What The Lumber Industry Can Do

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There is nothing difficult about it. Most of the ideas that would do the business are already in existence, already in use, but not generally known, even to architects. Take the modern closet, for instance. There is hardly an old fashioned home i4 this land that would not install a modern closet, if it could be shown them, and offered to themnot in the shape of lumber-but as an actual function in their house. I mean a closet such as you will find in every modest home in Southern California already, with shoe racks, hangers, drawers, a place for things such as the housewife would give her very eyes to possess. IF THIS CAMPAIGN DID NOTHING ELSE BUT SELL A MODERN CLOSET TO EVERY HOME IN AMERICA THAT CRIES FOR ONE IT WOULD BE ALREADY A HUGE SUCCESS, EVEN THOUGH IT DID NOTHING ELSE.

But there are the thousand and one wonderful uses to which lumber can be put to transform it into things dear to the home lover. They can'be put in the kitchen, in the pantry, in the bath, in the bedroom, the living room, in every room in fact. They can be installed in any old fashioned dwelling.

I have a picture in my mind of an equipment of a thousand ideas that could be furnished a lumber dealer, so wonderful, so appealing, so filled with possibilities, that even Mr. Pip himself would grab it under his arm and tear out to show his trade what wonderful things he could do for them.

It must not be a selfish campaign. The millwork men, the paint men, and others, must work in conjunction. The public loves color, both as to quality and variety, and color would have much to do with the value of the equipment I am thinking of.

The idea would be that the dealer could then remodel an entire house, or he could sell any part of a remodeling job. New closets, new doors, new windows, a cabinet fol the kitchen or pantry, new foors, new walls for the living room that would make it a paradis+any one or more of a thousand things.

Every house that put in one improvement would be in the market for others, when they get the money. Every

ANTI-SHINGLE ORDTNANCE VOTE AGAIN POSTPONED

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors again postponed the vote on the proposed anti-shingle ordinance at their meeting on February 6, when final action in the matter was put over for a week, the reason given being that some of the new members of the board had not had time to study the subject.

installation in a neighborhood would be shown and talked about in the whole neighborhood.

I am not talking about remodeling the big building, or .the large home where an architect's service would be possible. I am talking about these millions upon millions of eye-sore dwellings that fill this land, have nothing about them inside or out that likens them to HOME. They are just shelter.

They don't know what to do. They don't know what might be done. They donlt know how the people live who occupy modern homes. They don't now how to get the things they would like, don't know if they could afford them, don't know any of the things that they MUST know if this work is to be done.

And the dealer in the small town is NOT yet in a position to help them intelligently. The av€rage Small town hasn't a single home that contains the latest wood made luxuries that cost little. The average small to,wn architect hagn't even the ideas.

Surely, if there is any great work that these trade promotion funds should be devoted to, it is this.It is a work not only for themselves and for their industry, but a work for humanity. It would rank in its vital importance to the human race, with the campaign of the great Frenchman Voltaire, whEn he set out to free the minds of the human race.

We have cou4tless millions of people in America in thehelpless,,and so far hopeless bondage of the dwelling that is only drab and dreary shelter.

They have to be shown, they have to be helped. If the lumber industry did its duty this year, we could go without building a single new structure in the entire country, and still have a big building year, if this rebuilding program were onfy carried out.

To what better use could these funds be put?

I had retailers, big and little, great and small, come to me at Kansas City, and say that it was the first suggestion they had ever heard for using trade promotion funds that seemed to them to supply a great need, and be thoroughly practical.

Two San Francisco Plants Destroyed By Fire

The mill and stock of the Acme Lumber Co. and the plant of the Holmes Planing Mill Co. at Sixth and Channel Streets, San Francisco, were destroyed by fire a few days ago. The damage was estimated at $100,000. Two trucks and, an automobile were saved by firemen. This was the only property salvaged.