scheme of getting the right folks on 

 that land right away." 



Or it might be grazing land which, as things are right now, is un- 

 doutedly x capable of supporting a profitable grazing development. The 

 receiver could proceed to get that unit to work. 



When a lot of the really first-class tracts were being settled there 

 would be time to figure out what to do with the balance of the propery. 

 Some of it would, obviously, be worth more for growing timber than 

 for anything else. The land classification would indicate just where 

 such lands were located and just what condition they were in. The 

 receiver could turn such lands over to somebody who understood that 

 sort of work. 



INVENTORY COMPLETE. 



Finally, there would be left a lot of land of dubious character; not 

 of a quality or area or location to permit a profitable agricultural or 

 profitable grazing development now, as things actually are, and still, 

 perhaps or probably, useful for such purposes in the future. Maybe 

 some land would need drainage, other land might be all right, but too 

 expensive to clear, other land just beyond the edge of profitable use in 

 agriculture because of soil conditions. 



With those lands the receiver could take his time, being very busy 

 putting real settlers -on real farm lands and real timber on real timber 

 lands. He could take his time about the balance of the lands of dubious 

 character. H[e might find ways of working them into use or he might 

 let them lie idle, or he might turn them into timber producers pending 

 the time they might become more useful for something else. Anyway, 

 having his inventory, he would know what he had, the condition it was 

 in and what he would have to do to get all his property to work. 



STEPS TOWARD INVENTORY. 



All of which is a nice little picture but nothing but "dope." 

 And that is the way things stacked up until this spring. In April 

 there was a meeting of the Michigan Academy of Science and a special 

 session devoted to the discussion of these affairs. The resolutions 

 finally adopted called for the reinstatement of the soil and economy 

 survey of appropriation and an amendment of the original law so as 

 to provide an expert Board of Control to advise with the State 

 Geologist as to the best ways of running such a survey. So far so 



10 



