Items of Interest April 3, 1915 Issue

Items of Interest

Plans for leasing hotel sites, camp sites, store sites, and cottage sites located in the Appalachian national forest in Maine and New Hampshire, are being formulated by the forest service, in compliance with a provision in the new agricultural appropriation bill. This section gives to the secretary of agriculture the authority to lease plots of ground up to five acres, situated in the national forests, for periods of thirty years, to parties desiring to comply with the government's terms. Hitherto it has been possible to lease plots for terms of only one year.

It is expected that within the next few months the title to the land surrounding Russell pond, near Woodstock, N. H., will pass to the federal government. If this transfer takes place soon enough, the forest service will lease plots at rates yet to be determined, to persons desiring to establish summer cottages or camps. Conferences of officials of the service are being held for the purpose of settling matters of detail, most important among which will be the planning of the camps for the best convenience and comfort of all concerned. The headquarters of the forest service for the northern Appalachian region are at Gorham, N. H. The thirty-year leasing clause in the appropriation bill will, it is believed, result in a stimulation of the use of the national forests for recreation purposes.

As a result of the work of the municipal lake shore reclamation commission, created in 1910, the city of Chicago now owns the entire lake front between Grant and Jackson parks with the single exception of the Chicago Beach hotel tract between Forty-ninth and Fifty-first streets. When the commission was named the city was in control of only two small tracts in this stretch, the pumping station tract at Thirty-ninth street and East End park between Fifty-first and Fifty-third streets. Negotiations toward securing the Chicago Beach hotel tract are now well under way, which will give the city also this frontage. The commission was formed to acquire possession of the lake front. It was given substantial support by civic bodies. Through its efforts, scattered attempts to regain the lake shore from individuals were united and the question of title was settled in favor of the city.

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