California Panel & Veneer Company Enter Airplane Supply Business in Large Way

Howell Baker

A couple of years ago The California Panel & Veneer Company, of Los Angeles, of which Howell Baker is the very efficient head, became interested in the airplane business by furnishing veneers and panels for the interior finishing and decorating of some of the larger passenger planes being built in Southern California.

Today they have gone into the airplane supply business in so big a rvay that it already plays a leading role in their entire business, and because of the rapid growth of this particular department they are planning to greatly enlarge their already several times enlarged plant on South Alameda Street. Plans for their new warehouses are developing, and are only awaiting the determination of the city on the proposed widening of that very busy business thoroughfare. The land for the new plant, in the rear of the present plant, is already secured, and will permit any amount of development their needs may requrre.

When they got to selling interior finish for big passenger planes, they found that there was a growing demand for veneers for many other purposes on airplanes. For instance, on the rvings, the fuselage, and the. spars, much very high type rvood veneering is used. So they went into this line, stocking in considerable quantity the various sorts of big veneer sheets used for these purposes. They have one warehouse now filled with airplane veneers. For the covering of the wings of the planei, great quantities of Spguce and Port Orford Cedar veneers are nbw used. These veneers are especially built for this purpose, the wood being sliced vertical grained, and then the grain o,f the several plys being spliced, as it were, giving [hese thin sheets of wood enormous strength by the crossing of the grain of the various plys.

They found veneers were used in various other places, and they stocked these also. For instance, they calry in stock sheets of veneer made of genuine Mahogany, 22 leet long and 16 inches wide, sliced vertical and the grain being crossed in each ply to give the sheet great strength. This makes great red ribbons of wood that are pliable yet very porverful. These strips are used full length on the spars of the planes. Veneers are also used in various smaller ways in plane construction.

Port Orford Cedar has come into greatest popularity for sheeting the wings of planes, and Spruce enjoys the greatest popularity for innumerable other uses in plane construction. However, they are also carrying in stock sheets of airplane veneer made of Birch and Poplar, which are used in some places by certain manufacturers.

But they have not confined themselves to going into the supplying of veneers and panels for planes. This just opened up other channels, and they are doing a very large business today in the stocking and selling of many kinds of plane building hardware. For instance, they are exclusive agents for the Pacific Coast for the Summerill Tubing Company, of Bridgeport, Pa., and some idea of their work in this direction may be obtained from the fact that this big factory recently shipped them a consignment of airplane tubing which they declare in their wires and letters to Mr. Baker to be the largest single shipment of airplane tubing ever made.

They also represent the Haskelite Manufacturing Corporation, of Chicago, and the Ohio Seamless Tube Company, of Shelby, Ohio.

Their heavy lines, in addition to those already mentioned, are : Chrome Molybdenum Tubing; Chrome Metal Strip Tubing; aircraft iontrol wheels; -.bta rolled strip steel; cement coated and brassed barbed nails; airplane bolts and nuts; Haskelite Waterproof Plywood; Haskelite Spar Panels; Haskelite Blood Albumen Glue Plywood; Coreco Casein Glue Plywood; shock cord; Rusco Airo Rings; Rusco Safety Belts; Airplane Cloth; Plymetl.

Mr. Roderick Mulholland is manager of the airplane supply department of the California Panel & Veneer Company, and predicts that at the rate of airplane development this department of their business will soon lead all the older departrnents.

This line has caused them to take up the airplane sup- ply game with great alertness, for the business of plane building is changing so fast and .developing so rapidly as to make it a most attractive business.

Pacific Lumber Co. Officials Lumber Salesman Driving His Seventh Buick on Fishing Trip

P. C. McNevin,-general -sales manageri E. E. Yoder, / There must be some very good repsons why so many .dent manager; W. M. Nelson, comptroller; and John \lu*be. salesmen drive Buick automobiles. Al l(ellev- Sac_ ramento Valley salesman fr for the Santa Fe Lumber Com- Company, and T. Ready, San Francisco, re-

Tliict:; y' M' Ngfsot:.loltPttol]ery,and Jo.ld \l,t*b"rsalesmen Buickautomobiles. Al *elley, Sac- .a"'--:^French, employment manager; officials of The Pacific Lumber Comoanv. and r. F. Readv. San Francisco re- cently compleled'i ten days'fishing'trip on Blue Cieek, P&nI, San Francisco, started driving his seventh Buick on a tributarybf the Klamath-River, in'Def Norte and Hum- September 16th, a Master Six, Four-passenger Coupe. boldt counties, California. They reported some fine Al, by the way, completed his seventeenth year of service catches of steelhead trout. with "Gus Russell's Outfit" on September 6.