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THE HISTORY OF FORESTRY IN AMERICA 



W. N. SPARHAWK 



The history of forestry in the United 

 States can be divided into five periods. 



The first, the colonial period ending 

 in 1776, was characterized by a grad- 

 ual pushing back of the forests to make 

 room for settlement, nearly all east of 

 the Allegheny-Appalachian Range. 



The second period, from 1776 to the 

 beginning of forestry work in the Fed- 

 eral Department of Agriculture, lasted 

 just 100 years. This was a period of 

 forest exploitation, gradual at first, but 

 rapidly increasing after about 1850. 



The following 2 1 years, also a period 

 of accelerated exploitation, was marked 

 by the campaign of public education 

 and propaganda that finally led to the 

 establishment of a forestry policy for 

 Government timberlands in 1897. 



From 1897 to 1919 was the period of 

 development of the national forest sys- 

 tem and the establishment of a forestry 

 profession. The movement for conser- 

 vation of natural resources in general 

 also took shape early in this period. 



Finally, the period since 1919 has 

 been marked by an increasing emphasis 

 on private forestry, both in legislation 

 and in the policies of the forest-land 

 owners themselves. 



Several salients stand out in the story 

 of how forestry and the country grew 

 up from a spoiled, wasteful childhood 

 to rational adulthood. In its broad 

 outline, forestry in the United States is 

 evolving in much the same way as it 

 did in Europe, but much faster. For- 

 estry in America has not caught up 

 with forestry in the more advanced 

 European countries, but we have come 

 a long way in our brief period as a 

 Nation, and the progress we have made 

 came not from slavishly copying the 

 European pattern; American forestry, 

 as it grows to maturity, tends more and 

 more to become indigenous. 



DURING THE COLONIAL PERIOD, wood 

 was a necessity, but it was overabun- 



dant and free for the taking. The for- 

 ests harbored Indians and wild beasts 

 and encumbered the ground needed for 

 crops and pastures. So the pioneers, in 

 the words of GifTord Pinchot, "came 

 to feel that the thing to do with the for- 

 est was to get rid of it." 



Local wood shortages sometimes 

 arose near the larger towns despite the 

 abundant supplies, because transporta- 

 tion facilities were poor. This occasion- 

 ally led to restrictions on cutting, until 

 the timber farther back could be open- 

 ed up. Timber export from New Eng- 

 land began with or before the first set- 

 tlement masts and hand-made staves, 

 clapboards, and shingles at first, and 

 later sawn lumber, staves, and ship tim- 

 bers. These commodities formed the 

 basis of a thriving trade with the West 

 Indies and with Europe. The English 

 Government, anxious to insure a sup- 

 ply of masts for the Royal Navy and to 

 prevent other countries from getting 

 them, attempted to reserve all white 

 pine trees that were suitable for masts, 

 but succeeded only in arousing the re- 

 sentment of the colonists. These and 

 similar ordinances and regulations were 

 essentially police measures for the pro- 

 tection of town and crown property, 

 and had nothing to do with forestry. 



Perhaps the best-known attempt at 

 forest conservation during the colonial 

 period was William Penn's provision, 

 in 1681 or 1682, that an acre should be 

 maintained in forest for every five 

 cleared in lands granted by him. So far 

 as known, this provision was not long 

 enforced. 



IN THE FIRST CENTURY of independ- 

 ence, settlement spread over most of 

 the country. Transcontinental railroads 

 were built. Wooden ships were on their 

 last voyages. The westward migration 

 had already caused the abandonment 

 of many farms in the Northeast and the 

 Southeast. Most of the old-growth 



