Vagabond Editorials

By JackDionne

.Peter McNevin is gone, and my heart is sad. A lovable, honorable, useful gentleman. A generous, kindly, courageous soul. A lumberman of force and vision. The type of man tfie lumber industry sorely needs-and has few of. His passing is a blow to the Redwood industry particularly, and to the l,umber business generally. The world produces few Peter M*cNevins.

Saw an advertisement the other day, in one of the big consumer magazines, that I got a bang out of. The illustration showed a s4lesman trying to sell a npw idea to a business man. But a shadow stands at the business man's shoulder, Habit, and Habit whispered continually into the business man's ear: "Don't listen! Out of date methods are good enough." To one who has watched the lumber industry for a lifetime, and watched the world move on and leave it behind, that picture was impressive.

For Habit has been continually out-talking Progress to the lumber industry fron time immemorial. The song of the industry, thirty ye:rrs ago-and today-was and is: "\ilfood is good, and lumber is cheap; wood is good, and lumben is cheap; wood is good and lumber is cheap;" ad infinitum. And the world has grown weary of something totally uninteresting and *unapp*ealing.

And even today, faced by a situation whose apparent seriousness has no counterpart in recent history, lumber voices on all sides cry out the questiotr, "What shall we do to be saved?" and back still comes that sonprous dirgethe song of the industry-"Wood is good, and lumber is cheap-wood is good "tU*ttTOT is cheap."

I lsrow that when the last dread trumpet blows, and men are lined up to give their final accounting, when that vital question shall be asked-"What have you done tfiat you should' be savqd?"-that the voice of the lumber industry will answer back, loud and clear: "Wood is good, and lumber is cheap; wood is good and lumber is cheap; wood is good, and lumber is cheap.' *

Changing the subject. A man was praising one of the biggest financiers and one of the busiest big men in Amer. ica, and said this conce'rning him: "When you enter his office you find yourself in the presence of one who is no slave of Time. His attitude is that of a man of leisure. It is easy to pour out one's thoughts to him because he is such a receptive listener. He sends men out carrying with them a feeling of elation." Compare him with some of the two-by-threes you've called on, whose guardian of the gate made you give your name, age, business, wishes, desires, hopes, waist measure, hat size, and religious inclinations, before considering your application to talk for exactly two minutes to the prodigy within.

*rF{<

Big men are always approachable. Little men who are trying to act big are the guys that are hard to get at. A. B. Hammond, of San Francisco, the richest, busiest, most successful business man in the entire state of California, is the most approachable man in the state. He stakes out no hedges for the visitor to climb.

Harry T. Kendall, of Kansas City, as intelligent and respected a student of lumber distribution as lives, faced the recent meeting of the National Lumber Manufacturers' Association in Chicago, and delivered himself of some very impressive opinions conperning lumber. distribution. The higtrlights of his talk were these conclusions: That the small retailer is the bulwark of all lumber distribution, qnd that his maintenance and protection is vital to the industry; and that the wholesaler should be taken into the confidence of the manufacturer,'and given a harmonjous place in the distributing plan. And he told them why very interestingly. ***

Which bears out the opinion this journal has editorially expressed since its inception. Every one of those thirty thousand small lumber yards in this country is a4 active salesman for the manufacturing industry, and if the manufacturers had spent half as much time helping him sell as they have devoted to far less important nratters, things would be better. And, as Mr. Kendall well says, the wholesaler whose entire stock in trade is lumber and who has to sell lumber to make a living, must be a co{rstructive force. :t:t*

Speaking of lumber prices, here's a good one. A well known commission salesman in the middle west was confe'rring personally with a well known softwood manufacturer, and suggested to him that if he, the manufacturer, would send along his latest price list, this commission man would try to get him some business. The mill man pulled his latest list from his pocket, and haqded it to the commission man, saying: "All right, get busy." The commission man looked over the list of stock and prices, looked out of the corner of his eye at the mill man, and asked: "This is just a sort of guide, isn't it?" **+

The big automobile manufacturer who proposes to help save the forests by using no wood in the manufacture of his motor cars, will never give old King Solomon any trouble

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