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Plan Development of Olympic Peninsula Timber
OLYMPIA, Wash.-The iron fingers of new railroads, reaching into the fir, hemlock and spruce clad hills of the Olympic Peninsula, soon are expected to carry the lumberjack's ax into one of the greatest remaining stands of virgin timber in the United States.
Timber interests of the State of Washington are in direct competition for control of the 4Z,Z|Z,W,OOO board feet in this vast area that some day will be logged for lumber and for pulp. Four major timber concerns iie maneuvering for strategic positions, as if the peninsula were a giant chessboard.
Civic and industrial interests in the North and South are also vying over partition of timber in the national forest reserves. Meanwhile marked efforts are under way to assure the orderly utilization of this "last great stand," that such a valuable national resource may not be wasted.
The situation is emphasized by the fact that the Olympic Peninsula, in extreme northwestern Washington, is p geographical unit by itself. On the west lies the Pacific, on the north the Strait of Juan de Fuca, while on the east is Puget Sound and on the south, Grays Harbor, outlet of the seaboard lumber cities.
In the center of the peninsula, pointed northwest like a giant arrowhead, are the Olympic Mountains. They have been logged to the north, east and south, but between the wistern slope and the Pacific lies an untouched expanse of timber. And on the seaboard from Grays Harbor north there is no natural harbor, so that the timber, when cut, must be removed by rail.
Recently the Northern -Pacific and the Union Pacific announced that they would combine to build a 60-mile extension northward from Grays Harbor into the timber region. The road would cost $60,000 and the announcement proved the starting point of far-reaching developments'
Promoting this movement into the timber region from the south is Alel Polson, allied with the paper mill interests of Grays Harbor. FIis logging road extends through Humptulips into the Lake Quinault district, reaching to the very edge of the virgin timber.
The other three major interests are pushing down from the north, J. H. Bloedel and J. J. Donovan, of Seattle and Bellingham, with 1000 men in the woods and bringing out 300,000,000 board feet of timber yearly, have held a strong grip on the northern end.
- floovever, the plan of Joe lrving, of Everett, to extend the war-time government Spruce Division Railroad into this territory may change the situation.
The Milw;ukee Railway has a branch reaching out 40 miles west of Port Angeles, and, although this line is considered too short to warrant a spur into the southern timber stands, considerable interest has been attached to visits to the field by high officials of the Milwaukee road'
Much of thLe timber is on federal, state and Indian reservations, and is logged under contract. The partition of this timber is of majoi interest to the cities of Aberdeen and Hoquiam, on Giays Harbor, where lumber mills, pulp- and paper mills, and woodworking factories are the backbone of their economic life.