FORESTRY 



New Orleans, La., May 1, 1912.] 



THE LUMBER TRADE JOURNAL 



COLttSE Of* AGRICULTUItt 

 MIVCKSlTV or CAUrOKN I A 1 9 



WOOD USING INDUSTRIES OF ALABAMA 



Bureau of Wood Utilization of Forest Service Tells of Plants 

 Already Established and Opportunities for New Enterprises; 

 Division of Various Woods among Existing Manufactures. 



NOTE. 



The following report was prepared by John T. 

 Harris, statistician, and Hu Maxwell, expert, under 

 -the direction of H. S. Sackett, chief of the Office of 

 Wood Utilization, United States Forest Service. It 

 is published and thus made available to the public 

 through the courtesy of the LUMBKR TRADK JOURNAL, 

 New Orleans, La. 



CONTENTS. 



Page 



Preface 19 



Woods used in Alabama 19 



Longleaf pine 20 



Shortleaf pine 20 



Loblolly pine 



Spruce pine 20 



White pine 



Cuban pine 



Cypress 



Magnolia 20 



Red cedar 20 



Hickory ; 20 



Birch 20 



Yellow poplar , 20 



Gum 20 



The oaks 20 



Dogwood 20 



Elm 20 



Chestnut 



Cotton wood 



Persimmon 21 



Mahogany 21 



Green haw 21 



Wild cherry 21 



Hackberry 21 



Black walnut 



Spanish moss , 21 



Planing-mill products 21 



Sash, doors, blinds, and general millwork 22 



Peaking boxes and crates 22 



Car construction 22 



Vehicles and vehicle parts 22 



Excelsior 23 



Chairs 23 



Boxes, tobacco 23 



Agricultural implements 23 



Furniture 23 



Handles 23 



Sporting and athletic goods 23 



Shuttles, spools, and bobbins 23 



Fixtures 24 



Refrigerators and kitchen cabinets 24 



Caskets and coffins 24 



Ship and boat building 24 



Wooden ware and novelties 25 



Miscellaneous 25 



Summary 25 



Percentage of woods used by industries 25 



Cost of woods by industries 25 



Lessening waste 25 



Woods waste 25 



Mill waste 26 



Substitution etc 26 



Forest conditions 27 



Co-operators 27-28 



Uses of wood 29 



Appendix 29 



Annual lumber cut 30 



Softwood distillation 30 



Cooperage 30 



PREFACE. 



The state of Alabama embraces 33,000,000 acres, 

 of which about 24,000,000 are classed as 'wooded 

 land, 9,000,000 farm land, and 500,000 water surface 

 In this division the water surface alone remains 

 fairly constant, while the proportionate amounts of 

 wood and agricultural land change from year to 

 year. In some instances, old fields are lapsing into 

 forest, but iu many more instances the wooded areas 

 are being converted into farms. In its original con- 

 dition the whole region now included in Alabama 

 was wooded, the exceptions being so few as to be 



unimportant. Clearings were made in a small way 

 by the native Indians who cultivated corn, pump- 

 kins, and melons; and about 200 years ago more ex- 

 tensive clearings were begun 'by the first European 

 settlers. From that time until the present, the 

 primeval forests have steadily given -way to cotton, 

 grain and tobacco. For a long time the timber was 

 an encumbrance, as was the case in so many other 

 parts of t/he United States where the ground was 

 wanted for crops. \A little was used for fences, 

 bridges, and buildings, tout there 'being no manufac- 

 turing, most of the timber cut in clearing farms 

 was burned either for fuel, or in log heaps. Al- 

 though Alabama has anchorage and sea coast, the 

 early people built few ships, and sought no oversea 

 trade. As early as 1777, however, naval stores were 

 manufactured to a small extent at Mobile, the chief 

 product being tar. 



The soft woods; that is, pines and cypresses, 

 grow in all regions of Alabama, though not every- 

 where equally dispersed; 'but the pine 'belt, where 

 the finest forests of longleaf pine are found is about 

 fifty miles wide and lies in the southern part of the 

 state on lands usually flat and sandy. The genera 1 ! 

 elevation of this belt is not much above sea level. 

 Next above this, northward in the state, is the cot- 

 ton belt, which consists of broad, rolling prairies, 

 with many strips of timber still remaining. The 

 soil is tolack and fertile and the region is crossed 

 by many streams. Still north of this is the mineral 

 belt, where coal and iron are mined and constitute 

 the chief wealth of the region at this time. Timber 

 of some kind is found all over the hills, beneath 

 which the minerals lie. This timber has been and 

 still is of much value in mining operations, though 

 in this report little mention is made of it for the 

 reason that most mine timbers are used in the 

 rough as pit posts, proips, ties, lagging, etc. and 

 this report deals with manufactured products only. 

 Considerable areas of pine in this part of Alabama 

 were stripped many years ago by charcoal burners 

 who found sale for their products at the iron fur- 

 naces. The mining of iron in this region was stim- 

 ulated during the civil war by demands for the metal 

 in the South when supplies from other parts of the 

 country were difficult to procure. The confederate 

 ship, Tennessee, was built of Alabama iron; and 

 large cannon foundries obtained their supplies from 

 the same mines. Much of the iron was smelted 

 with charcoal made from pine cut in the vicinity. 

 To this day charcoal pits are common in the region 

 and hills are still being cleared of pine (some other 

 woods also) to meet the demand. Still north of 

 the mineral belt in Alabama lies the cereal belt, 

 where grains constitute the leading crops. This 

 region embraces the fertile lands of the Tennessee 

 river valley, extending entirely across the state, 

 east and west. When' the primeval forests covered 

 the country, this was a remarkable hardwood re- 

 gion; but the fertility of the soil tempted the early 

 settlers to cut the woods to make corn fields. Com- 

 paratively little of the timber was sent to market, 

 for it was not salable at that time. However, in 

 this region some of the best hardwoods of Alabama 

 are still found. 



Alabama is well supplied with facilities for ship- 

 ping its forest products by land and water. Rail- 

 roads are numerous, and they handle in a satisfac- 

 tory manner the 'business that comes to them. The 

 state's rivers give 1,500 miles of inland navigation, 

 without counting the streams too small for steam- 

 ers, yet large enough for a raft or for floating logs. 

 Mobile is the gateway to the sea, and to the mari- 

 time countries of the world. It has a splendid har- 

 bor, connected by a twenty-six-foot channel with the 

 Gulf of Mexico. The harbor always presents a busy 

 scene, and it is seldom without two or more foreign 

 vessels loading for distant ports. It is the confident 

 belief of the business men of Mobile, and of the 

 whole state, that the completion of the Panama 

 canal will add immensely to Mobile as a shipping 

 port and port of entry, and that new markets for 

 the products of forest and factory will be opened 

 on the western coast of Central and South America, 

 as well as in the Orient. 



The output of the sawmills in Alabama in 1910, 



according to the federal census of that year, which 

 is the latest thus far published, was 1,465,623,000 

 feet. The cut was made up of eighteen species. It 

 should be explained, however, that in some instances 

 two or more species are grouped as one. For ex- 

 ample, all pine is listed under the common name 

 "yellow pine," though at least five species are in- 

 cluded, viz., longleaf, shortleaf, loblolly, Cuban and 

 spruce. The same method was pursued in tabulat- 

 ing oak lumber in the census returns. All is class- 

 ed simply as oak, though it is well known that more 

 than one species perhaps half a dozen species 

 are included. The compilers of census statistics 

 pursue that method 'because it is impossible to list 

 each species of oak or pine separately, as many 

 mills which convert them into lumber make no 

 distinction between species. The drain upon Ala- 

 bama's pine has been very heavy. In 1910 it con- 

 stituted ninety per cent of the whole sawmill out- 

 put. It is, therefore, evident that any lessening of 

 the available pine supply will affect in a visible way, 

 the state's total lumber output. 



The state's timber resources are yet very large, 

 though the drain in the past has been heavy. De- 

 cline in value need not follow decline in output. 

 Closer utilization and preparation of tne product 

 for other markets, may more than make good all 

 losses due to a smaller total output. This can be 

 brought about toy converting more of the rough lum- 

 ber into finished product; that is, prepare it for 

 markets which will pay more for it, and toy that 

 means sell a less quantity of forest products for 

 more money. Farmers are learning to make more 

 profit from a small tract of land by intensive culti- 

 vation than was realized from large tracts under 

 the old way of growing one thing and selling it in 

 the rough. Timber men can follow the same plan 

 and dp as well. Lumber sold as it comes from the 

 sawmill is one commodity only; manufactured into 

 furniture, boats, vehicles, finish, and the like, it toe- 

 comes a number of products, each of which has a 

 market of its own. 



This study of the utilization of wood in Alabama 

 was undertaken by the United States Forest Service 

 in the hope that it would assist manufacturers and 

 timber owners in the state in converting the wood 

 into commodities which will be most profitable. 

 The figures brought together and shown in the vari- 

 ous tables should not be regarded as dry statistics, 

 for each table tells a story of progress and success. 

 It is an exhibit of diversified industries with the 

 forest as the raw material and the finished products 

 as the salable commodity. The census figures for 

 1910 (1,465,623,000 feet) show the timber converted 

 in a year into lumber. The tables in this report 

 show that nineteen industries in the state use 726,- 

 816,900 feet of rough lumber a year; and that 105,- 

 000,000 more is simply planed and is sold in that 

 form, while the remainder is apparently disposed of 

 in the rough form. About 36,000,000 of the 726,816,- 

 900 feet demanded by manufacturers is brought into 

 Alabama from other states; and about 770,000,000 

 feet of lumber cut yearly in Alabama is used in the 

 rough or is shipped outside the state for further 

 manufacture. 



It is a well-known economic principle that the 

 community, region, or state which produces abund- 

 ance of raw material and converts it into finished 

 products ready for use, is more prosperous than the 

 region which sends its half-finished product away 

 from home to be completed. It is unnecessary to 

 show by argument and figures the value of manufac- 

 turing concerns to a region; the facts are self-evi- 

 dent. Alabama is producing abundance of lumber, 

 but about half of it is not being further manufac- 

 tured in the state. Some of it, of course, is demand- 

 ed for use in the rough form ; tout there is no reason 

 why all necessary manufacturing can not be done 

 in the state, thus employing home people, and keep- 

 ing the money at home. Cheap power is abundant, 

 and facilities for shipping the finished products are 

 adequate. 



WOODS USED IN ALABAMA. 



Manufacturers in Alabama report the yearly use 

 of thirty-eight woods, ranging in amounts from 



