72 



THE ST. LOUIS LUMBERMAN. 



left in the woods by the log cutters. Missouri 

 still works more than half a million feet of white 

 pine into boxes yearly, largely into florist boxes, 

 which is a very small amount compared with red 

 gum, cottonwood, short-leaf pine and others. More 

 than half of all the box material demanded an- 

 nually in Missouri is red gum. Some of it goes into 

 very cheap boxes and crates, and some into those 

 of high class. That wood is plentiful, and an- 

 swers most purposes well, either as boxes, crates, 

 fruit baskets, or small cups for berries. Cotton- 

 wood answers as well for all purposes, and for 

 some it is better liked, because of its white color. 

 It. is more expensive than red gum, and naturally 

 where the gum will -do as well, cottonwood must 

 give way. Packers who ship meat in wooden 

 boxes consider cottonwood among the most suit- 

 able woods for such boxes, because it is free from 

 odor and taste. Willow from States further south 

 is a pretty active competitor with Missouri cotton- 

 wood for meat boxes. It is darker than cottonwood, 

 but otherwise is as satisfactory. Considerations 

 which give cottonwood an important place in tne 

 manufacture of meat boxes, cause the employmeni 

 ot yellow poplar and tupelo for butter boxes. Most 

 of the basswood reported was bought by lard box- 

 makers, and its principal recommendation is that 

 it is odorless and tasteless. The maker of ship- 

 ping containers for provisions must make a closer 

 study of the properties of woods, with regard to 

 odor and taste, than any other manufacturers. Some 

 kinds of foods absorb impurities so readily that 

 proximity to objectionable wood may ruin the con- 

 tents of a box. Other food products, such as ap- 

 ples, potatoes, and most vegetables, are affected 

 little or not at all. When the maker of egg cas"es 

 selects cottonwood he is influenced by the wood's 

 color and lightness, not its lack of taste or smell. 

 For the same reason, cottonwood seems to be the 

 favorite material for boxes in which to ship sirup 

 cans. The prevailing use of red gum in Missouri 

 for apple barrels is due to the wood's cheapness 

 and toughness, and white elm hoops are recom- 

 mended for banana hampers. Strength of material 

 seems to be the only consideration. Drums (a kind 

 of barrel) for shipping coffee are made of syca- 

 more veneer. They are almost air-tight. Sycamore 

 has long enjoyed a high reputation as a tasteless 

 and odorless wood. Sugar drums, for powdered su- 

 gar, are of cypress. They are constructed in near- 

 ly the same way as the sycamore coffee drums. 

 The makers of cheese boxes with best rims give 

 preference to white elm. It is very tough and bends 

 without splintering. 



An examination of Table II shows that several 

 rather high-priced woods are bought by boxmakers. 

 Among these woods are Douglas fir and Sitka 

 spruce from Washington to Oregon, redwood and 

 yucca from California, and red and white oak. 

 Some of these are made into boxes of large size, 

 such as piano boxes, where strength is demanded, 

 and good grades of lumber must be had. Others, 

 as redwood, are intended for boxes of a perma- 

 nent kind, such as tool boxes, or boxes in which 

 beer bottles or milk bottles are carried about. They 

 are used again and again and must be not only 

 strong, but respectable in appearance. The yucca 

 listed in this industry is a desert palm from Cali- 

 fornia and Arizona, and is used for veneer bottle 

 packing. 



listed in this industry in Missouri. The convenience 

 of short-leaf pine accounts for its low average 

 price. The grades are rather high, and $13.71 for 

 such lumber is cheap. It is based on the boards 

 when they reach the planer. 



The reported average cost of white oak in this 

 table is low. The only explanation offered is the 

 proximity of the wood to the factories. It is nearly 

 all produced in Missouri, and it is notable that the 

 small amount imported from other States costs 

 $70 a thousand, or about the price in other States 

 of white oak suitable for flooring and molding. 

 Siding is not made of white oak. The native-grown 

 red oak, and that brought from other States, fol- 

 low almost exactly the same rules as the white 

 oak, namely, the home-grown wood is cheap, and 

 the imported is expensive. Some of the manufac- 

 turers explain the difference in cost by pointing out 

 that the imported oak is much better than that cut 

 in Missouri forests. At any rate, they say, only 

 high grades are brought into the State, while all 

 grades make up the average cost of that procured 

 at. home. 



The cheapest wood listed in this Industry is cot- 

 tonwood, all of which is home grown; but the 

 amount is not large. Red gum is cheap and does 

 not reach the importance in the industry which 

 might be expected of a wood so highly regarded 

 av/ay from home, particularly in some foreign 

 countries. 



Most of the flooring included in this table is the 

 ordinary tongued and grooved kind, yet parquetry 

 belongs here, although much work after it leaves 

 the planing mill is necessary before it becomes 

 a finished product. The black walnut listed in the 

 table was used for parquetry and inlaid borders and 

 fields, but some of the woods which are associated 

 with it, being demanded in small amounts, were not 

 reported by the manufacturers, perhaps for the rea- 

 son that most of the colored woods were supplied 

 by carpenters and contractors who laid the par- 

 auetry floors. Among woods put to that use are 

 black walnut, already mentioned, which is of dark 

 color; maple, white in color, and forming sharp con- 

 trast with walnut; mahogany and ebony, dark or 

 black in color; vermilion, red; holly, white; cher- 

 ry, red; and oak for borders and general pattern 

 pieces. White pine is soft, and is liked for a foun- 

 dation on which to lay the parquetry floor. 



The waste in a planing mill is an important item, 

 even when the best economy is practiced. Pour or 

 five hundred pounds of wood (and sometimes twice 

 that) are planed off of every thousand feet passing 

 through the machines. Manufacturers make special 

 effort to lessen this loss by finding sale for shav- 

 ings, sawdust, and the dust from polishing belts. 

 Shavings are occasionally sold at 25 cents per 



PLAINING-MILL PRODUCTS. 



in Table IV. Thirty-eight woods are listed, rang- 

 ing in amounts from over 23 million feet for short- 

 leaf pine to 300 feet for sycamore, and in cost 

 from $500 a thousand feet for satinwood to $18.24 

 for chestnut. The average cost of the wood when 

 it reaches the factory where it is converted mto 

 finished products is high, $36.55. The wood de- 

 manded by manufacturers in this business must 

 be of good quality, seasoned, and well selected. 

 Practically none of it comes to the factory in the 

 log. Little more than one-seventh of that shown 

 in the table grew in Missouri, and four species 

 are not native of the United States. Woods from 

 the Pacific coast hold an important place, and 

 average above $45 in price. Seven species are list- 

 ed from the far west. This industry is highly 

 developed, and material is selected more carefully 

 than in almost any other industry. If a wood Is 

 found specially suitable for a particular purpose, 

 and is procurable it is pressed into service, eveil 

 if it must be brought from distant regions. 



Perhaps the largest use of white pine in this in- 

 dustry is for the backing of veneer in the making 

 of doors, interior finish, and columns. Formerly 

 much of that kind of work was made of solid white 

 pine, that is, a door or a column was of that wood 

 through and through. Built-up construction has 

 largely taken the place of the solid work of former 

 times. The inside is of one wood, and the visible 

 part is of something else. The outside material 

 is veneer oak, birch, mahogany glued upon the 

 core. One of the best known woods for the core 

 or backing is white pine. It is light, strong, and 

 holds its shape well. It warps and twists very lit- 

 tle, and glue adheres to it with firmness. Another 

 good core wood is chestnut, but it is not usually 

 considered equal to white pine. Western while 

 pine from Idaho and Montana also serves well as 

 core material. The western yellow pine is em- 

 ployed in the same way and also for solid doors 

 and frames; sometimes under its own name, but 

 frequently as "California white pine." It is not a 

 white pine, but belongs to the yellow pine group, 

 though it bears considerable resemblance to white 

 pine. It is more resinous than any of the white 

 (five-needle) pines, and for that reason is often ob- 

 jected to as a substitute for white pine for doors, 

 frames, molding, and sash. 



Douglas fir is much employed for porch columns 

 in Missouri, and for outside house finish in gen- 

 eral. It is taking the place of white pine in such 

 places, and for doors, frames and sash. Rotary- 

 cut veneer of Douglas fir possesses a handsome and 

 characteristic figure. It shows to good advantage 

 in using figured pieces. The fir's strength and 

 lasting properties are its chief recommendations 

 for this class of work. 



TABLE III. 



Totals 73,765,677 



100.00 



$ 13.92 



1,026,698 



70,844,677 



2,921,000 



BOXES AND CRATES, PACKING. 

 TABLE II. 



Totals 1 11,664,699 



Less than 1/100 of 1 per cent. 



Planing-Mill Products. 



100.00 



$ 16.41 



1,832,483 28,980,424 82,684.275 



Planing-mill products, as considered in Table III, 

 include flooring, ceiling, siding, finish, and such 

 molding as is used in the interior finish of houses. 

 These products are usually made by planing-mills 

 run in connection with sawmills. Nearly 94 per 

 cent of all of it is short-leaf pine. This excellent 

 wood is abundant in Missouri, and in regions south, 

 and the quality of the wood is high. In softness 

 and color some of it is claimed to approach white 

 pine, and is popular for skiing, ceiling and molding. 

 It is employed also in large amounts for flooring; 

 but if in situations where wear is heavy, it has not 

 quite the lasting qualities of the harder long-leaf 

 pine which grows a little farther south, but is not 



two-horse wagon load. The buyers are distillers 

 of wood alcohol, livery stables which use the shav- 

 ings for horse bedding, and some shavings are 

 thrown on muddy walks. Sawdust is generally 

 salable in large towns. About 10 cents a sack re- 

 tail is the price for that spread on saloon and meat- 

 shop floors, and the demand for it is rather large. 

 Certain floor-cleaning compounds are made of saw- 

 dust with chemicals added. The dust is often 

 ground to powder before the chemicals are added. 

 Another use for sawdust is as an absorbent for 

 nitroglycerin in dynamite manufacture. 



Sash, Doors, Blinds and General Millwork. 

 Statistics of this industry in Missouri are given 



Sitka spruce, from the same region as Douglas 

 fir, is demanded in more than twice the amount 

 of that wood. Many of its uses are the same as 

 Douglas fir, but it is employed indoors rather 

 than out. It is light in weight, white in color, 

 strong, rigid, and generally free from objectionable 

 knots and defects, and is an ideal material for in- 

 terior house or hall finish, except that it has little 

 figure. 



Another substantial wooii from the Pacific coast 

 which fills a place in this industry is the western 

 red cedar. The amount demanded is much below 

 Douglas fir and Sitka spruce. It is more frequently 

 mentioned for window frames than for any other 

 purpose, and the part of the frame where it gen- 

 erally appears is the sill. That is the bottom 

 piece of the frame, and if outside, it is much ex- 

 posed to dampness, and therefore subject to decay. 

 The western cedar is one of the so-called "ever- 

 lasting woods," and it is purposely selected for win- 

 dow sills because of its ability to resist decay. 

 The eastern red cedar, which grows in Missouri, 

 but reaches its best development in Tennessee, is 

 also selected for window sills, and a rather large 

 amount of it is so used in Missouri. Cypress, 

 which is also an enduring material, is employed 

 for the same purposes, but the whole frame is 

 made of cypress more frequently than the sill alone. 



Cypress and California redwood are specially 

 reported as suitable for fire doors and fire shut- 

 ters because they contain no resin and are slow to 

 take fire. Redwood is the less combustible and 

 absorbs water so readily that if dampened, its in- 

 combustibility is increased in a marked degree. 

 Some manufacturers refer to the slow combustion 

 of white pine as one of its chief recommendations 

 for fire doors and shutters. It contains little resin, 

 but when it takes fire it is speedily consumed. 



The high-grade cabinet woods listed in this in- 

 dustry, such as cherry, black walnut, Circassian 

 walnut, mahogany, satinwood, sweet birch, vermi- 



