Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-06-16
IN THE MIDST Of WOODS
Steel Cables Drag Mighty Tim
bers to the Cars.
GRAY SQUIRREL is AMAZED
Few People Realize What Lumber In
dustry Means.
FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST
Logging in the State of Washington
With the Giant Killers
Thrifty Men.
FORESTS OF THE NORTHWEST
Copyright. 1905, by Frank @. carpenterl


SULTAN JUNCTION, Wash.
am debating these notes In the midst or
the woods. 1 am in the greatest forest
region Of the United States. on the western
slope OF the Cascade mountains and in the
heart OF a lumber camp. with hundreds or
men saving and chopping away on all
sides. At my back stationary steam en-
glne Is dragging mighty timbers by steel
cables to the cars, and with similar cables
loading the giant logs for shipment to the
mills. My seat Is hr tree which has just
fallen. Il IS 200 feet long and so thick at
the base that a cross section of 1t would
reach from the floor to the ceiling of the
average parlOr. Other frs, each as big
around as a railroad water tank, rise about
on all sides, their tops in some cases kiss
ing the sky 300 feet over my head. At my
right, standing on spring boards fastened
into cuts In the trunk at about four feet from
the ground. are two wood choppers. making
a notch I'm a tree TO give it the right dlrec-
ton for falling, and farther over are two
other lumbermen on similar boards pulling
a CrOss-cut saw back and forth. The saw
works like velvet as it goes thrugh the soft
bark, but the tree seems to Shrek as the
teeth cut into the wood and pillow their
way toward its heart. As l look a gray
squirrel sneaks down the trunk Of a forest
giant nearby. and then flies to the top of a
mighty stump thirty feet round and sits
there, evidently amazed at its surroundings.
I stand upon the log and look about me.
Except where the lumbermen have cut
their way through, the jungle IS almost as
dense as that OF the Hlmalaya mountains.
The ground Is covered with rUtting under
brUsh and fallen trees. There are snags
and broken branches everywhere and the
old trunks have thick coating of moss
There are giant ferns and bramb!es with
sharp thorns which tear ones hands and
clothes as he makes his way through.
Woods of Washington.
But first let me tell you something of the
mighty timber product OF the great north
west Washington. Oregon and California
are cutting moro and more trees every
year and Washington leads the Union IN It's
timber resources. According to an estimate
OF the Department OF the Interior there
are almost 200 billion feet OF valuable tim
her stiI standing. The state is cutting
something like a billion feet every year.
and in addition about i've billion cedar shin
giles; but even at this rate the cutting can
go on for a hundred years and leave plenty
TO spare. A billion feet OF lumber means
enough 10 make a board walk a foot wide
and an inch thick a billion feet long. At
5000 feet TO the mile such a walk would
reach 100000 miles IL would be long enough
to plank q road eight feet wide clear around
the world. That is what Washington is
doing every year and what she can con-
tlnue 10 do for more than a hundred years
20 come,
The great timber range here west OF the
Cascade covers more than 10000 acres. It
IS big enough 10 make ten states the size
OF Delaware, and Is said TO be about the
most Gensely wooded portion of the globe
II Is now filled with lumber camps like this
where am writing. and where everything
Is carried on on a vast scale. The camps
themselves, as / shall describe farther on.
are different from those Of the east. and
the milling establishments where the tim
Der Is cut into lumber for export are equip
ped with band and gang saws and all labor
saving appliances. The best OF them stand
upon Puget Sound. and they have a clean
waterway from there to Panama, China.
Japan. Australia. and. In fact, 10 all parts
OF the globe.
Uncle Sans Big Lumber Business.
Few people realize what our lumber In
dustry means. Uncle Sam gets more out OF
his woods today than any other country.
We are producing almost one-half of all
the forest products turned out upon earth
The annual output of the world Is about
81. 800 100000, and OF this $500. 000. 200 comes
from tho United States. Next to us stands
Russia which, when not numbered with
revolutions, sells one-third as much we
do; then comes Austria. which produces
about one-sieth as much. and France,
which produces about one-eIghth. Norway