St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1916-08-09


spend one cent per acre per year, re-
port yearly losses as follows: 1912,
10 of 1Gc; 1913, 1-2O Of 19o; 1914,
no report; 1915, $40 of 10. The st.
Maurice Valley Fire Protective As
ISOLATION of Quebec, with an area OF
eight million acres on which they
spend Il of 10 per acre per year, re-
port the following losses: 1913, n
of 80; 1914, Il of 10; 1915, when
one big fire got away, u 20. These
being the large representative pri-
yate associations in four widely scat
tered sections of our country and
Canada.
Even the fire hazard represented in
the popular mind by general con-
hagration, a more accurate statistic
will show (when compared with the
value of the remaining timber land
in the states in which they occur) is
a small percentage of the whole
value involved. Minnesota with a
forest wealth valued at ESQ millions,
during the last ten years has had a
computed loss each year of only
100000, or about 1-34 OF one per
cent annually. Maine, with a valua-
ton of 100 millions of timber lost
for four years, from 1909 to 1912,
$4,000 annually, or lie of one per
cent In the United States Forestry
Bulletin No. 1T, entitled Forest
Fires" it states that in 1891, very
bad year for fires before there was
any protection, that the annual loss
throughout the United States was
s25.OOO.OOO. If the $50, 100000 acres
of timebered area in the United States
was worth at that time on an aver
age of SIS an acre, this would be
little less than one per cent loss
yearly.
CONFEDERATION hazard for insurance
purposes could be counteracted by the
distribution of small individual risks
widely placed over various sections
of the country among many owners
under various climatic conditions, CIV
ing preference if possible at the
start to a country broken by settle
ment, and in which the yearly losses
prove to be the most uniform, like
New England. Past computations
usually have paid small attention to
the fact that a considerable percent
age of such fires occur in cutover and
so comparatively worthless lands, and
that where burned timber was rea-
sonably near to market much salvage
could be taken. Estimates also in
cluded value destroyed in young
growth and the burning Of the soil
which set back the productivity of
the land While these two losses are
very real, and in the end should be
protected by insurance, for immedi-
ate practical reasons soil and growth
are not included in this paper. 1t is
true that there are foreign timber
insurance companies in Germany and
Sweden which insure young growth
and soil as well, but the method of
computing values is so complicated,
with it's growth tables, species, meth
DDS of management, expectation
values, markets, etc., that it is not
practical or applicable to American
conditions now, and is impossible.
All told there are 80 million acres
with more or less private protection
and 1877 million acres with more or
less public FIRE protection, or in other
words, about half of the timbered
area of the United States. In 1913
statistics show that public and pri-
vate agencies spent a little less than
a million dollars on $50 million acres,
being four-tenths of a cent per acre
annually. Insurance should be re-
stricted to the areas which are ade-
quately protected.
To meet the difficulty presented by
law in some states to the establish
ment of fire insurance companies,
calling for immense reserves to as
sure the great values tied up in tim
Der, the difficulty of obtaining char
tiers from legislatures conforming to
multitudinous requirements, the diff
Guilty of restrictions placed upon do
ing an Interstate business, it is pos
sible to form an Inter Insurance As
14af
operating among owners of timber
yards, saw mills and other Industrial
properties in the United States, with
no record of failure. The interim
surance Associations, like the Mu-
tuals, are conducted at cost for the
individual subscribers by crediting
back the unused balance of pre-
MUM to each account yearly. But
unlike the Mutuals, by doing no out
side business, or business for profit,
they are subject neither to Federal or
State Supervisory Boards, and are
easily organized and controlled by a
board of supervisors. Business is
done under the management of sin
gle mutually appointed attorney-in-
fact who acts separately for each
subscriber. The office where this is
done is called an exchange, as it is
there that insurance is exchanged
amongst subscribers. Legal opinion
as to this has been given by Hon.
John T. Barker, attorney general of
Missouri, on May 7, 1914, and Mr..
Sites, corporation lawyer of Wash
ington, D. c., in October, 1914. Some
of such successful inter-insurance as
sociations are the Lumber Manufac-
turers' Inter-Insurance Association of
New York, with 800 members, at
torney-in-fact, Peck & Hughes; Lum-
bermen's Exchange, Kansas City, Mo-,
attorney-in-fact, ]. W. Carney e. Co.;
National Lumber Manufacturers In |
Reinsurance Exchange, attorney-in- |
fact, Charles T. Simanson, Chicago, |
ILL.,, and many others.
Granted that the average annual |
loss to standing timber would be |