Wood as a Material

Wood is one of our most abundant and valuable materials. To primitive man it supplied shelter, utensils, fuel and weapons. Men soon learned that wood could be shaped and several pieces joined together to make all manner of useful things. With the advance of civilization other materials have replaced wood for some purposes, but there has been, at the same time, a very large increase in the number and variety of new products manufactured from wood or wood fibres. Some of these are paper, plywood, furniture, plastics, veneer, wallboards and ad-hesives. It would in fact be difficult to imagine our way of life without wood.