IDOON & SASH CO.

5th and Clpress Streets' Oakland' Callf.

Tlimptebor A4OO

(Continued from Page 12) a shield. There came a bigger club, and we made a bigger shield. And so it has always been right up to the development of great guns. Always we devise a protection. And so we shall against atomic bombs, he said. He quoted a man as saying: "I can't be happy when the world is so frightened of the atom bomb." And he said he answered: "Why can't you? Why make it unanimous?"

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"Under the guise of refugees, task forces of dissension have established beachheads on our Atlantic and Pacific coasts. I recommend a postscript to the Atlantic Charter in the form of a return passage for this crew."-Eddie Rickenbacker.

Read some figures or, ,1. ,"*"*, effect of a big strike on the individual striker. In one certain strike the men were getting $1.20 an hour. They asked for a raise of 30 percent. They were offered l3f cents increase per hour. The union turned that down and the strike was called. It lasted 113 days. ft cost the striker over $130,000,000 in lost wages. And what they.got was an increase of. I8l cents an hour, or just 5 cents more than they had been offered. On this basis it will take these men five full years of 40 hours work a week, to get back their lost wages. And that does not count the loss of all that production, the loss to the public in needed goods, the loss to industry and commerce of the $130,000,000 the strikers lost and therefore could not spend. The man who says the strike is an antiquated weapon, is in little danger of logical contradiction.

I heard Charles E. Devlin, Managing Director of the Douglas Fir Plywood Association, talk the other day about the prospects for plywood for the building trade and the retail lumber trade particularly, this year. He said that production this year will be the second greatest in history, over 1,6(X),00O,O00 feet. But he listed the various users of plywood and the amounts they need, and drew the conclusion that there are more buyers than there is plywood, and that it will continue that way through the year. ,'No use adding it up, it won't come out," said Devlin, in predicting that there will be millions of plywood users vvho will come up short of their full needs this year.

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As an aside thought, I visited a huge wholesale hardwood lumber yard the other day, and looked over their stocks. And do you know what were the only surplus items they had in stock-fairly "running out of their ears" as the manager put it? You'd never guess. They were hardwood panels and plywood. They were piled high and moving slow, beautiful panels of Birch, Mahogany, and Gum. "That's our big surplus right now," they told me. Funny, eh? Mahogany lumber is woefully scarce. But you can buy Mahogany plywood and panels in any quantity.

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Heard S. V. Fullaway, Jr., Secretary-Manager of the Western Pine Association, tell about prospects for Ponderosa and Sugar Pine for the trade this year. He said, referring to tree supply, that in the L2 Western states there is over 500 billion feet of softwood commercial timber, of which about half is Pine. Present rate of growth in this Pine region is in excess of 4 billion feet annually, which rate will be accelerated constantly in the future as old forests are harvested and young fast-growing forests take their place. Regional growth may reach 8 billion feet annually. In this region there are now practically 2l million acres of practical tree farms.

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Lumber production in this Pine region avetaged, 3f billion feet annually before the late war, but swelled to over 6 billion feet in 1946, and currently 1947 is ahead of 1946. A future yearly average not under 5 billion feet looks reasonable for this territory. So they are making and will continue to make more Pine in the future than ever in the past. Pine production is below present demand. Clears and shop lumber are very scarce, and will remain so for many months. Commons are being made in great quantity, but the supply does not yet measure up to present abnormal demand. Yet Pine stocks are growing slowly in the yards of the distributors, and the trend toward a full supply continues steadily.

H. V. Simpson, Executive Vice President of the West Coast L'umbermen's Association, makes an interesting report on the Fir and Hemlock supply. He says th,at the distributors of this lumber will handle more stock this year than any time in the last sixteen years. He says that except for clears, which will be scarce for a long tirn€ to come, there will be plenty of lumber for everyone this year. He was frank about it. The mills are making lumber as fast and furiously as possible under high price urging, numerous mills are improving their equipment and their facilities to make more dry lumber, and the long and short of the story is that there is lots of common Fir lumber today, and lots more in sight. "No Fir shortage this year," said Simpson. ***

As this is written the most serious situation facing the lumber ind,ustry of the entire United States, is the car shortage. In various territories and districts, it is already rather tragic. Years ago the car shortage was always one of the annual headaches of the lumber industry. Looks like it will be a severe one this year.

Henry Wallace hogs the headlines of late. Many charges are hurled at his head. Most of them are probably true. But the inco,ntrovertible charge against Wallace is that he has horrible manners. When you are the guest in a house, you keep the name of that house sacred when you go forth. That is just plain decency, and has come down to all decent men through the ages. Not so with Henry. He has been an honored guest in^ the United States-his father's house -yet he has gone forth from that house to other lands, and reviled and befouled the house of his fathers. He could have said what he pleased at home, and perhaps been justified under the right of free speech; but to go abroad to do it marks him guilty o'f an unforgivable crime.