The Green Forest tribune., 1911-05-05

rasMjEA.1N HE word ''lumberman," as it
 .EkA is used here, does not apply
 KdHA exclusively to the rough and
 NW4LK often disreputable logging s4ssAs@s crews of our great forests.
 That is but one phase of a comprehensive and varied industry, and least attractive of all to one who Is ambitious to make for himself a satisfactory place among the success full breadwinners with whom he comes in contact.
 The numbering business takes in everything from cutting down trees in the woods to selling the finished prod uct to the man who has a lumber yard in your home town, and there is such a great variety of occupations con- nected with it that your boy, having decided that he wants to be lumber man. may select his own line of ad- yancement. It is up to him in the be- ginning to say whether he would pre- fer to be an office clerk, or to handle an ax in the woods, or to pile boards In a lumber yard or to be an engineer or machnist in mill or a salesman or buyer or dealer in timber land. No matter which branch he may choose, there Is plenty of room at the top if he will only exercise a reason able amount of industry and stick-to-it- iveness.
 Strictly speaking, however, a lum- herman is generally taken to be the man who owns a sawmill and disposes of his product in large markets. There fore this is the department to which I shall devote myself in trying to show the steps that must be taken to reach a lofty place in the industrial world.
 The biggest end of any business is the marketing or selling of the prod uct, for no producer can thrive unless he can dispose of his wares profitably. This makes numbering sort of para dox; for the owners of the biggest saw mills, the most successful lumbermen, are not always the greatest experts In the mechanical phases of their mills, the ones who know most about lumber production technically; but may be the ones so clever and experienced that they can so handle their shipments as to sell at greater profit than their competitors. Let us say that your boy, not caring much for mechanics, has taken Up this line.
 All that is necessary for him to do is to get job with the lumberman in the home town. If you live in a vil- lage. so much the better; for then his r. will have to help unload and pile the lumber and shingles that come in to replenish the stock. check off, accord ing to board measurement, the in- voices, help in keeping the books of accounts, assist in figuring up the price at which the lumber must be sold in order to realize an adequate profit, sell to local contractors and builders, etc. And for all this he will be paid what his employer thinks he earns, possibly $50 month or so. If he should be employed in city yard he would get from $40 to $60 after he had acquired some ability.
 It will require year or so before your boy begins to realize some of the possibilities of his chosen lifework. He has been learning all he can about numbering, of course, and will be diligent reader of the lumber trade pa- pers that come into the office which will inform him of the proceedings of various manufacturing and selling as- sociations throughout the country and conditions all over the field
 
 This study is most important for thus he will be solving a serious prob- lem affecting his own firm. If he be- comes student of freight rates and manufacturing conditions, he will find plenty of opportunity to use his brains to the advantage of his employer For instance, he may discover that, through local conditions, the mill men in some parts of the country are over- stocked with lumber and are willing to accept offers below list price. He knows the freight rates from that mill to his own town. Thus a telegram or dering a carload of this or that may result in a saving of $20 to $50 or more, enough to change close shave into really profitable business.
 By the time your boy has become acquainted with the various kinds of lumber sold in your town and learned the yard business sufficiently we'll to be able to handle all departments without any directions from anybody, unless he should prefer to stay until he becomes a member of the firm which he probably would be in time he should go to some large railroad center in the east or middle west, where he will find wholesale lumber ing an important business, and get a job. There should not be any special difficulty in doing this, for he will have met numerous lumber salesmen when he was in the home yard and will probably have secured their assistance in making the move.
 Here his work will be that of clerk. attending to the volume of orders and invoices and correspondence with mill men, railroads and retailers. If he is with firm that has an extensive trade he will be doing business with all parts of the country, from buying car loads of lumber and shingles in the states of Washington and Texas and Michigan and Maine, to selling it to the government for a drydock to be built on the Panama canal or to re