Portal:Oregon/Selected article/93

The Spruce Production Division was a unit of the United States Army established in 1917 to supply the army with high quality spruce and other wood products needed for the production of combat aircraft and ships for the United States war effort in World War I. The division was part of the Army's Signal Corps. Its headquarters were in Portland, Oregon, and its main operations center was at Vancouver Barracks in Vancouver, Washington. Workers in the division were members of the Loyal Legion of Loggers and Lumbermen, a union specifically established to support the Army's wood production operations. Originally, the Spruce Production Division was authorized to induct 10,317 troops, including both officers and enlisted men, but in May 1918, the division was authorized to grow to 28,825 personnel. The armistice that ended World War I was signed on November 11, 1918, and the next day all Spruce Production Division logging ended. The impact of the Spruce Production Division continued long after the unit was deactivated. Not only did the division dramatically increase the production of forest products for the war effort, the transportation network it built helped open up Pacific Northwest forests to greater use in the decades that followed. In addition, the division's work rules became the standard for logging and sawmill operations throughout the Pacific Northwest well into the 1930s.