Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1916-05-26
OUR ALLEGHANY FORESTS
: By FREDERIC J. HAsKIN.

~r,ASHINGTON, D c., May 21-A great strip of
M forest land along the backbone of the Ale
w ghany mountains from Pennsylvania to Georgia
has been put under the administration OF the
United service. For several years the
service engaged in purchasing and surveying
these areas Strengthening titles that date back to-
the land grants colonial times Now the actual work
of forest administration begun Roads and trails
are being built telephone lines lookout towers and tool
stations have been established; guards and rangers
patrol the woods.
Although much smaller imposing than the
great these national forests
are of immediate importance than any of them
They watershed which is the of all the
great rivers the South Atlantic seaboard The Poto
mac, James, Roanoke, Santee Savannah, their tribu-
taries and many smaller rise in these noun
tains These rivers carry commerce. furnish cities
supplies the basis of important indus
Their fow-the prevention of freshet and
ooddepends upon the protection of the forests that
cover the watersheds at their sources.
Furthermore, these mountains within easy reach
of Philadelphia, Baltimore Washington, Richmond
Raleigh many lesser cities of the south Atlantic
section The people of the west have learned to use
the national forests their summer Fairgrounds
They to them by the hundreds of thousands
every summer. The establishment OF these eastern
forest means for the people of some of
largest similar Fairgrounds where the natural
scenery is preserved where the most desirable camp
ing places accessible by roads and trails. and
where any may lease the land upon which to build
a summer home for nominal sum.
The forest service secured the i'm
portant along the Allegheny divide, and the pur
ceased for lack of funds. The foresters
assert that congress should Immediately make further
appropriations that these be rounded
out and made certainly sufficient to their pur-
poses.
One of the interesting phases establish
rnent Of these forests has been the
tween the government forces and the mountaineers.
The people the Allegheny have been the
ject great deal Of usually centering
their feuds and their moonshne STILLS, and of
mnistraons by the forces of uplift which
brought them religion, and sometimes small quantities
of food and clothing no one has taught them the
afPC hocic oil
civilization, and they have remained picturesquely
backward.
The forest service has enabled them to take some
toward the attainment of economic efficiency
it may conservation will important
in the development Of these people.
when the foresters first entered these lands they
found themselves attitude of profound
suspicion. generations government officer had
been to many of people simply officer,
in search Illicit dstilleres people of fine natural
r+eeence however, they not long in perceiving
that the foresters in dangerous to their
interests The government men found that in each
raigbhorhood there was usually old patriarch.
who as one forester described it, the kingpn of
the community. the authority of office, he
ercsed wide control and he had been to
the cause of conservation. the The
ountaneers the foresters into their homes, and
even showed them their hidden stills"
In these mountain people, the government found
race of strange contrasts OF excellent Scotch, Irish
and English blood, the TALL well-formed
nroud and often had features of a decidedly aristo
atic cast The women were pretty when young but
quickly ACQUIRED the stolid face and heavy carriage
which are the marks Of monotony hard manual
work.
These people lived in log cabins of two rooms
which sometimes sheltered twenty to twenty-five
sons They lived cornbread, salt pork, with a few
vegetables in the and occasionally fish,
This food almost always badly cooked. Their
farms consisted in patches of twenty thirty
on the hisdes reclaimed grdling and killing the
trees that the could grow between the dead
trunks. AS summer storm frequently washed whole
away. there not much incentive to fertze
cultivate intensively. The people had few scrub
cattle and razor-back hogs. All of their mple-
ments of the crudest Cut off from the world by