Opportunities for Coopera ting/ With California Dealers

By Kenneth Smith, Secretary, Lumber Dealers Association of"Los Angeles.

The happiest augury of the future prosperity of the lumber industry lies in the steadily increasing adherence of manufacturers to the proposition that the distribution of the product of the sawmill is of far greater importance than the detail of its production and in your realization that the retail yard and the wholesaler, so long regarded as your customer, is not your customer at all but merely your salesman, the agent by whom and through whom you must contact and sell your real customer-the user of wood, the man who puts up every dollar that you

You have taken some great strides in this efiort to help yourselves in these last three years. Formation of the Trade Extension Bureau, adopting American Lumber Standards, subscribing to ths five year Trade Extension program of the National and the determination to throw the strength of your reorganized and revivified West Coast Lumbermen's Association behind the grade-marking program of the National will in years to come be looked back upon as the initial sign posts along the road of scientific merchandising that led you to a better and happier day as manufacturers.

And not the least of thes_e sign posts will be the agreement which is now in the final stages of consummation between your Association and the dealers of Southern California, providing for official W.C. L.A. grade-marking at their yards under the same rules and under the same continuing supervision as governs the use of the officia! grade-mark of your Association at*the*sawmill.

Grade-marking was n-rothered by necessity. It was adopted by the lumber industry as an essential measure to arrest the growing public distrust of lumber grades and merchandising practices; to prevent sub-standard lumber being sold as standard; to prevent grade substitution and lessen product substitution; to safeguard the integrity of the industry's standards, and restore the age-old confidence of the public in wood.

It had to be. The plain fact is that the marketing of a guaranteed, identified product is the only possible chance the industry has to recover its lost markets or retain those it has.

Dr. Compton summed it up in a few words the other day: "If we ourselves are not smart enough to modernize our own business and furnish the specifiers, the buyers and the users of our products, these ordinary protections of the integrity of the products which they buy from us, we cannot expect them to do for us what we should do for ourselves. The buying public does not nowadays wrestle with a backward industry. It simplv uses the products of some other, less backward industry. That is what the lumber industry in its trade extension work is trying to forestall."

California is one of your largest and most important markets. You want the dealers there to join hands with you and push the sale of grade-marked lumber. They want to do it-are anxious to do it, in fact, in order to cure problems of their own that have arisen out of a past history too complicated to recite here. But there are two great obstacles-one at your end and one at ours. The great majority of those particular mills who cater to our market do not subscribe to your grade-marking program so that our dealers could not brry their requirements grade-marked. At our end are great waterfront planing mills built to do the surfacing for cargo rnills who either had to, or preferred to, sell rough.

More than half of the commons handled by the jobbing yards at San Pedro come in rough so that even if you had 100 per cent cooperation among the mills and grade-marked every foot of surfaced lumber that you shipped to Southern California you would still be obliged to make arrangements to grade-mark the lumber surfaced at San Pedro in order to make your program eftective. Therefore, the offer of your board to authorize and supervise official grademarking in Southern California seems to me a very logical and sound solution of the probtem.

In the course of the negotiations (referring to recent conference between West Coast manufacturers and Southern California dealers) your committee tried very hard to win acceptance at the hands of our dealers of American Standard sizes for yard stock and while these are already acceptable on worked uppers and common boards our dealers were not willing to accept these standards on some items. The chief point of difference was common dimensions, on which we felt we were certain to get into difficulties if we changed at this time.

I know that some of you were keenly disappointed when your committee made that concession to, us, but I feel sure that if you take all of the facts into consideration you will applaud their judgment.

The prevailing standards in California on these items are larger than the minimum established by the American Lumber standar?s. However, our common is surfaced when :practically green, and invariably shrinks afterward, so that ifit were surfaced green to the American Lumber Standard of 9{ inch.off it would in a majority of cases be scant of that size when it went into construction and subject to being refused by the building inspectors for the reason that. our building code specifies that American.Standard sizes as a mtnlmum.

Again, the surfacing practices in our market are different than the usual practices of the rail markets, and while I am fully appreciative of the tremendous gains that will adhere to the indus,try when it becomes possible to sell just one size and one surfacing practice for each grade in all markets, I think that you will readily concede

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The door here illustrated is one of several antique designs in the residence of Mr. Alfred Dieterich at Montecito, California. It is made of solid Spanish Cedar finishing l'/a " thick. All surfaces are adzed. The seasoning checks in two of the cross rails were deliberately sought after, as was the lack of precise geometric outline of panels, to further the impression of great age.

ARCHITECTVRAL iilb-,;;bv6iiiii contract by Boyd Lumber & Mill Company, Santa Barbara, California (Certified Plant No. 12). Architect: Addison Mizner, Palm Beach, Florida.

East Bay Hoo Hoo Club

Albert Rhine, special investigator for the San Francisco police department, was the principal speaker at the F'ebruary dinner meeting of East Bay Hoo Hoo Club No. 39, held at the Athens Athletic Club, Oakland, February 10.

Mr. Rhine chose as his subject, "Fakers in Mysticism", and his positive statements showed that he has made an intense study of all phases of the spiritualistic and fortunetellingrackets. Following this talk he entertained with tricks of magic, many of which were new to the audience, and at the conclusion received a big hand.

President Bert Bryan, Strable Hardwood Co., presided, and Larue Woodson, Wheeler Osgood Co., was chairman of the day.

M. D. Bishop, secretarv of the Coast Counties' Lumbermen's Association, reported on lfoo Hoo activities in his territory.

H. Sewell Morton, Hill & Morton, Inc., vicegerent snark of the Golden Gate District, which takes in the counties of San Francisco, Marin, Sonoma, Alameda, Contra Costa, Napa, and south half of Solano, announced that a big concatenation will be held on the evening of April 14, the regular meeting night of the club, at the Athens Club, Oakland. Mr. Morton asked for the support of every individual member in making this concat a great success.

Paul Overend, vicegerent snark of the Monterey district, which includes all the coast counties south of San Francisco and north of Santa Barbara counties, announced that his district will join with the Golden Gate district in a joint concatenation on the date mentioned.

Peninsula Hoo Hoo Club

Peninsula Hoo Hoo Club No. 58 and San Jose and Peninsula lumbermen held their monthly dinner-meeting at the St. Claire Hotel, San Jose, Monday, January 27.

President Fred P. Boes of Hubbard & Carmichael Bros., San Jose, presided.

C. S. Hamsher of the First National Bank of Los Gatos was the speaker of the evening, delivering an interesting address on "Business Conditions in 1930".

Tidewater Mill Burns

Fire destroyed the sawmill of the Tacoma. last week. with an estimated rvhich is fully covered by insurance. mill will be rebuilt at an early date.

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Tidewater Mill Co.. total loss of $200.000, It is stated that the

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