The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-02-15

into com petition with US because they are 100
far away They have 1900 miles to haul, and
that is too far to let them in. The yellow pine
from the South makes the best flooring IN the
world, and We can get ,t from Arkansas and
Missouri with a 500 or go milo haul You
can't haul your lumber 200 miles and
compete with It. Your average rate
to our territory is about 60 cents, and your lum-
bermen say they can't dry thousand feet to
less than 5000 pounds. That makes the freight
about SIS thousand. Well. we can get South
ern yellow pine laid down at SIS o. sl9 thou
sand, so that you see you are notin 1t. In short,
a 2O0O-mlle haul can't compete with e 500 or 600
mile haul ii you had So or 81 cent rate, you
might compete, but even 60 cent rate is equal
10 only about half cent ton a mile, and that
Is about as cheap as you could make IT,
That is why our lum5crmen going South.
There are great belts OF timber in Missouri and
Arkansas, and there are still others almost I'M
touched in Texas. Louisiana and Mississippi,
and II is nearer our market Our people are
buying stumpage in that section and moving
down there they work out what they have in
the Northwest. They are not coming TO the
Coast because your local market is already over
supplied, your foreign market well supplied,
and you have no Eastern market
but suppose the Nicaragua canal were I'm
ished2''
Then you would be in il. You could go into
the Southern market and compete with those
people on their own ground You could get
into the market on the Atlantic coast, and you
could go into the European market Then you
would be in it. But now you are shut out. You
are cut off from your market
zine great difference between numbering in
this country and in our section is the amount OF
waste out here. II amounts to 20 per cent at a
moderate estimate At Tacoma they take a log
winch would square eighteen inches and Gu. it
into beam sixteen inches square. They cut off
four big slabs we would make into lumber and
use them for fuel. They could easily take
smaller log, but they want that particular log,
anu waste SO much lumber in cutting. I
asked them why they did it, ana ono
OF them told me frankly that they made it off
the iobber. Sixteen inches is all they pay the
1obber and they throw the rest away. That may
be, but they are throwing away Just SO much
lumber, whether it costs them anything or not.
1.-THE principal reason for this waste is the
cheap stumpage. We bought 100 10000 feet for
100000 on the Chippewa river last years.
thousand-and most stumpage costs nearer 81
than Sc thousand. Here stumpase only costs
about 20 cents thousand. In our section most
OF the timber land is not for sale, it is owned
by men who have mills and want to cut il
themselves. The people out here waste lum-
Der simply because it is so cheap and plentiful.
They say it is inexhaustible, but that means
whole lot won't believe they have as much
very well to take all there is if you don't want
TO leave anything for your boys,
but We are thinking about poster
ity little. Our lumbermen are sitting
mourning over what they wasted in the early
days and wishing they had it now. That is
what your people will be doing soon. Any of
our young men with money, business ability
and snap would come out here and save what
your people waste and beat them in their own
field.
"Iour shingles are getting all over the
East, but they are only small
part of the lumber consumed Your
mig timbers are used everywhere in
bridges and for other like purposes. We have
one OF the best mills in the country at Chippewa
Falls, Wis, and right i'll sight OF it is a bridge
on the Omaha road built OF Puget Sound lum-
Der. Your fir is good for easy working, and
your cedar makes splendid finishing lumber
and takes good polish. saw cedar mantel
at Tacoma which would like to have had, but
] could not get it, The cedar also does SPLEEN
didly for outside work; it is practically ever
lasting.
''Some ofus walked two or three miles out from
the camp at Wilkeson Saturday, and got a
good idea OF your timber; We were right in the
forest primeyal. Inever so much growing
on an acre OF ground before; it 10 rank. And
the soill You could almost cut it with knife.
1.-THE salvation Of this country is the Nicara-
qua canal. Your people ought to be shouting
for it, and keep shouting for il till it's built"