Good news, boys and girls. 'Wood Magic' returning to MSU!

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An event that once attracted thousands of elementary school students to the Mississippi State campus returns next week after a seven-year absence.

What now will be the university's eighth annual Wood Magic Science Fair takes place Monday-Friday [Oct. 20-24] at the R.T. Clapp Forest Products Laboratory on Blackjack Road. More than 3,000 fourth-graders and their teachers from around the state are expected to attend.

Sponsored by the College of Forest Resources and the forest products department, Wood Magic illustrates the values and uses of one of the Magnolia State's most abundant natural resources. Activities and exhibits illustrate everything from the strength of a toothpick-sized piece of pine to the process of papermaking.

Major events include:

• A portable sawmill that turns rough logs into lumber and helps introduce such terms as heartwood, sapwood and residues;
• "Wood sandwiches" that illustrate how plywood is made;
• Furniture testing, including computerized evaluations of seat cushions and frames;
• "Bubbling bazookas" that transform small oak billets into bubble blowers and illustrate wood's density, permeability and other characteristics; and
• Wildlife skulls, antlers and horns, to better understand an animal's distinctive biological features and lifestyles.

For more information about the 2008 Wood Magic Science Fair, contact David Jones at 662-325-8454.

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Forest Products