Our national forests

by Richard H. D. Boerker

ECONOMIC CONDITIONS WHICH LED TO FOREST CONSERVATION

In order that the reader may fully appreciate the gigantic task that has been accomplished in bringing the National Forest administration and organization to its present state of development, it is necessary to briefly sketch the conditions that led up to the inauguration of the Federal Forest Policy before we stop to consider that policy and the establishment and organization of National Forests.

Prodigality Leads Finally to Conservation. Every great movement, which has for its object the betterment of the lot of mankind, lags far behind the times. There must be an actual economic need before a new movement can be expected to take root and flourish. Forest conservation had no place in the household economy of nations that had forests in superabundance. Their forests were used with prodigality. It seems to be a great human failing to use natural resources lavishly when the supply is apparently unlimited, and to practice frugality only when the end of a resource is in sight. Thus we find in the pages of forestry history that all nations have begun to husband their forest resources only after having felt the pinch of want. In our country history repeats itself and our federal policy of forest conservation properly begins at the time that the national conscience was awakened to the realization that if we did not practice economy with our forest resources we would some day be without an adequate supply of timber and forage, and be confronted with other dangers and calamities that follow the destruction of forests.

The March of Forest Destruction. When the London Company settled at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607 it found that unlimited pine and hardwood forests confronted it on every side. Nor did these early settlers ever find a way out of this forested wilderness except by clearings made with the ax. When the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Cape Cod in 1620 they found similar forests stretching in all directions from their town-site. After the Atlantic seaboard became pretty well settled the home-builders began moving westward through New York, Pennsylvania, and what is now Ohio. Still nothing but unbroken, virgin forests were encountered. Westward to the Mississippi civilization advanced and still forests reigned supreme. Then the Middle West, the Rocky Mountain region, and finally the Pacific Coast regions were settled. During 140 years civilization has spread from coast to coast and of that vast wilderness of forest there is left only a remnant here and there. The giant pines that sheltered De Soto and his thousand followers on their ill-fated expedition in 1541 to the Mississippi River have long since disappeared. Along the Allegheny and Appalachian ranges the vast forests that once harbored the hostile Narragansetts and Iroquois are now but a memory. The giant oak, ash, and cypress forests of the Mississippi Valley are rapidly being decimated by the big sawmills that work night and day to outdo each other. In the north the dense and magnificent forests of white pine that greeted Father Marquette, when he planted his missionary station at Sault Ste. Marie in 1668, have been laid low. Unproductive wastes, sandy barrens, and useless underbrush now greet the eye. In fact the pine forests which covered the greater part of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota have been leveled by the woodman's ax. The army of lumbermen has moved now to the Coast to again turn virgin timberlands into unproductive wastes.

Thus forest destruction has followed civilization. Statistics show very vividly how gradually one large lumbering center after another has become exhausted, often leaving behind desolation and business depression. In these large centers thriving towns sprang up only to disappear again after the removal of the forest wealth. In 1850 about 55 per cent, of the annual cut of lumber came from the New England States; even as late as 1865 New York furnished more lumber than any State in the Union. By 1890 Michigan had reached the zenith of its production and in that year the Lake States furnished 36 per cent. of the lumber cut. By 1909 the Southern States had increased their cut to over 50 per cent. of the total of the country. In 1913 the cut of the State of Washington was the largest ever recorded for that State or for any other State, even outdoing Michigan during its Golden Age. In 1915 about 20 per cent. of the cut came from the Coast but the South still furnished almost 50 per cent.

Our Lumber and Water Supply Imperiled. In our prodigal use of our forest resources we have become the most lavish users of wood in the world. While the annual consumption per capita for France is about 25 cubic feet, and that of Germany about 40 cubic feet, our per capita consumption is in the neighborhood of 250 cubic feet. And the most terrible thing about our reckless methods has been that we have wasted by crude lumbering methods and we have let great forest fires consume many times as much lumber as we have used. There have been vast public and private losses through unnecessary forest fires which not only consumed millions of dollars' worth of timber every year, but which also cost the lives of thousands of settlers. Then, as every one knows, by being grossly negligent with our forests, our rivers have visited their wrath upon the unfortunate people in the valleys. Many streams have become raging torrents in the spring and only chains of stagnant pools in the summer, thus destroying their value for water power and irrigation. Cotton mills, which formerly used water power all the year round, now must depend upon more expensive steam power generated by coal to keep their mills running in times of water shortage, while during high water there is the great danger that the entire factory might be swept away.

THE FIRST STEPS IN FEDERAL FOREST CONSERVATION.

Gradually the national conscience became awakened to the need of a more rational use of our forest resources. But it was not until after the Civil War that the first steps were taken. As was to be expected, the States in which forest destruction had reached its worst stages were the first to attempt to mend their ways, thus leading the way along which the Federal Government was soon to follow.

The Upbuilding of the West. The decade following the Civil War is marked by the construction of some of our great trans-continental railroads and the consequent development of the great western country. In fact between 1865 and 1875 the railroad mileage of the United States doubled. The first trans-continental railroad, the Union Pacific, was completed in 1869. Others soon followed. To encourage construction and settlement vast tracts of land were granted to the railroad companies by the Government, and with the land much valuable timber passed from government ownership. After the construction of the railroads towns and villages sprang up like mushrooms. As was to be expected with this increased development the destruction of our forests received an added impetus. The Lake States, then the center of the lumber industry, began to take alarm at the rapidity with which their hillsides were being denuded. Destructive lumbering, usually followed by devastating forest fires, was fast decimating the virgin pine forests. The young growth that had escaped the lumberman's ax fell a prey to forest fires which soon took the form of annual conflagrations. As the population increased the new sections of the country were settled, and as manufacturing operations were extended timber was getting higher in price.

The Lake States First to Act. The first attempt to remedy the situation was made by the State of Wisconsin. In 1867 the Wisconsin legislature suggested a committee who should report upon the destruction of Wisconsin's forests. The next year Michigan took a similar step and in 1869 the Maine legislature began to look into their waning supply by appointing a committee to estimate the standing timber of the State. As early as this observations and calculations upon the rate of consumption of lumber pointed to a not far distant wood famine.