Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1916 [PAGE 896]

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896

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

[Feb. 8,

ing trees, be done only after consultation with and approval of the Department of Horticulture. This recommendation is based on the following communication from Dr. T. J. Bur rill to Prof. J. C. Blair, after conference with him and the Department of Buildings and Grounds. ^ February 8, 1916. Prof. J. C. Blairj Urbana, Illinois. MY DEAR SIR: In view of the sleet injury to the trees in the University forest plantation, you ask in yours of the 2d instant for my opinion as to What should be done, having prominently in mind the future policy to be pursued in regard to the plantation. In the first place, it may be well to recall the original purpose of this experiment with such facts in its history as seem to bear upon the present inquiry. It should be remembered that fifty years ago this was a new country, largely prairie, with multitudes of untried problems facing the early land owners and managers. The importation of wood of any kind had scarcely begun and the facilities existing gave small promise of what has since taken place. The supplies of coal were little known and its use little appreciated. The railroad engines commonly burned wood. By far the larger proportion of household heat especially in the kitchens (and often there Was none other) came from the same fuel. Kitchen stoves especially adapted for coal were hardly known until at least a decade later. Good building timber was scarce and the home supply was rapidly disappearing with every prospect of an increase in price. On the other hand the country was speedily settling up. Increasing calls were made for construction timber as well as for wood for many purposes now supplied by iron, brick, cement, etc. It did not require any great vision to impress the necessity of making provision for future needs. And then good land was cheap. The usual returns from agricultural crops were poor. Corn rarely sold for more than twenty-five cents a bushel and had been so low with such poor market that it was burned instead of wood in the cook stoves. If timber was to be needed anywhere and could be grown to profit anywhere it would seem to thoughtful people of the time to be in Illinois. This is, in brief, the general condition of things when the first steps were taken by the University authorities in regard to this plantation experiment. In support of these statements I wish to refer to the first report of the Board of Trustees issued in 1868, pp. 276-278. Here Mr. D. C. Scofield of Freeport, 111., estimates the value of an acre planted to larch and pine after 75 or 80 years to be no less than $10,000, while it would more than pay its way from near the beginning. Or better, see in the second Report, 1869, pp. 352-358, the lecture given by Mr. O. B. Galusha, one of the first Board of Trustees and a member of the committee on whose report the forest plantation was originated. The address was one of the first series of agricultural lectures given at the University by leading experts and authorities in January, 1869. Its character may be surmised by the concluding paragraph which should be read with the understanding that the planting of trees is the deciding influence. It reads: "Here, then, brother farmers and farmer students in this University, we have two pictures presented to us. In one we look into the future and see wide-spread desolation—an extended treeless country, visited by destructive storms, by severe droughts, with its streams dried up, and food for man and beast in such'scarcity that the poor can scarcely obtain a supply. In the other we see a charming landscape, a rich, fertile country, a population enjoying all the blessings which flow from peace and unity. Which will you choose? Will we take warning in time and arouse ourselves to action in an enterprise which promises such rich results?" To get at still more directly the purpose in the minds of those' chiefly responsible for the experiment, it would be well to read the report of the Committee on Horticulture found in the volume last cited, pp. 46-52. In this, forest planting takes the first and most emphasized place with those for fruits, shelter, and ornament following. A paragraph such as the following indicates why: "Timber for railroad ties, culverts, cars, roadways and buildings, fencing, vineyard stakes, hop poles, stanchions for coal banks, soft wood,, like white willow and the poplars for berry boxes, crates and staves, hoop poles, wagon and carriage material, agricultural implements, and the uniform wants of the age, make up a demand of most surprising magnitude, that will add to our rural industry an importance that the most sanguine have not hitherto dreamed of." The recommendations of this report were adopted and an appropriation from the State Legislature was later secured (March, 1869) to carry them into execution, thus indicating that others besides the members of this committee considered the project a greatly important one. No time was lost in making a beginning. Many thousand forest tree seedlings small m size were purchased that spring and put into a nursery from which the first were transferred to the permanent grounds two years later (1871). Others from the same source or grown in the meantime from seed followed year by year for about three years and then at longer intervals. Hence the main parts of the plantation are-42 to 45 years old. There is about twenty acres of it. From the beginning the trees have had much better care than such tree plantations commonly receive, at greatly more cost than was originally estimated. Plainly, we see things now, mistakes of several kinds have been made, but they have been brought out in the experiment rather than due to faulty planning or execution. With the information and skill existent forty-five years ago and later for the new problems as they arose, it can hardly be said anything better in the way of results can now be figured out. As a rule the trees have lived and prospered except as conditions, most of which could not have been foreseen, proved unfavorable. But the showing today is a far 'cry from the early anticipations as somewhat sketched above. Taken as a whole and basing estimates solely on timber values, I do not believe the area is worth much more today than is an adjoining equal