The Timber Industries 



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THE FORESTS of Tennessee provide the raw 

 material for a great number and variety of 

 primary wood-processing plants. Its several 

 thousand sawmiils make the State a leading producer 

 of hardwood lumber. Memphis, the wood-working 

 center of the State, is the Nation's largest manufac- 

 turer of hardwood flooring. Some 200 nonlumber 

 plants distributed across the State manufacture pulp 

 and paper, cooperage stock, veneer, handle stock, 

 shuttle blocks, and other products. Large quantities 

 of fuelwood, fence posts, and miscellaneous farm 

 timbers are also cut each year. 



Production of all timber commodities (logs, bolts, 

 and split pieces) totaled 263 million cubic feet during 

 1949 — 60 million in softwood, 203 million in hard- 

 wood. Fuelwood and sawlogs were by far the leading 

 items; together they provided 83 percent of the total 

 (table 3). Pulpwood, although of increasing im- 

 tance, comprised but 5 percent of the total output. 

 A large number of other products, notably posts, 

 cooperage bolts, and veneer, accounted for the 

 remainder. 



Table 3. — Percent of volume of output in Tennessee by round or split 

 timber product, 1949 



Product 



Sawlogs 



Fuelwood.. 



Posts 



Pulpwood.. 

 Cooperage.. 



Veneer 



All other. -_ 



Total 



All species 



Percent 

 36 

 47 

 4 

 5 

 2 

 1 

 5 



Softwood 



Percent 



67 



19 



4 



7 



( l ) 



V) 



3 



100 



100 



Hardwood 



Percent 



28 

 56 

 3 

 4 

 2 

 1 

 6 



100 



1 Negligible. 



Virtually all of the State's raw wood goes to plants 

 within the State. Although there is movement back 

 and forth across the State's boundaries, net imports 

 (principally to Memphis plants and to the State's four 

 pulpmills) were but 5 percent of the 1949 timber out- 

 put. 



Tennessee's Timber Economy 



333612—55 4 



Lumber 



Early lumber production in Tennessee was mostly 

 for local needs. Large-scale expansion of the industry 

 did not begin until the virtual exhaustion of the old- 

 growth hardwoods in the northeastern and central 

 States. The earliest statistics on lumber production in 

 Tennessee, gathered by the Census of 1869, reported 

 only 205 million board-feet for that year. During 

 succeeding decades, however, production mounted 

 rapidly. In 1909, it soared to an all-time peak of 1.2 

 billion board-feet (fig. 22). In this year Tennessee 

 was the Nation's number one producer of hardwood 

 lumber — principally oak, yellow-poplar, sweetgum, 

 chestnut, and hickory. The subsequent low point was 

 1932 when, under the impact of the nationwide de- , 

 pression, production declined to 0.1 billion board -feet. 

 Output remained relatively low throughout the nine- 

 teen-thirties, but was sharply stimulated by war and 

 postwar demands. In 1946 output totaled 0.9 billion 

 board-feet and in 1953 about 0.6 billion board-feet. 



A survey in 1946 by the Forest Service in cooperation 

 with the Bureau of the Census and the Tennessee 

 Valley Authority found 2,789 active sawmills (fig. 23) 

 with a total production of 893 million board-feet. Of 

 this volume, hardwoods made up seven-tenths; soft- 

 woods three-tenths. 



Small mills, each cutting less than 3 million board- 

 feet a year, produced nine-tenths of Tennessee's lum- 

 ber output in 1946 (table 4). Because of their mo- 

 bility and low operational costs, these mills are well 

 adapted to processing the small isolated tracts or the 

 lightly stocked stands of timber that are so prevalent 

 (fig. 24). 



Mills cutting less than a half million board-feet 

 annually numbered 2,238, or 80 percent of all active 

 mills. Although the average mill in this class pro- 

 duced only 148 thousand board-feet, the total cut by 

 these mills added up to 37 percent of the State's lum- 

 ber production. Many of the mills are farm rigs that 

 operate only during slack seasons on the farm. Char- 

 acteristically, these part-time mills are equipped with 

 the bare essentials for sawing lumber (a circular head- 



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