524 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



spring, and make the station their headquarters when they go to the lumbering 

 camps of that region in the winter. It is there that the great problems of the 

 Lakes forest will be solved, and the original work of solving these problems 

 will be a tremendous stimulation to both faculty and students, for no man 

 can teach a subject successfully unless he himself is studying and developing it. 



The curriculum has three objects in view: (1) the training of a competent 

 and fully equipped professional forester; (2) a well-rounded scientific educa- 

 tion; (3) the teaching of such subjects as will make a man at home and satis- 

 fied in the woods. 



The first group naturally receives the most attention. It consists of 

 courses in dendrology, silviculture, surveying, drawing, protection, mensura- 

 tion, management, lumbering, lumber manufacturing, forest by-products, and 

 forest economics, tree diseases, forest entomology and wood technology. The 

 time spent at Itasca, Cloquet and the lumber camps is looked upon as labora- 

 tory work. The sophomores are encouraged to take jobs in the woods for the 

 summer months and most of them are placed in the forests of the Rockies and 

 the Pacific Coast. 



A broad, all-round education is necessary both on account of the scope 

 of the forester's duties and connections, and for the reason already stated that 

 all those who study forestry will not continue in the profession. This is true 

 at the present time and will be even more true in the future. The graduate 

 school gets this work ready made, but the undergraduate school must do it 

 for itself. To fulfill this object courses are given in botany, geology, chemistry, 

 zoology, languages and economics. The amount of this work offered is limited 

 onlv bv the time available. 



The third group receives the least time and attention but is nevertheless 

 vital. No man can make a success of his business unless he is thoroughly 

 interested in it and contented with it. This he cannot be if he is not in sym- 

 pathy with his surroundings. There are no horse shows, theater parties, foot- 

 ball games and other social amusements in the back woods where the forester's 

 work will take him; there may not be a single soul within hailing distance 

 with whom he can talk of the things which used to be part of his life. If he 

 still depends on those things for his amusement he will be lonely and his trials 

 will be many. All stones will be rock, all flowers brush, and all other forms 

 of life varmints to be shunned or neglected as he may deem them dangerous or 

 harmless. With botany, geology, zoology, entymology and a knowledge of 

 game and fish every particle of woods life takes on an interest that is irre- 

 sistible, and loneliness in the woods is almost impossible. This intimacy with 

 woods life is no small part of the benefit of the months at Itasca. 



