Spruce Production Division The Spruce Production Division was a unit of the United States Army , established in 1917 to supply the army with high - quality spruce and other wood products needed for the production of aircraft for the United States war effort in World War I . The division was part of the Army Signal Corps ' s Aviation Section . Its headquarters were in Portland , Oregon , and its main operations center was at Vancouver Barracks in Vancouver , Washington . Workers in the division were members of the Loyal Legion of Loggers and Lumbermen , a union specifically established to support the army ' s wood production operations . The division produced nearly of spruce in just 15 months , halting work almost as soon as the war ended . Col . Brice Disque was then put on trial for accusations that he had wasted millions of tax dollars . He was found not guilty of malfeasance . The division had a large impact on logging in the Pacific Northwest . Logging companies adopted working conditions similar to those the division had , and they took advantage of the division ' s former logging roads and rail lines to access forests more easily . Activation . From the beginning of World War I , wood products were in great demand for war production . Sitka spruce was the most important tree species because its combination of lightness , strength , and resiliency was ideal for aircraft production . In addition , its long , tough fibers did not splinter when struck by bullets . As a result , even before the United States entered the war , the Pacific Northwest had become the main supplier of spruce for aircraft production in Great Britain , France , and Italy . Northwest lumber mills , however , were never able to meet Europe ' s demand for spruce . The government wanted the monthly production of of spruce , but before the division was activated , only were produced monthly . When the United States entered the war in 1917 , General John J . Pershing sent Brice P . Disque , a former army captain , to the Pacific Northwest to determine if local labor issues within the forest products industry could be resolved quickly . Disque met with mill owners and representatives of the Industrial Workers of the World , the union that was trying to organize loggers and sawmill workers in the Pacific Northwest . After studying the situation for several months , Disque determined that the long - standing labor management dispute could not be resolved without direct intervention by the army . Based on Disque ' s report , the United States Army Signal Corps was given the job of reorganizing the forest products industry in the Pacific Northwest to support United States war production . On 29 September 1917 , Disque was brought back into the army as a lieutenant colonel and was assigned to develop plans for an army unit to produce wood products for the war effort . On 6 November , Disque was promoted to colonel and given command of the newly formed Spruce Production Division , a part of the United States Army Signal Corps . The headquarters of the new unit were located in downtown Portland , which was " the centre of the great spruce area of the Pacific Northwest , " while the division ' s induction , training , and operations center was established at Vancouver Barracks across the Columbia River in Vancouver , Washington , where it employed about 19 , 000 soldiers . Production . Originally , the Spruce Production Division was authorized to induct 10 , 317 troops , including both officers and enlisted men . The Spruce Production Division quickly recruited several thousand experienced loggers and mill workers , many of whom were above the military draft age of 40 . In May 1918 , the division was authorized to grow to 28 , 825 personnel . Initially , both the mill owners and local unions were against the army ' s takeover of lumber production . The mill owners disliked having the army overseeing their businesses , and the unions saw soldiers ' labor as a form of strikebreaking . Disque , however , called on everyone ' s patriotism to support war production . He was also very careful not to favor either owners or unions as he increased production , helping both sides achieve their goals . For the mill owners , military manpower kept mills open and running at full capacity . In addition , it prevented radicals from sabotaging facilities or equipment . The unions benefited because military rules stabilized wages and established rules that guaranteed better working conditions for loggers and sawmill workers throughout the Pacific Northwest . Among the improved conditions was a standard eight - hour day . To counter the influence of union radicals in the Industrial Workers of the World , Disque sponsored an alternative union based on patriotism and labor - management cooperation . The new union , the Loyal Legion of Loggers and Lumbermen , was established in 1917 and put under the leadership of Portland attorney Captain Maurice E . Crumpacker , who would later serve as a U . S . Congressman . The union was initially opposed by both labor and mill owners , but due to Disque ' s strong advocacy , within six months nearly all of the mill owners had agreed to support the union ; by October 1918 , it had 125 , 000 members . In fact , the union lasted 20 years longer than the Spruce Production Division . The Spruce Production Division established approximately 60 military logging camps throughout the Pacific Northwest , usually near existing privately owned sawmills . While privately owned , these mills were operated under the direction of the army . On 20 December 1917 , Disque reported that the division was only meeting 40 percent of the demand for spruce . He said that the division needed to increase production from to in order to meet the demand . In early 1918 , the division opened a sawmill at Vancouver Barracks , the largest spruce sawmill in the world , " producing more than one million feet of spruce lumber each day . " The mill complex covered and was operated by 2 , 400 soldiers from the division . The army also built sawmills in Coquille and Toledo , Oregon , and in Port Angeles , Washington . A 3 , 000 - worker community in Washington was designed as a company town by architect Carl F . Gould . The townsite was laid out with bunkhouses , and with dining and recreation halls styled after Adirondack lodges . The division also built 13 railroads with over of track to connect logging operations that were far from roads to local sawmills . At the peak of construction , there were 10 , 000 soldiers building railroads in Oregon and Washington forests . All wire rope manufactured in the west , as well as anything shipped in , was controlled by the spruce division per Colonel Disque . As the " Los Angeles Times " reported in February 1918 , " There was a serious shortage of wire rope when Col . Disque took charge of the spruce production campaign . " The division lasted only 15 months , during which time it produced a total of of spruce . It produced nearly for aircraft construction from Oregon forests alone . Before the Pacific Northwest began logging spruce for the war , much of the lumber came from the east , where production amounted to just 15 percent of demand . Logging techniques in the east were not as advanced and were not as efficient with wood . The network of roads and railroads that the division had built allowed for future development of the forests , which facilitated the growth of the lumber industry in the Pacific Northwest for the remainder of the 20th century . Demobilization . The armistice that ended World War I was signed on 11 November 1918 . The next day , all Spruce Production Division logging ended , most construction projects were stopped , and sawmill operations were curtailed . Government machinery and equipment from all over the Northwest was shipped back to Vancouver Barracks and division personnel were quickly discharged from military service . Over $ 12 million of logging equipment , sawmill machinery , and other property was eventually sold in a government auction . While the Spruce Production Division was quickly demobilized after the war , there was some post - war controversy over the cost of its operations . Disque , by then a brigadier general , spent months answering charges that his division had wasted taxpayers ' money . Congress was particularly critical of the $ 4 million spent on an unfinished railroad located in the Olympic Peninsula of Washington . But then Disque explained that it was to be used for transporting spruce lumber . Eventually , the charges proved to be unfounded . Disque was discharged from the army in March 1919 to be " appointed chairman of the export and import branch of the American International Corporation with headquarters at New York . " Legacy . Lt . Col . Cuthbert Stearns compiled a history of the Spruce Production Division , " The Spruce Production Division , United States Army and Spruce Production Corporation " , that was published in 1919 . This detailed record of the division ' s operations helped General Disque defend the cost of spruce production in his debate with members of Congress . At the U . S . National Archives in Seattle , there are approximately of records related to the division , as well as " a complete roster of all military personnel in the Spruce Production Division as of 1 November 1918 . " The effect of the Spruce Production Division continued long after the unit was demobilized . Not only did the division dramatically increase the production of forest products for the war effort , but the transportation network it built helped open up Pacific Northwest forests to greater use in the decades that followed . In addition , the division ' s work rules became the standard for logging and sawmill operations throughout the Pacific Northwest well into the 1930s .