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4. The President of the United States has issued his Proclamation designating April 18-24, inclusive,
as American Forest Week, the sixth annual observance of this educational campaign.
Q. To no state should this question appeal more strongly than to our own. Oregon has one-fifth of the
standing timber of the Nation. It is our greatest resource, outside of the land itself. Due, perhaps, to
a lack of information or sympathetic interest, our forestry problems have not received the emphasis that
should be accorded them. The country is only now slowly awakening to the gravity of the situation. The
conservation and renewal of our forests is a common task. The problem deserves the earnest and
thoughtful consideration of every citizen, for it concerns alike the lumber producers and the timber
users, the nonforested and the forested regions.
q Our forests are a heritage, to be used wisely and not wasted. In addition to the lumber products,
they give us a perpetual and regulated water supply for domestic use, for irrigation, for hydroelectric
power. They afford protection in preserving the moisture for the summer supply of water, and for
holding the snows and rain, They furnish haunts for propagation, preservation and protection of our
wild game. In their shady recesses are found the recreational parks, the playgrounds of our Nation.
q For the purpose of continuing the effort to deal sanely and effectively with this national problem, a
campaign of education will be carried on to awaken the citizen to the perils that confront our rapidly
diminishing virgin timber. The public must be educated to the impending crisis in our timber and lumber
supply. The time is at hand when the country is actually threatened with a timber shortage. Truly is it
said that the sound of the axe has penetrated the last of our primeval forests. Effective means must
be used in combating forest insects and diseases, in eliminating the fire hazard, in studying the many
phases of better utilization of timber products, in correcting the appalling waste hitherto common to
lumbering operations, and in the propagation of new forests.
Most of our cut-over and burnt-over lands are an economic loss, paying little or no taxes, offering no
employment, building no cities, schools, factories, or roads, and bringing no prosperity to our people.
The fire hazard in our forests is a problem of the first magnitude. It is the vital duty of every
&itizen to give to this subject serious thought. The Ioss to the nation through forest fires is so great that
it is staggering to the intelligence. Over a ten-year period Oregon alone suffered the loss of more than
200,000 acres through forest fires. In this vast expanse of land, once covered by virgin timber, with
beauty and scenic grandeur unsurpassed, affording recreation and pleasure to thousands of our citizens,
can be found today only denuded hills, valleys choked with debris, devastated plains and abandoned
farms.
q The great bulk of this terrible fire toll is due to carelessness and to human agencies. Before any
program of forest protection can be made effective, the general public must Join in condemning the
careless camper, the vicious firebrand, the indifferent hunter, and the indiscreet Smoker, whose care-
lessness and utter disregard of the rights of others annually costs this country millions of dollars.
Therefore, I, WALTER M. PIERCE, Governor of the State of Oregon, by virtue of the authority in me
wested, do hereby declare April 18-24, inclusive, AMERICAN FOREST WEEK and urge every citizen
in our state to cooperate with all commercial organizations, clubs, fraternal orders, the Schools, the
pulpit, the press, the radio, business houses and offices, to the end that an awakened public may deal
effectively with the fire hazard which every season has swept over thousands of acres of our beautiful
forests, leaving in its wake frightful economic loss, blackened stumps, desolation and ruin.
In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the State of Oregon to be
hereto affixed this 1st day of April, A. D. 1926.
GOVERNOR.
BY THE GOVERNOR:
Secretary of Stoj

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