Vagabond Editorials

(Continued from Page 6) ber purchase and use. England always used the highest grades of lumber. The fact that cheaper lumber could be had in profusion never interested English buyers. They bought quality. With the coming of the depression American buyers of lumber turned in wholesale fashion to the cheap and the shoddy. England, far worse off financially than we are, made no such change. They buy less, because they use less, but when they buy they buy the same grades and species and pay the differential, regardless of the fact that the cheapest of lumber is being thrust at them from every source. Some day we'll learn that fine lesson.

*{<* fle was asked, "will wood continue to be used for general building purposes?" He replied it was up to the lumber industry to answer that question, but that it will aU depend on what the industry does about it. "If you do nothing about it, lumber will be supplanted by other mate- rials". From now on it isn't what we need but what we take that will determine our situation.

An architect of note told a retail lumber convention some fine truths the other day. What he said should reach all lumber ears. He said if lumber has a place in industry it must get busy and prove it in the next few years. (Amen.) He said that if lumber is to prosper it must be dressed up in new clothes, adapted to new purposes, offered in new forms. He said we should have our own laboratory and find out all the interesting things there are to know about lumber, so the world can be told.

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He said we should experiment until wefind ways to make lumber fire-proof, water-proof, decay-proof. That we should findout a thousand important things about our product that no one on earth knows today. (Three loud and rousing cheers.)

**rl.

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We have a beautifully embossed invitation to attend the President's Conference on Horne Building and Home Ownership, which takes place in Washington, D.C., December second to fifth. May much good come of it, and may the building of homes be facilitated and assisted in such manner as will enable millions who have never been able to do so, to own their own home. Folks will readily build homes if they are enabled to do so financially, for the home building and owning desire is one of the deepest of instincts, and one of the most appealing.

When the Federal Trade Commission enjoined the distributors of Philippine Mahogany from calling that wood "Mahogany", it was supposed to be a case without competitive animus behind it. Just for the good of the American consumer, you understand. Naturally I pointed out at that time the certainty of several very rnuch interested "niggers" in that wood pile. Last June the Commission finally decided that the beautiful red Philippine wood COULD be called "Mahogany".

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Then the boys left cover and came out in the open. The Mahogany Association, Inc., and the American Walnut Manufacturers Association recently appeared before the Federal Trade Commission and asked for a rehearing of the case. By a vote of three totwo the Commission declined to go further into that dispute. So, from now on boys, let's sell the stuff on its merits, without resorting to judicial interference. It's really the sporty thing to do.