NEWS BR[EFS

Weyerh,aeuse'r Co. has made a bid to acquire Dicrks Forests Inc., Hot Springs, Ark., for $350 million. despite big W's earlier brave talk, their first major acquisition appears to be another forest products co.. DiGiargio Corp. has bought, for $3 million, the mills of /. R. Simplot Co., Boise, Idaho; included are lumber mills at Chiloquin, Ore. and Camptonville, Calif. and a millwork complex at Auburn, Calif.

Southwest Forest Industries bought Wide' field Homes Enterprises, Colorado Springs homebuilder, for an undisc]osed amount of SWF common stock . Banh ol America says now that Calif. housing starts will be 160,000 this year, rather than 180,000.. nationally, housing starts in April (latest figures) dropped' 2/o, the third consecutive monthly decline..

Euans Products new warehouse distri' bution center in Renton, Wash., is now open Western Building Material Assn. is site-seeking for their new HQ location in Olympia, Wash.; no word yet when the move from Seattle will be made . Boise Cascade has reputedly bought ld'aco Lum' ber Co., a Healdsburg, Calif., firm that makes trusses and manu{actured housing

The .Nl'l. Assn. ol Horne Build'ers has approved continuing the I|/a surtax and repeal of the 7/o investment tax credit. South Bay Redwood Co., Hawthorne, Calif', plans a late summer-early fall move to new quarters in Orange Bel Air Door is now the So. Calif. distributor of St. Regis doors.

Ore. Senntors Hatfield and, Packwood, want the Interior Dept. to study possibility of a neut nt'\. park in the Cascades faulty wiring was probably to blame for the $50,000 fire at Ced,ar Mill Lumber & Hardware, Portland in April . . trIt. Hood, Building Supply, Portland, was razed by fire six days later, some lumber in the yard was saved

George A. Christi.e, chief economist for F. W. Dodge, says it's not likely the cur' rent pace of construction can last for long in the face of recent credit restraints and interest rate hikes computerized com' munications will allow Union Pa'cific RR to monitor all trains on its 9,600 miles system'round the clocle .

Shareholders approved the Ceorgia-Pacific lwo-Iorone stock split and increase in shares from 25 million to 75 million . . Neiman-Rei.d, Lumber Cily plans to open a new yard in Thousands Oaks, Calif., by late summer, also one in Ventura, Calif., in 1970 . Oregon sta.te senator Ted' Hallock called on the state highway commission to use more wood in the buildine ofhighways...

Dant & Russell plans to sell its stock to the public for the first time, they were founded in 1904 . . . $1.5 trillion will be needed over the next 30 years i{ America is to house everyone in 2000 A.D., OwensCorning warns . . Tum-a-Lwn Lumber, The Dalles, Ore., recently opened their new yard opposite the old set-up .

Suaerhrup Lumber, closed after 40 plus years in Riverside, Calif., has been leveled and the site cleared . Euans Products Co. plans to acquire Commercial Lumber Co., Ltd., in British Columbia more than 1 million acres oI non-federal land were restocked with trees last year, the Forest Service says, 99/o ol that land is priuately owned,

Vickes Corp. plans to spend $I9.5 million in the fiscal year ending Jan. to expand its retail and manufacturing capacity

E. L. McNeely moves up to be Wickes president and chief executive officer. Fibreboard Corp. plans to buy Bate Ply' wood Co. and Merlin Forest Products, both of Oregon for about #7.05 mi,llion. combined, the mills will have 375 employees..

More than 7 million will see NBC TV's program bn constructive practices in today's timber industry . . Ed Clifi, chief of the Forest Service says annual tirnber output from national forests could be upped 2/g, more roads and money will do it, he says the plywood ass'n. quotes forecasts cl 1.3 millian housing starts in '69, though many experts now see 1.5-1.6

Wcrlom Lurnbcr & Building Mot€fiq1s ,VIEICHANT

Ameriq,n Forest Prod,ucts CorP. in' creased its lst quarter earnings by la9/o on a sales increase oI 24/o more than 60,000 bf. of fire-protected' wood studs, plates and blocking are used in a new 12 story dorm. on the San Jose State College campus in Calif. . Nt'L. Particleboard' lssn. members are pushing a grademark program for the underlaYment theY make...

Tight money will d'rop interest rates' ac' cording to economist Karl Brunner, who sees them I/o lower by the end of '70 Boise Cascad,e is increasing the capacity of its La Grande, Ore. particleboard plant by I00%, they put $5 million into its ex' pansion Pichering Lumber Corp. plans a new planning mill at Sonorq Calif., the mill plus other modernization, will cost m.ore than $1 million . -

The Pacific coast's first conta.iner crane to handle containerized shipments from both Far'East and, Europe will be operating at Los Angeles Harbor by mid'summer Union Pacific, since '64 spent $581 million on new rolling stock, $85 million on its roadway and $44 million on other maintenance; they currently have on order $222 million worth of new rail equipment Boysen Paint Co. (their new name) also has a new label design .

International Paper has launched in Japan a $10 million ship to haul U.S. pulp and paper overseas , , Knott's Berry Farm, Los Angeles, is opening a new ride featur' ing the mythical Calico Log and' Lumber Co., included is a 2,000' waterway ride in a hollowed out log . a N-AWLA suruey of its members showed a record sales volume $2.006 billion, the lumber wholesalers didonly ff40 million in nonlumber items

Mould,ings, Inc., of Marion, Va., the nation's largest pre-finisher of wood and plastic moulding has agreed to buy Tirnberline Forest Prod,ucts, Inc., Santa Ana; former owner Dicl Snyder remains as gen. mgr., no price was released . Masonite Corp. has opened a new distribution center in La Mirada, Calif. April contracts for luture construction showed a modest re' covery from March's sharp decline. ..

More than 1L7 mi,llion nero trees were started during the just-ended planting sea' son on G-P land... nearly 3 million fam' ilies now own a second or vacation home.