CIVIC IMPROVEMENT NOTES 
WAKING UP TO FOREST NEEDS 
M R. Henry A. Barker of Rhode Island, who, as 
Secretary of the Metropolitan Park Commis¬ 
sion of Greater Providence, has done so much to create 
a desire in Providence and the surrounding districts 
for an attractive environment is actively pushing the 
important project of an Atlantic Slope Forest Res¬ 
ervation. 
A few days ago the Board of Trade of Providence 
passed a resolution earnestly favoring the enactment 
of such legislation by Congress as shall be needed to 
secure a national forest reservation in the White 
Mountains, and urging the Rhode Island delegation 
at Washington to lend their assistance toward the ac¬ 
complishment of this purpose. 
These New Hampshire forests have a considerable 
influence over the climate of all New England. They 
also make the White Mountains attractive as a sum¬ 
mer resort; if they were cut down, the barren heights 
would be uninviting to tourists. Rhode Islanders in 
great numbers make annual visits to this delightful 
region, and thus any serious damage done to it would 
be a personal loss to them. Besides, considerable 
property there is owned by residents of Rhode Island. 
Upon the White Mountains much of the best timber 
to be found in New England is now growing, hut if 
the present rate at which it is being cut continues, it 
will not be many years before nearly all that is of any 
commercial value will have been disposed of. If for 
no other reason than a desire to prevent the home 
supply of lumber from being exhausted, New Eng¬ 
landers who have occasion to use it should favor the 
establishment of a national reserve in the White 
Mountains. The adoption of scientific methods 
of forestry, which would come with Government 
control, would in the end mean less expensive mate¬ 
rials for all the builders in this part of the country. 
In one great service which the White Mountain 
forests perform for New England, Rhode Island is 
the only State in the group that is not directly inter¬ 
ested. They form the storage reservoirs for great 
rivers that run into or along the border line of all the 
others. The Androscoggin and the Saco, which 
drain the whole southwestern part of Maine, are fed 
from the great New Hampshire forests. The Con¬ 
necticut River, rising among them forms the bor¬ 
der line between New Hampshire and Vermont 
for the entire length of these States and then enters 
Massachusetts to flow through such large and im¬ 
portant manufacturing cities as Springfield and 
Holyoke, and later to run the width of Connecticut, 
not only supplying a vast amount of water power, 
but providing from Hartford to the Sound a highway 
for commerce. 
Mr. Barker wrote to the City Engineer of Hartford 
not long ago, asking that official if the destruction of 
so many acres of the forest area of the White Moun¬ 
tains was not having an injurious effect upon the vol¬ 
ume of water in the river at Hartford. The engi¬ 
neer replied that he had never given the matter much 
consideration, but he would make an investigation. 
As a result of his inquiries he found that there was a 
direct connection between the destruction of wooded 
districts in the New Hampshire mountains and the 
supply of water in the Connecticut at Hartford. The 
Board of Trade of the city took the matter up when 
this was discovered, urging the State representatives 
in Washington to do their utmost to see that the Gov¬ 
ernment take charge of the White Mountain forests. 
Senator Frank B. Brandegee of New London, 
Conn., is Chairman of the national committee on 
forest reservations, and he has received a vast num¬ 
ber of letters favoring the plan to place the Govern¬ 
ment in charge of the timber sections in the White 
Mountains and also in the Appalachians. In aid of 
the more southern enterprise a bushel and a half of 
communications has reached him. 
A glance at the accompanying map is sufficient to 
emphasize the great need of forest reservations in this 
part of the country. The black sections, showing the 
extent of these reserves, cover a large part of the 
Rocky Mountains, include national parks and oc¬ 
cupy many other regions of a greater area than Rhode 
Island. Thus the West is assured of a large lumber 
supply for centuries to come. East of the Mississip¬ 
pi the map does not show even one dark section. 
New York has set aside vast tracks of the Adiron- 
dacks for a forest reserve of its own, and Pennsyl¬ 
vania has made several slight but encouraging efforts 
to a similar end, but throughout this wealthy and 
populous division of the nation the Government has 
done nothing toward protecting the fast disappearing 
forests. 
The West already has 92,741,030 acres, or 144,- 
908 square miles, in national forest reserves. Only 
2,800,000 acres are asked for in the East, 800,000 
acres, or 1250 square miles in the White Mountains 
and 2,000,000 acres, or 3125 square miles in the 
Southern Appalachians. 
Valuable timber for building purposes, to put the 
question in the form of dollars and cents, is rapidly 
disappearing from the East, and if reservations are 
not established in the near future most of the lumber 
for this section of the country will have to be imported 
from the West. 
It is here in the East also that the water power 
furnished by rivers is most widely used in manufac¬ 
tures. As forests act as storage reservoirs their des¬ 
truction will greatly diminish the value of mill streams 
permitting dangerous freshets in the spring and ex¬ 
tremely low water in times of drought. For this 
reason the protection of many millions of dollars 
worth of manufacturing enterprises depends upon 
the preservation of the wooded region in this thickly 
settled region east of the Mississippi. 
253 
