30 ANNUAL REPORT OF 



PROPOSED NATIONAL PARK VANDALISM. 



A year ago last August I visited Cass Lake and found, 

 to my surprise and delight, on its south shore, such an ideal 

 pine forest as, with the remarkably clean and attractive 

 sandy beach, formed one of the most beautiful spots for a 

 health and summer resort that could be imagined. I gave 

 to the press some account of it at the time. Later a joint 

 committee of the state medical societies made a visit 

 there, and through the influence of a committee of 

 woman's clubs the legislature memorialized the president 

 to postpone for two years the sale of the land, so that the 

 State of Minnesota might, if it should then deem it expe- 

 dient, buy the same for a park. 



Judge of my surprise and indignation then to find, as I 

 did, on visiting the same spot again the early part of July 

 last, that a dozen or more acres of this beautiful forest 

 were lumbered and cut over the preceding winter, on the 

 fraudulent pretense of its being "dead-and-down timber." 

 The tops and branches of the trees — slashings as they are 

 called — are now lying there endangering the rest of the 

 forest in the event of dry weather. Notwithstanding this 

 terrible injury and disfigurement, the forest is not ruined 

 for a park. But last May fires were set on its eastern 

 side, the traces of which cover quite an area, and were 

 set for the purpose, as is generally believed, of making 

 pretext for another contract the coming winter to lumber 

 it as ' 'dead-and-down timber. " 



This sad and wicked despoilment of one of the most 

 beautiful pieces of scenery Minnesota possesses is under- 

 stood to have been committed by a white man, living at 

 Cass Lake, who is connected by marriage with the Chip- 

 pewas. It was perpetrated under the fraudulent system 

 of lumbering "dead-and-down timber," a system which 

 offers a premium for firing the forest and which was cun- 

 ningly devised to enable rascals to obtain standing pine at 



