comes the closest with 30,495
square miles. Well, well! We say
Quite a hunk of land to turn
over to 1G0 million dollars worth
of corporations. 85 Billion feet
of timber at ten dollars per
thousand is 850 million dollars.
Runs into money, our timbe re
sources! Pulp companies in the
east are paying the neighbor
hood of $20.00 for pulp wood too.
The question enters our mind,
“How can we have pulp compa
nies and still profit by our tim
ber resources?”
Nothing is simpler. Have Con
gress pass a law providing for
supervision of cutting to elimi
nate waste and provide for re
forestation. Cut this 20 million
acreas up into parcels of 160
acres each and invite 125.000 cf
those homeless men in tht Stat
es who are looking for a chance
to make a start in life to come
and take them.
Let those sixteen pulp com
panies come. The owners of our
land will he glad to sell them
timber. Let a bunch of Forest
Inspectors earn their pay by see
ing that no timber is wasted and
proper provision mode for re
forestation. Let the pulp com
panies own timberland if they
want to. Once installed, super
vision of cutting will apply to
the land whether it belongs to
them, to the Government, or to
the original settler. Let’s be in
telligent American citizens. Let’s
use a little horse sense.
Mr. Heintzelman’s article ot
ters us jobs for 9,600 men. To
create those jobs for us and our
children, the Forest Service is
willing to deprive us of South
eastern Alaska, a country as
large as South Carolina, of all
further development and settle
ment. Also to turn the entire pro
fits over to sixteen non-resident
owned pulp and paper corpora
tions. If you take the time to
study the articles and vision
condition as they will be when
the program is carried through,
you cannot help but see the
enormity of the betrayal of A
mericanism. We did not become
the greatest Nation on the face
of the earth as a nation of wage
workers. We have not been proud
of our country and its traditions
because we have been allowed to
rent a piece of land. How will
cur children feel toward our
country under conditions being
foisted upon it merely through
a lack of opposition on our part?
If on the other hand, we in
vite 125,000 men here to take
up land, what would be the re
sults? When you build a dam and
maintain it for 25 years .and
then suddenly remove it. there
is bound to be a flood. Settle
ment on anything that might
remotely be termed timberland
has been practically denied
Southeastern Alaska for 25 years.
It is hard to predict what the
exact results would be. Probably
r'5 per cent of the first takers
would be absolutely unfitted to
cope with conditions. Of one
thing only I am certain. Our
precious timber would receive
vTery little hurt. The unfit would
leave. Either selling their hold
ings cr abandoning them. Thrnr
places filled by other men more
fit. Our more determined settlers
would at once introduce modern
forest practice, a thing which
the Forest Service has so far
refused to do here. They would
cut a few of their best trees
and peddle them to our local
mills. They would cut the kind
of timber the mills want. Not
insist on cramming down their
throats timber unsuited for
their market demands. Our mills
with half a chance are able to
stand alone. With the grade of
logs the owners would be able
to furnish them they would soon
l:e healthy and increase their
ou^ut even without the salmon
box business.
The pulp mills would come in.
Here is an open field they would
say. Now we can get the kind of
tmuer we have to have to
meet competition without hav
ing to cut that expensive poor
grade stuff fifty years ahead of
our market demands. Let’s go!
Ah! You say that is just what
our Forest Department is guard
ing against. This indiscriminate
cutting of timber. Why the pulp
mills will come in here and strip
our hills. Leave us nothing but
the rocks. They will overcut and
have to close down, they will
ruin our country.
There is only one danger and
that one very remote. Overcut
ting All right! Our Forest De
partment has done an immense
lot of research work and are
apable of lots more. They
should know how many tons of
pulp wood could be taken yearly
from our forests without danger
When that point is reached oar
children will know what to do.
Our job is to see that our chil
dren have the power and intelli
gence to do so without having
first been diven to bloodshed to
better their living conditions.
We cannot be blind to the fact
that an immense proportion of
our land is not agricultural land.
Let us be pessimistic and say
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