Proclamation 3616—National Forest Products Week, 1964

Whereas this Nation has, from the days of its inception, been blessed with forest resources that have made it a beautiful and a bountiful country; and

Whereas those forest resources sustained our forebears and immeasurably contributed to this Nation's growth, wealth, and prosperity by providing a wide variety of products essential to life, commerce, and progress; and

Whereas the forest products industry is one of the largest industries in this Nation; employing 1.7 million workers who turn out 27 billion dollars worth of products each year and who receive 5.7 billion dollars in wages and salaries annually; and

Whereas our forest resources are so closely related to the welfare of all Americans that it is fitting that we set aside a special day to direct public attention to those resources and to the people associated with the industry; and

Whereas the Congress, wishing to reemphasize the importance and the potential of our forest heritage, has by a joint resolution approved September 13, 1960 (74 Stat. 898), designated the seven-day period beginning on the third Sunday of October in each year as National Forest Products Week, and has requested the President to issue an annual proclamation calling for the observance of that week:

Now, Therefore, I, Lyndon B. Johnson, President of the United States of America, do hereby call upon the people of the United States to observe the week beginning October 18, 1964, as National Forest Products Week, with activities and ceremonies designed to direct public attention to the prominent role of our forest resources and our forest resources industry in contributing to the economic growth of our Nation, and to the significance of those resources as a base for the continued progress of rural America.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States of America to be affixed.

DONE at the City of Washington this 18th day of September in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and sixty-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and eighty-ninth.

LYNDON B. JOHNSON

By the President:

DEAN RUSK,

Secretary of State.