FORESTRY 



EDITED BY DR. B. E. FERNOW, 



Director of the New York School of Forestry, Cornell University, assisted by Dr. John C. Giftbrd, of sa 



institution. 



FOR ANOTHER NATIONAL PARK. 



WALTER N. PIKE. 



All lovers of nature and sympathizers 

 with forestry movements will be glad to 

 le?~n an effort is being made to have Con- 

 gress establish a National Park in the 

 Southern Appalachian region. The Appa- 

 lachian Park Association, an organization 

 composed of citizens from many States of 

 the Union, has adopted a memorial, pre- 

 senting reasons for the establishment of 

 such a park. One of them is that there is 

 no national park of the character of the 

 one suggested East of the Yellowstone, 

 which is considerably more than 2,000 

 miles from the Atlantic coast. 



The location recommended for the park 

 by the Association in its memorial lies 

 partly in Western North Carolina and 

 partly in Eastern Tennessee, in the heart 

 of the Great Smoky mountains, the Bal- 

 sam mountains, and the Black and Craggy 

 mountains. There the noble Appalachian 

 system, the backbone of the area between 

 the Atlantic ocean and the Mississippi 

 river, finds its culmination, and is broken 

 into half a score of lateral and cross 

 ranges, which are intersected with deep 

 valleys, rivers and waterfalls, combining to 

 make it a region of unsurpassed attractive- 

 ness. There are within the area no less 

 than 43 mountains of 6,oco feet and up- 

 wards in altitude, and 80 which exceed 

 5,000 feet and nearly approximate 6,000; 

 while the peaks exceeding 4,000 feet are 

 almost innumerable. No other portion of 

 the United States displays an equal rich- 

 ness of sylva in the variety of its hard 

 woods and conifers. Professor Asa Gray, 

 the eminent and lamented botanist, stated 

 that he encountered a greater number of 

 indigenous trees in a trip of 30 miles 

 through Western North Carolina than can 

 be observed in a trip from Turkey to Eng- 

 land, through Europe, or from the Atlantic 

 coast to the Rocky mountain plateau. 

 Here is the meeting place of the mountain 

 flora of the North and of the South, and 

 the only place where distinctive Southern 

 mountain trees may be found side by side 

 with those of the North. 



It is a widely recognized fact that the 

 plateau lying between the Great Smoky 

 mountains and the Blue Ridge is one of 

 the most deservedly popular health resorts 

 of the world. It is the far-famed ''Land 

 of the Sky," of which Asheville, the "Sara- 

 toga of the South," is the commercial and 



tourist center; a region which enjoys the 

 unique distinction of being equally famous 

 both as a summer and a winter resort. 

 The geographical location and the geolog- 

 ical formation are peculiarly adapted to the 

 production of those conditions which make 

 for health in general. Malaria is un- 

 known, while it rivals Arizona as a sana- 

 torium for those suffering from pulmonary 

 troubles. Our present existing national 

 parks can only be visited in summer, snow 

 and ice barring the way at all other sea- 

 sons ; but if a national park were created 

 in this favored mountain region it could 

 be visited and enjoyed at all seasons of the 

 year. This part of the Appalachian range. 

 lying as it does midway between Maine 

 and Texas, Canada and the Gulf, and but 

 24 hours from New York, Chicago, St. 

 Louis, Toledo and the Gulf States, is with- 

 in easy reach of millions of people, and a 

 park there could be, in fact as in name, a 

 national park. 



The tract of land recommended by the 

 Association for the park contains the 

 highest mountains and the finest scenery 

 in the whole Appalachian system, and 

 embraces the largest area of virgin forest 

 and the finest example of mixed forest (by 

 which is meant a forest of deciduous and 

 evergreen trees), in America. Neglect on 

 the part of the National Government to 

 save this forest may, in fact, is almost cer- 

 tain to work irretrievable loss. Standing 

 on the summit of one of those sublime 

 heights, the eye often seeks in vain for the 

 bare mountain side — the evidence oi the 

 devastating axe and its more deadly and 

 sure successor, fire; and before one 

 stretches out a view magnificently beaut 1 

 ful. The strongest economic reasons make 

 it the duty of the National Government, 

 as the guardian of the national interests, 

 to acquire the proposed area, convert it 

 into a national park, and. by the applies 

 tion of methods of scientific fore-try. pic- 

 serve the forests as a heritage and a bl- 

 ing to future generations. At this late day 

 the calamities of flood and drought result 

 ing from the wanton destruction of for 

 are well known. The experience of the 

 old countries stands as a warning. Tin- 

 forest once destroyed can not berestored 

 to its virgin state. Reforestation i> a glow 

 process; it is. as has been truly said, for 

 subsequent generations. The in> 

 scarcity of timber is causing the large areas 

 of forest in this part of our country to be 



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