130 OUR FEDERAL LANDS 



Arizona, and New Mexico; also Alaska. The sec- 

 ond largest grouping of National Forests occurs in 

 six of the southern Appalachian states: Virginia, 

 West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, 

 Tennessee, and Georgia. The third group in area is 

 that in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas. Small 

 National Forests also occur, approximately in the 

 order of their size, in Minnesota, South Dakota, New 

 Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Florida, Nebraska, Ala- 

 bama, Michigan, Oklahoma, and Maine. There are 

 National Forests also in Alaska and Porto Rico. 

 Those purchased under the Weeks Act amounted, in 

 1927, to 2,564,619 acres or 4,007 square miles. 



So widely scattered, the National Forests in- 

 clude lands of every kind in the United States, to- 

 gether with scenery of every rank and variety. They 

 include, for example, the glacier-covered summits of 

 Mount Hood in Oregon, part of the Sierra summits 

 in California, and the Sangre de Cristo range of 

 Colorado; also the majestic White Mountains of 

 New Hampshire and forested summits in the south- 

 ern Appalachians. They include forest-dotted bar- 

 rens in South Dakota, semi-deserts in Utah and 

 Arizona, and splendid masses of primeval forest in 

 many states, watered by rushing rivers which, in 

 the far West, originate in everlasting snows. 



A wilderness empire, this, including thousands 

 of square miles of magnificent primeval forest. In 

 its safe guardianship and scientific administration 

 lies largely the future of the American lumber sup- 



