THE FORESTS AND THE TIMBER BARONS
Coleman, Mcalister
The Forests And The Timber Barons THIS FASCINATING LUMBER BUSINESS, by Stanley F. Horn. Bobbs-Merrill. $3.75. Reviewed by McAlister Coleman STANLEY F. HORN, editor of the Southern Lumberman,...
...Wisely protected, harvested, and used we have enough timber for our present and our apparent future needs—and we can increase the supply...
...He founds his optimism upon the change of heart that has come to the lumbermen since the bad, old days of "cut out, and get out...
...Now, he says, the lumber interests have seen the light and are doing a fine job of voluntary research and conservation which is regularly cutting down the drain on our timber resources...
...Horn is quite cheerful and reassuring about our timber situation...
...HORN'S optimism is not shared by Lyle F, Watts, Chief of Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture, who in an article in the New Republic of Apr...
...Horn for the private interests, in that corner, Mr...
...17, entitled, "The Coming Timber Shortage," says: "The war has demonstrated that an abundant timber supply is essential to national security...
...Believe it or not, there is no mention whatever in the book of the I. W. W. whose spirit still marches on among the Woodworkers Union of the C. I. O. and whose members went through hell itself to get any sort of decent work conditions...
...Annual sawtimber growth is not much more than half of Forest Service estimates of postwar requirements...
...In this corner, Mr...
...He knows trees and their uses from the South to the West Coast, and he gives the layman a comprehensive and often fascinating picture of what's going on from the log to the saw-mill...
...MR...
...Yet as a nation we manage our forest resources in a woefully inadequate way...
...Obviously we cannot continue indefinitely to cut and destroy almost twice as much timber as we grow each year . . . even under the most favorable circumstances it will take many decades to restore essential growing stocks in depleted areas and build up forest productivity so that annual growth will be double what it is today...
...Reviewed by McAlister Coleman STANLEY F. HORN, editor of the Southern Lumberman, does a top-notch job of industrial reporting in this well-organized, well written book...
...It is a battle that has been going on ever since the first Maine loggers went into the woods...
...His few references to Gifford Pinchot and the tremendous fight for the conservation of our forests which Pinchot started are slighting...
...Watts for the people...
...But you would never guess it from reading Mr...
...When he moves from the detailed description of the work ways of the industry to the broader fields of conservation, governmental controls, labor problems, etc., one has the feeling that the author is presenting a brief for the defense, rather than any objective appraisal...
...By the nature of things he writes from the standpoint of the private lumberman, to whom he dedicates his book...
...Horn's book...
...You have to read Paul Brissenden, Carleton Parker, the chapter on Seattle in George Leighton's magnificent Five Cities, the interview with old man Weyerhauser in Lincoln Stef-fens' autobiography to get a full picture of the human side of this fascinating lumber business...
Vol. 8 • May 1944 • No. 19
