were billed to the clerks.
Mr. Lea. You billed them for the total amount delivered to the
teamsters ?
Mr. Hyde. Yes.
Mr. Lea. And then a report would come that they had not received
all they billed?
Mr. Hyde. Yes, sir; and then I would get out a statement to the
shipping clerk and ask him if he put all on the slip.
Mr, Lea. Do you know whether any adjustment was finally
made
Mr. Hyde. There was none at all.
Mr. Lea. Of those goods, or not ?
Mr. Hyde. The men were out and they got so much less.
Mr. Lea. The men
Mr. Hyde. The soldiers — I mean the men in the camp.
Mr. Lea. In the camp ?
Mr. Hyde. Yes.
Mr. Lea. Do you know that, or is that simply your conclu-ii^nj '
How long did you remain in this price-fixing business ?
Mr. Hyde. I stayed there only about two weeks.
Mr. Lea. Do you know what occurred after you left there?
Mr. Hyde. Only from hearsav. I know that occurred until there
was trainloads running, and then they sent this out on the tmin-
and this did not occur.
Mr. Lea. About the adjustments, did you know anything ab<*ui
what occurred after you left ?
Mr. Hyde. No; not after I left; during those two weeks -it wa-
almost three weeks.
Mr. Lea. Did you know of any instance in which the teamstir-
made trips back and recovered goods ?
Mr. Hyde. Some of them did; yes, sir; that is, some of them tuU
me they did. Others would not take the time.
Ml-. Lea. I think that is all. Just a minute. You spoke about
prices being marked on the goods. Whose prices were market! »>n
the goods ?
Mr. Hyde. That was on the mackinaw. They were selling som*
mackinaws for $8 and $10. They had a price marked; a little pi^*'
of cloth with *^$5'' printed on, in the inside of the collar.
Mr. Lea. That was a transaction with which the Government h»i
nothing to do ?
Mr. Hyde. Nothing to do with. Of course, it excited the men asi
they complained about it to their commanding officers.
Mr. Lea. Was that a printed price or handwriting?
Mr. Hyde. That was a printed price, sewed rio^ht into the mackina*
Their instructions were to charge just a little bit less than surroun !•
inff citias there.
Mr. Lea. That is, the men got them a little cheaper than at th-
ordinary retail stores ?
Digitized by
Google
AVIATION. 678
Mr. Hyde. The ordinary retail price; yes. In some cases they
charged just as much, but they usually were just a little bit cheaper.
Mr. Lea. Did you have any trouble with any of your officers there?
Mr. Hyde. No; not at all. The officers all did the best they pos-
sibly could do there.
Mr. Lea. How is that?
Mr. Hyde. I think the officers all did the best they possibly could,
as far as I know; they all worked hard.
Mr. Lea. I suppose vou were not familiar with the lumber industry
before you went out there, were you ?
Mr. Hyde. No; nine-tenths of the men were not.
Mr. Lea. The clearing of this acre of land; did you see that work?
Mr. Hyde. Yes; I was there almost every day diu-ing that period.
Mr. Lea. For what purpose was it used ?
Mr. Hyde. They ran the railroad — the main line ran through there.
Mr. Lea. What was the character of the timber that had to be
grubbed out ?
Mr. Hyde. Small spruce there and fir, and that is about all; just
^ruce and fir. The small trees, they had to grub them out. TTiey
oidn't use but very little dynamite there at that time.
Mr. Lea. What made it cost so much ? Because the men were
not working, or didn't have enough dynamite ?
Mr. Hyde. They had enough dynamite. I guess sometimes the
men did not work very hard if they were not pushed hard. Some-
times they would not have enough steel there, and other things.
The foreman would tell them to lay down, and they did not work.
Mr. Lea. You never laid off durmg that time ?
Mr. Hyde. No; I was a surveyor; I was just beyond there.
Mr. Lea. Did you actually Imow how much it cost to grub that
acre?
Mr. Hyde. No. Mr. Cunney was foreman at that time. He
thought it cost the Government probably $3,000 or over $2,000.
Mr. Lea. Was the grading done at that time?
Mr. Hyde. No; it was done at another time. The grading cost a
little more.
Mr. Lea. I believe that is all.
Mr. Frear. Is there anything you want to testify further — any-
thing of interest ?
Mr. Hyde. There was one remark about how Porter Bros, obtained
that job out there. I remember Joe Porter stating this at one time,
that they have built several cantonments, that tney had sufficient
money to swing it, and for that reason the Government turned that
job over to them, because they had enough money to swing it.
There was another rumor there that Mr. Gean was selhng some oi the
timber at Portland
Mr. Frear. Was it only a rumor, or something you knew about ?
Mr. Hyde. No; only a rumor.
Mr. Frear. Then don^t give it, if you have no knowledge of it.
(Witness excused.)
Digitized by
Google
674 WAR EXPENDITURES.
TESTIMONY B7 THOMAS D. FEBBY.
(The witness was first sworn bj Chairman Frear.)
Mr. Frear. Where do jou reside, Mr. Perry ?
Mr. Perry. Grand Rapids, Mich.
Mr. Frear. What is your business ?
Mr. Perry. I am vice president and manager of the Grand Rapids
Veneer Works.
Mr. Frear. Do you know anything about the spruce problem ?
Mr. Perry. In connection with the Grand Rapids Veneer Works,
we operate perhaps the largest company in this country, buildinp
one of the dry kilns ; and I was frequently called to Washington by
members of the Aircraft Board for consultation on the building of
lumber dry Irilns and the operation of kilns, in order to get this spiw
out as quickly as possible and with as little impairment as po^ible
in artificial drying.
Mr. Frear. Now, what is there about it .
Mr. Perry. My original connection with this came from an early
conference with Mr. STigh, when he asked me whether spruce Imnber
could be artificially dried green from the saw and be as good as the
air-dried lumber, which up to that time had been used as a standard
for strength. This was aoout the time Mr. Sligh was conducting hjs
own experiments in his own plant. Mr. Sligh had known of oar
company even before my connection with it and felt that if anvooe
could dry the lumber, we could. I told him I felt sure that it could
be dried, and I would conduct a series of experiments to inform him
along that line. I ordered a considerable quantity of various kin<b
of western and eastern and southern lumber by express prepared for
a test at Grand Rapids, and at Mr. Sligh's suggestion, asked him and
representatives of the Forests Production Laboratory at Madison and of
the Bureau of Standards at Washington. I knew all the time thtl
the forests production laboratory at Madison were very anxioas to
promote a dry kiln. That was their pet hobby, and the facts revealed
that. They finally very reluctantly attended the test.
In order to have an unimpeachable computation as the result ii
this test after the lumber was dried in regard to its strength, we ^nh-
mitted the samples after they had been dried in our kibis under our
conditions to the Forests Products Laboratory for their analysis o(
the results. They were very slow in getting out the results, becaos*
they did not want to discredit their own kiln or their own previousi
statements. The test was conducted — after Mr. Shgh's request m
June — from July 27, 1917, on into the first part of August, TV
results of the test, which Mr. SUgh and nearly all of the aircraft manu-
facturers wanted for their use, was not sent us until the 17th of May,
1918. I have the official copy of the report hero bearing that datr
The whole proposition was one of endeavoring to utilize a Govern-
ment laboratory kiln for all aircraft work, Government-oontvivi'd
policies of operation, rather than take a kiln which had been on ih^
market and had been proved practical by all kinds of wc>o<lwt>rk<*r*.
We had built at this time about 1,600 dry kilns in this count rv. Tbf
result to the Government was to require the installation ot a kilr.
that cost 50 per cent more to install and dry lumber half as f»>i ».'•
we could supply. The Government's own test — the GoveninieM -
own computations — prove lumber dried in our kilns excelled their air
Digitized by
Google
AVIATION. 675
dried standard by from 20 to 60 per cent; better than they required.
I have the various figures here and the different scientific terms.
Mr. Freab. Is that a copy or is that the original?
Mr. Perry. This is a compilation that I made or I had made in
our office of their report; because their own report was not expressed
in comparative terms.
Mr. Frear. Do you want to put that m evidence ?
Mr. Perry. I should be glad to supply a copy of it for you in
evidence.
Mr. Frear. Supply a copy of it. That is, a copy of the Govern-
ment's report.
Mr. Perry. A copy of my r6sum6 of the Govenmient's report.
(The said document was marked by the reporter for identification
'Terry Exhibit 1, August 11, 1919.^')
I was in close touch with all the artificial drying that was done in
aircraft plants all over the country. In fact, our company assigned
me to that work for the period of the war, and I was famiUar with
this work done in this so-called timber kiki.
Mr. Frear. How do you claim the Government did there with the
lumber ?
Mr. Perry. The Government decided in the six months to make
similar — I won't say similar — tests. In the six months' tests, a good
deal of the tests in every portion of the coimtry, the slowest and
most expensive kilns were built there at Vancouver at the barracks.
Mr. Frear. Did they attempt to dry it out there ?
Mr. Perry. They tried to dry it out there. We had a man ki
Seattle, Wash., and they said these were not wanted. They said
they would rather take a kiln manufactured by a Government labora-
tory, in which there was no chance for any private individual to make
any profit. In fact, all our work in our Government dry kilns was
less than the normal profit. It was a case where we gave om: services
and we were glad to give it.
Mr. Frear. Your contention is that the use of a kiln used by the
Government was much slower in point of operation ?
Mr. Perry. Yes, sir.
Mr. Frear. And cost more ?
Mr. Perry. And cost more, as shown by the tests. It was a con-
tention that was shared by nearly all of the practical aircraft manu-
facturers. There were several instances where we were asked to
build a kiln that had the features of the Government kiln, of the
Tiemann kiln, as well as the Grand Rapids kiln, that you might call a
bisexual kiln; it had both features. In every instance the practical
manufacturer chose our method rather than the Government's.
Mr. Frear. Who chose it ?
Mr. Perry. The practical aircraft manufacturers, such as the
Aircraft Co. of the New Jersey; Gallaudett people of East Greenwich,
R. I.; Alexandria Aircraft Co., of Alexandria, Va. ; Thomas Morse
Aircraft Co., of Ithaca, N. Y. ; West Virginia Aircraft Co., of Wheeling,
W. Va. ; and a good many other plants where aircraft work was taken
as a war measure, as was the case of Grand Rapids. I call to mind
thoseparticular plants that built special aircraft kilns. I should add
the West Woodworking Co., of Cnicago, to that list in its proper
order.
Digitized by
Google
676 WAR EXPENDITURES.
Mr. Tiemann is the wood tester at the Forests Products Laboratory
at Madison. He is an excellent student; knows wood thoroughly.
He has never been in the practical world. He has never had to make
a piece of equipment, produce a profit. He has never had to iDstall
it on contract. His decisions with regard to the method of building
and installing these kilns were changed all the time. We could not
be sure a kiln built one day would suit him the next day.
Mr. Frear. WeU, did he operate these kilns at Vancouver Bar-
racks ?
Mr. Perry. He claims to have done it, and one of his assistants
claimed to have done it; and they both hate each other like cats and
dogs.
Mr. Frear. Is it your contention that they did not perform the
work?
Mr. Perry. They did not perform the work, and they cost much
more than was necessary in order to have similar service.
Mr. Frear. That is when the product was sent from Vancouyer
Barracks ?
Mr. Perry. It was not so much it was sent out in improper con-
dition as it was that the capacity of the plant — the output —was yery
limited, and the cost of operation very nigh.
Mr. Frear. Well, did it have to be lain dried somewhere else when
sent from there ?
Mr. Perry. No, sir; but they ought to have gotten out in the
kilns they built about three times as much lumber as they did. Oar
drying period was 10 days; and the best information I have had, bj
hearsay, from Vancouver, 25 days. I have not been there, but we
have a report from our western representative.
Mr. Frear. Well, your own knowledge.
Mr. Perry. We have a western branch from which I have full
reports, and the record of Tiemann kilns that I personally verified at
the Day ton- Wright plant at Dayton, Ohio, was 38 days.
Mr. Frear. What I mean to say. Is it your contention that the
product was sent from the kilns at Vancouver in an unsuitable
condition ?
Mr. Perry. No, sir. I claim that-
Mr. Frear. The contention is that it cost more
Mr. Perry. And produced less.
Mr. Frear. And resulted in material delays.
Mr. Perry. Resulted in material delay. And in the building of
kilns that did not represent the best art at the time.
Mr. Frear. Any further facts you want to submit to the coid-
mittee ?
Mr. Perry. I should be glad to have any questions the committee
asks. I have the airplane specifications here which were framed up
on such a basis as to cause this unnecessary delay.
Mr. Frear. What do you mean by that; excluding companies like
yours?
Mr. Perry. No.
Mr. Frear. In what way ?
Mr. Perry. Retarding the drying, it requiring such low tempefv
tures as to delay drying three time longer than neoessarv. Th«r
final temperature which they allowed was 145 degrees. Yhe final
Digitized by
Google
Ayunon. 677
temperature which we used and which they passed as satisfactory
was 170 degrees. The final temperature in the dry kiln is, as Mr.
Sligh will tell you, the measure of its speed.
Mr. Lea. You think the speed with which it dries is unimportant,
except the sooner the better ?
Mr. Perry. My contention there is that it was the Government's
business to buy tne dry kiln that impartial tests in their own labora-
tory showed dried the material safely and in the quickest time.
Mr. Lea. You did do drying work for the Government, did you,
during the war ?
Mr. Perry. We built probably 75 dry kilns for practically aU of
the aircraft plants in this countrv.
Mr. Lea. And when did you begin installing those plants ?
Mr. Perry. The first one we installed in the Curtiss plant at
Buffalo in May, 1917.
Mr. Lea. And then you continued to install them after that, did
you ?
Mr. Perry. Contmued to install them after that until — ^well, my
memory won't tell me just how close to the armistice, but imtil the
summer before the armistice was signed.
Mr. Lea. How many did the ^vemment install on their own
account do you know?
Mr. Perry. I think the battery at Vancouver Barracks was 24
dry kilns; very crudely built, and in a way that no engineer would
construct them that knew anything of the process of lumber drying.
Mr. Lea. Were you out there when they were constructed?
Mr. Perry. I offered to go out there and I offered to have our
Seattle men come to Washington to do the job on a percentage basis ;
but they preferred to use tneiT own laboratory men, who had no
practical experience.
Mr. Lea. You were out there, though, were you, when they were
constructed ?
Mr. Perry. No, sir.
Mr. Lea. How long was it after they were constructed before you
saw them ?
Mr. Perry. I have my knowledge of the kilns as they were built,
from our Western representative; he watched them aU the time.
Mr. Lea. So you aon^t know that of your own knowledge?
Mr. Perry. And except as I met him several times since that time.
Mr. Lea. As you are informed. ^
Mr. Perry. Yes • as we get all our information of kilns built in
this country. Perhaps I ought to add most of the kilns were not
directly for the Government but were built directly under their
specifications and of the different inspectors in the dinerent aircraft
plants in this country.
Mr. Lea. So that your kilns were satisfactory to the Government
and to the Government inspectors ?
Mr. Perry. They repeatedly proved so. Of some 35 or more dry
kilns that were used in Grand Rapids for aircraft drying, practically
all were Grand Rapids kilns and practically all of them gave entire
satisfactory results. I know of no lumber condemned.
Mr. Lea. Now, who made these tests on which the Government
originally acted ?
Digitized by
Google
678 WAR EXPENDrrURES.
Mr. Perry. They were made at the Forests Products Laboratory
at Madison^ Wisconsin.
Mr. Lea. At what date ?
Mr. Perry. They came to us — ^were mailed to us on May 17, 191*^.
The letter is signed by Mr. Butler, and the tests are checfced by Mr.
G. E. Heck.
Mr. Lea. Now, you be^an installing these plants the month after
the war started, did you?
Mr. Perry. Yes, su*.
Mr. Lea. And when did the Government first instaU any? This
one at Vancouver ?
Mr. Perry. WeU, that is a difficult question to answer, b6caQ>«
plants like the Curtiss Aircraft at Buffalo and the American Propeller
Co. at Baltimore were practically Government plants, although thej
traded under private names; and I don't know how far the Govera-
men't dominated their management.
Mr. Lea. As I understand you, as I hear your testimony, that a>
a matter of fact your plants were installed before the Government
installed any.
Mr. Perry. Our plants
Mr. Lea. Just after the war started.
Mr. Perry. Our plants were installed by the practical manufa»-
turers whenever we could get a job. We were out to get busine -
and we sold every job that we could. ^
Mr. Lea. But the Government on its own accoxmt was not esUK-
lishing any ©xcept at Vancouver, was it ?
Mr. Perry. Tne Government on its own account was consistentlv
recommending against our dir kiln and in favor of their own kilii
and withholding, as I claim, this report which justifies it.
Mr. Lea. But I was talking about the ones actually estabUsheJ.
Mr. Perry. The only ones the Government actually built in thel'
own name was at Vancouver.
Ml*. Lea. And the Government tests were made by the Forfr'.
Products ?
Mr. Perry. Yes.
Mr. Sligh. Let me also add that the Bureau of Standards maile
tests, and that they are also taken in connection with the Forft^t*
Laboratory, because I operated on that myself.
Mr. Lea. Of course, the subject of your criticism is that ihej
should have adopted your plan from the beginning.
Mr. Perry. No, sir. I don't put it on that — if you will pardon ^:^
Mr. Lea. I am not inferring anything improper.
Mr. Perry. I would rather put that this way: Mtr contentioD i:-
that they should have had some record or practical experience m
woodworking manufacture rather than to take, without any dilution
recommendations of a laboratory who think and act and operate »»:.
laboratory plans without regard to either economy or efficiency.
Mr. Lea. Who did pass upon that matter for t6e Government '
Mr. Perry. There were quite a number of representatives i>f tL?
Aircraft Board in different plants, and in many cases the mspert. r
individually made his recommendations. Inspectors were frequftiii'
men hardly out of college, who did not know an ash board from a pir*
stump. In many instances they tried to design their own dry falrc
Digitized by
Google
AVIATION. 679
these youngsters from cpllege^ with rather sad results. My only
contention is, and my only reason for wanting to appear here, is to
point out the fact that practical experience was disregarded by the
Govemment in securing results, on top of a demonstration that is
entirely conclusive in their own words.
Mr. Lea. Well, of course, the doctors frequently disagree, even
though ttiey have practiced together a while. That is all.
Mr. Fbjbab. I suppose what you mean is, a lack of efficiency, which
resulted in not only useless expense to the Govemment, but in material
delay.
Mr. Ferbt. In material delay, and the regret that the fellow who
hopes to be patriotic sees any such terrible bungling over a thing
that he has made a life mistake.
Mr. Frear. You receive some recommendation, especially when
the Grovemment is admitting the value of your kiln.
Mr. Perry. I would hke to divorce your minds from this, any
desire that I might have had for business. We were naturally out
for business.
Mr. Frear. Yes.
Mr. Perry. But I am not saying what I say for that reason. I
have a pride in my own trade and business. I like to see the best
things aone in that line. I honestly tried to render any service I
could during the war to our people. Our company said, "Do any-
thing you can without stint of expense to render service without
regard to whether we get paid for it or not.'' And that is what I
tried to do, and it was the hardest job I ever had to make any im-
pression on any of these people who were in charge of that work.
Mr. Frear. Well, of com^e, there are a good manv subordinates
necessarily. If you had come in contact with those higher up, you
might have received some recognition.
Mr. Perry. Well, I traveled all the aislea in Washington.
Mr. Lea. There are over 7,000 people had inventions in plumbing
devices and air inventions to press on the people at Washington.
Every fellow thought he had the best one.
Mr. Perry. Well, I
Mr. Lea. It is your child, and everyone thinks it is better than his
neighbor's. The War Department is up against that. What we
want is facts. We have to be just to those people.
Mr. Perry. Yet we had something that had been a demonstrated
success for 10 or 15 years. It was not a new experiment. It was
not brought out by the war.
Mt. Lea. I am not casting reflections on that.
Mr. Perry. I understana your point.
Mr. Lea. You see the other side of it.
Mr. Perry. Oh, yes.
Mr. Frear. Thank you very much for coming down.
(Witness excused.)
Digitized by
Google
680 WAB EXPENDITURES.
TESTIMONY OF MAJ. CHABLES B. SLIGH— Besmiied.
Mr. Lea. You are the owner of timber out in Oregon and Wash-
ington, I believe you said.
Mr. Sligh. I am at present in two companies that own nearly a
billion feet of timber in Oregon and Washington.
Mr. Lea. You are, I suppose, conducting sawmills ?
Mr. Sligh. No; we ai*e not. It is just a holding proposition. I
was interested in a sawmill at Monroe, Wash., and also one at Everett.
Wash., but I sold out all my interest in those. The last interest 1
had was about 1909.
Mr. Lea. You were actively engaged in operating these milb.
were you ?
Mr. Sligh. No; my business is to manufacture the furniture.
Those were investments I made as a side investment. They arp
both profitable. And we had an opportunity to sell out, and we sold
at a ^ood profit. I had been interested in sawmills in Michigan and
in Mississippi and in Wisconsin and in Washington for the last— thai
is, up to that time I sold out — that was the last one. But I had
previously to that for 15 years had an interest in other mills «» v^
were using in connection with our furniture business.
Mr. Lea. What I was really getting at, I understood you were a
practical logger; that is, a mill man.
Mr. Sligh. WeH^ I am a practicable furniture manufacturer; and
as I say, my interest, from my financial interest in these milk,
familiarized me more or less with logging and with sawmill operation^
I did not give them only incidentally my personal attention, becao^
my larger interests were home.
Mr. Lea. And when did you enter the service ?
Mr. Sligh. I entered the service as a volunteer of the Airoraft Pn>-
duction Board on June 17, 1917.
Mr. Lea. You were a member of the Council of National Defenv.
were you ?
Mr. Sligh. No; I was not. The Aircraft Board was authoriz^^i
by the Council of National Defense April 12, 1917, and Howanl Fl
Coffin was made a chairman of that Aircraft Board, with auth<vnt\
to name the other members, and in June he called on me, as I ha^l
been recommended to him, and I took service with him on Jane IT
purely as a volunteer, and paid my own expenses.
Mr. Lea. What was your idea, as I understand, you gave them th^
wrong age ?
Mr. wSligh. I did not have to give any age when I went down tb<H-r