-vt 



44 



THE LUMBER TRADE JOURNAL 



[New Orleans, La., June 15, 1912. 



Oak 33,998,000 



Maple 120,000 



Red gum 11,618,000 



Beech 



Birch 



Basswood . 

 Hickory . . 



Elm 



Ash 



Cottonwood 



Tupelo 



Sycamore . 

 Walnut . . . 

 All others . 



40,000 

 11,000 

 20,000 

 781,000 

 431,000 

 3,630,000 

 3,853,000 

 59,000 

 71,000 

 92,000 

 825,000 



The total yearly amount of wood in Texas further 

 manufactured after it leaves the sawmills is shown 

 in Table I to 'be 768,336,112 feet, which is 41.5 per 

 cent of the mill cut. 



The making of veneers in Texas has assumed 

 large proportions, and most of the product is pine, 

 red gum, tupelo, magnolia and cottonwood T.he 

 cut in 1910 was 8,584,000 feet log measure, which 

 was nearly 2 per cent of the veneer cut for the 

 whole United States that year. Expensive hard- 

 woods, such as white and red oak, black walnut and 

 mahogany, are the materials of which the highest 

 classes of veneers are made. There are three meth- 

 ods of manufacturing the commodity rotary-cut, 

 sawed and sliced. Most of it in Texas is rotary-cut. 

 A log a few feet long is placed in a lathe and is 

 turned rapidly against a strong knife which peels 

 off a thin ribbon of wood the length of the log, 



round and round, until the log is cut down to a 

 small central piece called the core. The part sliced 

 off may consist of one piece probably 100 feet long, 

 resembling a bolt of cloth. It is usually about as 

 thick as a sheet of cardboard. The veneer thus cut 

 is made into small boxes, crates and baskets for 

 shipping fruits and vegetables; or, if it goes to a 

 furniture factory, it is made into panels or other 

 pieces by gluing several sheets one upon another 

 until the desired thickness is obtained. Sometimes 

 a thin sheet of veneer is glued upon a thick piece 

 of some other wood, and the veneer becomes the vis- 

 ible outer part. Much furniture and interior finish 

 is made in that way. The finished article appears 

 to be solid wood, but it really is a thin layer of out- 

 side veneer upon some cheaper wood. This cheaper 

 wood, which is concealed by the veneer glued upon 

 it, is called "backing" or "core." The word "core" 

 has, therefore, two meanings when used in connec- 

 tion with veneer. It may mean the wood upon 

 which the veneer is glued, or it may mean the 

 central remnant of a log from which veneer has 

 been cut by the rotary process. 



Some veneers are sawed much as ordinary lumber 

 is cut in a sawmill, but special machinery is used. 

 The most important part is the extra thin saw 

 which cuts the veneer with the least possible waste 

 in sawdust. Veneer of this kind is generally made 

 from valuable, well-seasoned hardwoods, while ro- 

 tary-cut veneer is made from logs./g'enerally in the 

 green state, and usually steamed to soften them. 

 Sawed veneer is generally less than a foot in width, 

 and runs about like ordinary lumber in length. The 



sawed product often shows the grain of the wood 

 quarter-sawed if the wood permits it. Sliced veneer 

 is cut from the side of the log like that which is 

 sawed, but a knife is used in place of a saw, and the 

 machine by which the slicing is done is very strong 

 and rigid. One of the advantages of slicing over 

 sawing is that the slice wastes no sawdust. 



APPENDIX. 



The Bureau of the Census, in co-operation with 

 the Forest Service, collects and publishes year by 

 year statistics showing the output of lumber, lath, 

 shingles, cooperage, veneer and certain other forest 

 products in the United States and in the separate 

 States. That work is independent of the studies 

 of the manufactures which the Forest Service has 

 made in several of the States. The latter supple- 

 ments the former, and care is taken that work done 

 by the Bureau of the Census, is not duplicated. The 

 Forest Service begins where the Census leaves off 

 after lumber leaves the sawmill. There are certain 

 products in their finished form when they appear in 

 the Census figures, and for that reason they are out- 

 side the scope of the Forest Service's study, because 

 they are not subject to further manufacture. If, 

 however, a State's wood-using industries are to be 

 fully presented, it becomes necessary to include some 

 of the Census statistics. Such is one of the purposes 

 of this appendix. The figures which the census 

 gives are for all the States, but such only as relate 

 to Texas are here presented and in condensed form 

 for the year 1910, which are the latest available. 



