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Wood products would play a vital ping crates, tank models, troop housing, Army laundries, hospitals, portable bridges, recreation centers, laboratories, chapels, offices, mess halls, naval air bases, hangars, ships, drydocks, shipyards, defense factories, scaffolding, wharves, pontoons, ties, poles, props, anti-tank barriers, shoring, shelters, lockers, gas mask filters, lifeboat covers, plywood to black out windows, and thousands of other uses. By late 1942,997o of all U.S. lumber shipments went into war, defense and priority-controlled essential civilian uses.

It took just two weeks in 1942 for Weyerhaeuser to build a special mini-sawmill in Longview, Wa., install second hand machinery and begin producing special timber for aircraft lumber. A few months earlier, Penberthy Lumber Co. opened a new yard in Los Angeles exclusively to remanufacture, process and dry airplane spruce lumber for the glider and aircraft program. The next year, Batr Lumber Co. converted its Santa Ana, Ca., yard and mill to produce barges.

Ironically, the lurnber industry, which had long derided substitute materials for encroaching on its markets, now saw wood being called to play roles always filled by steel and other "war metals." Wood was used to produce explosives, rubber, flour, glass, photographic supplies, dyes, clothing, motor fuel, even food.

Wood technology exploded, as researchers began treating, twisting, laminating and otherwise controlling the shape and strength of wood in order to make it serve war purposes that were undreamed of months earlier.

Not every sector of the industry thrived during the War. On April 9, 1942, the War Production Board outlawed all construction not essential to war effort since it diverted labor, materials or equipment. Building already in progress could continue, rigidly controlled, but no new projects costing over $500 could be started. The freeze made it illegal for retailers to sell their prod-

"The manufacturers have no serious selling problems," Jack Dionne wrote in The Merchanl, which throughout the War featured a regular Honor Roll of Lumbermen in the Armed Services. "Theirs is now a problem of intelligent supply. Their brains and energies are devoted to trying to meet the exigencies of the situation in the best possible manner."'

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VV HeN World War II ended, the U.S. faced an unprecedented shortage of housing brought on by 16 years of depression and war. During the next 10 years, more than 10 million American families would become new homeowners. Annual housing starts exceeded 1 million in 1950. and never looked back. For the first time, home ownership surpassed 60%.

Like the U.S. itself. the nation's 26,(n0 lumber retailers prospered. They became more efficient and reduced handling costs through the development of mechanized and time saving equipment, improved methods of inventory control, and the continued training of the more than 100,000 men hired by retail yards after the war.

Sales were also aided by a record birthrate, low-interest. lowdown payment government loans, a surge in remodeling, and the emer- gence of a new customer, the *doit-yourself enthusiast. "

July 15, 1956, Vol.35, No.2: Gordon-MacBeath Hardwoods sometimes stressed the unusual, such as top quality imprted bamboo poles" in random diameters and lengrths.

With defense spending remaining high, keeping steel in short sup ply, wood technology research continued strong after the war. The development of the TECO ring connector helped enlarged lumber's use as an engineering material, while strides made in perfecting glues and gluing techniques created glue-laminated members, opening up countless more uses for wood. Glue-laminated beams, trusses, columns and solid members could be built up in an endless variety of sizes, shapes, lengths and styles.

The wood products industry played a vital role in rebuilding America. As the then-president of the National Assn. of Home Builders told lumber merchants in 1955: 'Tn providing good homes, good designs and good values, we are making it possible to build better citizens and a better nation for us all."