The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-07-07
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

ing through the Jackson Lumber com pany plant I took it as great op- portunity to see what is considered to be one of the largest and best handled lumber industry east of the Misslss- ippi, the Jackson Lumber Co.,, at Lock- hart with model town built around it.
 Now I know very little about the lumber business though for several years was a director in the Barnett Lumber company, when it was owned by my brother $. T. Barnett before he sold out to J. Mercer Barnett my neph- ew I heard talk about prices, the high rate of insurance, the difficulty of keeping the yards in condition, the excessive demurrage, the trouble with the railroads, and occasionally the slt- nation at various mills in the state. But my mind and heart were not in the business.
 had read a great deal about the ruthless manner in which America was using up it's forests and the need for better laws to protect the great tim Der reserves in the west from forest fires, and of the utter disregard that many saw mill men had for sheer waste in numbering. I knew how careful some of the older countries were to safeguard their natural resources, and how the care of trees was profession' but the subject had not gripped me as had some others.
 
 But the war has taught me that it is high time for all of us who love our state to get interested in the subject or seeing to it that what remains of our timber reserves are not wantonly sa- crificed by slip shod cutting and mill ing realize that the lumbermen themselves have the matter continually up, but the ones who realize the gray itv of the situation and are doing what they can to cure it, need the support of an awakened and intelligent public opinion in the matter.
 | The Jackson Lumber Co.,, was tolo had a capitalization of one million 1 eight hundred thousand dollars, owns | l of land, with an output of eighty mil- lion feet of lumber annually. It owns the Dixie railroad with a trackage or nearly one hundred miles; two hun dred or more cars and seven locomo- lives, employing hundreds of men. who live in the little town of Lockhart in painted homes, with attractive front yards, and ample gardening plots. | understand that Lockhart is an un- incorporated town, but that it is one | of the most orderly little cities in the ] entire United States. My guide in | formed me that during his eleven years residence he had witnessed only one 1 fight and that it was so well under stood that rowdyism would not be countenanced that no one is bent on
 trouble, he is quitely notified that he l is not wanted and he quiets down or moves on.
 The trip through the modern milling I plant was intensely interesting. The huge logs were brought in on special loging cars, and dumped into the wat CT, and then srlaked out to be eat up by the saws. It was exciting to fol- low a great tree trunk until it came out in thin strips properly sawn and
 sized and shunted on to the kilns or on the yards to be piled or loaded at
 once into box cars waiting on tracks alongside the mill It was a busy, noisy place It appeared to me that enough lumber was stored in the yards
 to meet the needs of all Alabama. 4 For years by day and night as I have gone up and down Alabama on the trains I have always watched with
 curious interest the piles of burning slab near the various saw mills, and
 wondered if some way could not be
 found to salvage it, but I suppose it
 is out of the question, for at the Jack
 son plant running far out over the
 pond is a continuous flow of odds and
 ends to fall on the burning mass which
 has never died out since the mill began
 to operate back in 1903. By day and
 night 1t is a continuous bon fire a
 perennial Fourth of July celebration 1
 souvenir book given to each guest } at the Florala banquest by the Jack , son Lumber Co.,, entitled Tn the Heart l, of the Long Leaf Pine" with sketches l by Currier, in the first place is about
 as handsome a piece of bookmakine as have ever seen issued by any com t mercial enterprise. I am saving my : copy to make John Henley open his eyes in astonishment and grasp fol
 pure joy that any concern in the soutf ? was willing to put up the coin fol such an edition de luxe.
 I'started to say that the book migh. f have been called 'SThe Trail of tn, Lonesome Pine" for the frontispiec shows a tall long leaf pine, but th' :, next page drawing sets forth a fires . of them Born and reared in the soutl r there are to me few more beautiful O.
 impressive sights than virgin pin
 forest and to walk through one at tn, o setting of the sun with the wind e soughing in the tree tops is to hav
 ones soul filled with sense of aw : and reverence. All my life I hay
 in forest of pines.
 Ihere is a beauty all it's own abou
 pine lumber. I have seen many of tn II more famous woods used in Englan