8 BULLETm 1119, U. S. DBPABTMENT OF AGRICULTUEE. 
transportation, or both, inevitably rises, and with it the price of the 
lumber delivered at the distant market. 
In this age of specialization Americans no longer build their homes 
of hewn logs and whipsawed planks. They are dependent upon the 
sa^Taills. If they use lumber, they must pay the prices asked. The 
incomes of most people are very little in excess of their necessary 
expenses. Hence even a slight rise in lumber prices results in a wide- 
spread tendency to reduce per capita consumption, which operates to 
decrease the annual cut. 
LUMBER PRICES INCREASED. 
The average value of lumber at the mill as reported in 1920 was 
$38.42 per thousand. This is an increase of $8.21 per thousand, or 
27 per cent in excess of the value reported in 1919 to the Bureau of 
the Census. It is the highest average value and the greatest aimual 
increase ever recorded, although the extremely high prices were 
mamtained only a few months. Hand in hand with the persistent 
decrease in lumber production went a persistent increase in valuation. 
The value at the mill in 1920 was 247 per cent in excess of the mill 
value as reported in 1899. In the 21 years since 1899 the value of 
lumber went up at the rate of full}" 5 per cent per average year. On 
the percentage oasis prices rose faster than the cut diminished. (Fig. 4.) 
The value reported for 1920 by no means reveals the violent 
upheaval in prices which occurred in that year, because it is an 
average for the year, and shows neither the maximum attained nor 
the subsequent swift decline of lumber prices. Here it will be of 
interest to review briefly some of the conditions which drove prices 
to the peak. Following the armistice in 1918 the liunber industry 
was seriously hampered by conditions created by the war. The 
logging camps, the mills, and the offices had contributed their quota 
to the Army, often losing the services of those best qualified to run 
the job. When the soldiers returned, many of them never regained 
touch wdth the work they left. Labor troubles were widespread and 
serious throughout 1919, and stocks ran low. Throughout the period 
of demobilization transportation conditions were fairly chaotic, 
punctuated by embargoes and embarrassed by frequent shortages 
of cars. Throughout the winter of 1919-20 weather conditions in 
the lumber woods were particularly unfavorable in the Central 
States and in the South, the woods being so watersoaked as greatly 
to hamper lumbering operations. 
The Northeast and the Central States had each cut 96 per cent 
of their original areas of virgin timber. The Lakes States had cut 
90 per cent, and the South was not far behind. The South was the 
only lumbering region east of the Great Plains in which depletion 
of the timber stands had not gone so far that there was no reason- 
able chance to increase production. And the South itself was 
seriously handicapped because of the conditions indicated. Sixtj^- 
one per cent of the total remaining saw timber is west of the Great 
Plains, and the remainder in the East is no longer so distributed as 
to serve its markets with the former ease. 
During the war domestic consumption of lumber was relatively 
low because most forms of construction, including dwellings and 
apartment houses, were classed as nonessential activity. Both on 
the farms and in the cities a vast amount of building was deferred, 
