The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1907-11-15
1t Was at One Time the
COuntry's Timber.
FORESTSFAST DISAPPEARING
Best Now to Be Found on Indian Res
ervatiOns of Minnesota; Price
of Lumber Going Up.

Washington, Nov. l2.-The position
which the United States has held as
Il lumber producing nation has, per-
haps, been due to white pine than to
any other wood The timber of this
valuable tree which has played a
most important part in the material
development of the nation is fast dis
Tappearing and now it is as costly as
the finest American hardwoods.
Rev. Edward Everett Hale, the chap
lain of the senate, who has always
taken an interest in forestry, explores
the passing of white pine as our fore
most wood. and tells how in his own
life time he has seen the day when
'the masts of every vessel that sailed
the seven seas were made from New
England grown pine; while Today
very little white pine is cut in New
England big enough to furnish good
sized SPAR" He tells also, to illus
trate the increasing cost of the wood
that he ordered a set of book shelves
on which the cabinet maker made a
price, and then asked whether they
should be of mahogany or white pine
The white pine production has shift
ed from New England to the lake
states, and Michigan was the leading
lumber producing state for twenty
years, from 1870 to 1890, with a SUI
premacy based on white pine. In these
two decades the cut was l60 bill
lions of board feet, valued, at the
point of production, at not less than
two billions of dollars, or nearly half
as much again as the value
derived from all the gold fields of
California from their discovery in the
late forties until the present. The rich
forests of Michigan were once thought
inexhaustible and numbering continued
in most reckless manner for years.
Suddenly the people awoke to the
fact that the thQughtless destruction
of the trees taas Thrown 6.000,0O0 of
acres Of the delinquent tax list. These
white pine barrens point to the ter
rible penalty OF wasting the forest
resources which should have been the
heritage of all future generations.
An idea of the increasing scracity
of white pine timber is given by the
New York f. o. b. quotations, on a
basis of carload lots. '.Uppers' of the
best grade, cost S97 to STA thous-
and board feet and the selects" or
next lower grade cost $3.50 to $1,000.
Men who are not yet middle aged re-
member the time when these grades
could be purchased at SIS to $25 a
thousand feet. The present quotations
on quartered white oak, which are
$15 to $50, offer another basis of
comparison which indicates the con-
dition of the market for white pine.
The best stands of this timber now
in this country are in scattered sections
in Minnesota, New England, and parts
Of Idaho. The species in Idaho is
sometimes called silver pine. Some of
the country's best white pine is found
on the Indian reservations in Min
nesota and Wisconsin and scattered
stands are found in the states of
Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, and one
or two other states. At the present
rate of cutting the tree will soon be
practically thing of the past. The
small stands in the national forests
are inconsiderable, but they will be
managed with the greatest conserva-
tism by the government through the
forest service, and through this meth
cd and practice of demonstration it
may be hoped that the fine old tree
will furnish timber for all other gen.
erations