Letters/Errata

Abstract

Maine's Public Lands The illustrations for Lloyd Irland's article on “Rufus Putuam's Ghost: An Essay on Maine's Public Lands, 1783–1820” in the April 1986 Journal of Forest History contained two errors: the chart on page 61 should have indicated the “end of Massachusetts holdings” in 1854 rather than in 1878, and true north for the map of Township 18 on page 67 is actually toward the upper right rather than the upper left of the portion shown. World Sawmill Records Howard W. Blagen of Mokelumne Hill, California, contests the claim of the “world's sawmill record” made on behalf of the Brown Company's Berlinh, New Hampshire, mill by William G. Gove in the April 1986 JFH (“New Hampshire's Brown Company and Its World-Record Sawmill”). Mr. Blagen reports that in the early 1920s the Grays Harbor Lumber Company mill in Hoquiam, Washington (owned by the Blagen family), “set production records for a single-cut band mill for sustained periods” of 340,000 to 350,000 board feet per shift, “or over one million feet per day” with three shifts. Much of the mill's production went into “Jap ties or squares” three or four feet square, which were shipped to Japan for resawing. Mr. Gove's article mentioned such later western records on page 87: “ The complex west coast mills of a later decade quadrupled this record production,” although he believed that the west coast records depended on “using a combination of machines.” Differences in sawmill equipment, timber, and final lumber sizes make any final or definitive claims about world's records almost impossible; certainly both the New Hampshire and Washington crews deserve to be remembered for their achievements. Another Facet of New England Forest History Mr. Robert E. Wolf of St. Leonard, Maryland, points out that Howard S. Russell's A Long, Deep Furrow: Three Centuries of Farming in New England (Hanover, New Hampshire: University Press of New England, 1976) provided much information on an aspect of New England's forest history not covered in the April 1986 JFH: the interaction between forests and agriculture. Beyond the give-and-take of forested and cleared land according to the ups and downs of the farm economy, Russell's book mentions regulations meant to guarantee the supply of firewood for Boston, ordinances protecting shade trees on town streets, the industrial use of wood for fuel, and the economically important manufacture of wood products during the winter by farm families.