CHAPTER II 



Three Thousand a Mile 



The use of wood in maintaining railroad transpor- 

 tation ; wood cross-ties. 



We Americans are great home-lovers, but we are 

 also inveterate travelers, and there is hardly a man 

 or a woman in the country today who has not made 

 at least a short journey by rail. Did you ever stop 

 to consider that under nearly every mile of railroad 

 track lie more than three thousand wood cross-ties? 

 Perhaps you have often seen the section gangs 

 ceaselessly pulling out the worn and weakened 

 sleepers to replace them with new wood, the piles 

 of fresh ties and the burning heaps of discarded 

 timbers. The railroads of the United States use 

 about 125 million new wood cross-ties annually. 

 When you realize that these ties would be sufficient 

 to build forty thousand miles of road or carry a 

 track nearly five times around the world at the 

 equator, you get some conception of the drain on 

 our forests necessary to maintain transportation. 



The choice of wood for use as railroad ties de- 

 8 



