QUIOK ACTION

By rlaok lXonne

During the first World War a colored American soldier was with a detachment of troops that was awaiting orders to go over the top. He was highly nervous as the minutes ticked by. "Men,'o he said, "I hates dis waitin'. What I craves is action-dass what f qlayss-3ction !" Just then a fragment of a bomb conked him on the steel helmet, halfstunned him, and down he went. fn a minute he had recovered, shook the dizziness out of his head, and said: "Men, dem Huns sho do give you service, don't dey?"

That's the way I felt on August l5th. I published an editorial in the August 15th issue deploring the fact that the lumber industry, which in my judgment is doing a warservice job second to none, had been getting very little public recognition and no awards at all for its effective contribution to the war effort, in spite of abnormal difficulties.

On the day that was printed, one of the widely published Washington syndicated columns certainly gave me the service, as the colored soldier said. He let fy at the lumber industry with both barrels, and every statement was an insult to the industry. I got quick action, all right, on my demand for public recognition of the industry; but it was not exactly the kind I was asking for.

This writer gave the lumber industry several very black eyes in three-quarters of a column of smearing. And just to show that he was broad-minded he dragged in the Army, the WPB, and the government generally in his sweeping charges that the lumber industry has done a rotten job in its war effort. He spanked the lumber industry as a whole, and the South in particular. He more than doubled the. membership of the Southern Pine Association, more than quadrupled the mills of the South, and shut down most of the sawmills of the entire country. That's what I call having influence. He has the army in cahoots with the bigger mills to keep the smaller mills from selling the government. The big mills do this to prevent an over-production of lumber that might be hurtful after the war. They also refuse to pay over-time, so they run short hours. And the government is charged with letting the mills get away with it.

Of course the entire industry seethed with indignation for days after the thing appeared. Too bad Mr. Ickes, the hatchet-man. couldn't have listened in on thousands of lumber conversations. He might have added something worth while to his sulphurous vocabulary. But they have gradually cooled off, most of them perhaps wisely deciding that the old adage that "it's a waste of lather to shave a jackass" still holds good; likewise that the best way to scatter and distribute a falsehood is to vigorously deny it.

I searched in vain through the article for some glimmer of fact or truth, but failed to find any. Some of these scandal-mongers wait for nothing so foolishly nonessential as facts, in order to scatter their peculiar publicity. I'll give you just one idea of how close this guy came to telling the truth about lumber. He said that in May of this year there were 9,7,10 sawmills shut down; and blamed the industry for that condition.

Friends, do you know how many ESTABLISHED sawmills there are in this whole country? By established I mean mills that have a location, timber to supply their operations, and money to finance them. My estimate is that there are not more than TEN THOUSAND such sawmills in the whole 48 states. So far as I can judge from first-hand reports every one of those mills except such as were closed. by fire or some other calamity were running in May, and in June, July, in August, and they are running now. They are running every hour they can run, regardless of cost or over-time. They are running to help the war effort and for no other reason, in spite of difficulties that would frighten ordinary business men. Big mills and little mills, great mills and small mills, are all doing their best to get out lumber. No big mill is interfering with that effort. No little mill is being impeded by anything except natural and normal difficulties. The lumber industry would double its production if it possibly could, to help the war effort and its neglected domestic trade.

There wasn't a word of truth in that Washington column. Not one word. And that fact could have been authenticated in no time at all by any fair and interested man. And the only thing I can think of that might do justice to the situation would be for someone to compile the remarks that have been made in the last two weeks by the lumbermen of the United States concerning that Washington writer, and present them to him under permanent cover. It would make swell reading.