18 EDUCATION IN FORESTEY. 



has consisted in establishing the foundations of forestry in public policy, men 

 not necessarily possessed of a technical forestry training. To the technical 

 group belong the research specialists who are laying the foundations of forestry 

 in the woods. These men as specialists are indispensable, but can we depend 

 upon them alone to establish the practice of forestry? Until the advent of the 

 trained forester, forest agitation got nowhere except as a land policy, which is 

 pure economics. On the other hand, the purely technical side of a foresters 

 training tends to make him contemptuous of the economic side, and to regard 

 popular education as hot air because it does not teach him anything new, and 

 speech making as an ordeal to be shunned. These ultratechnical foresters 

 remind one of the text, " and like a lamb, dumb before his shearers, so opened 

 he not his mouth." They are absolutely dependent for their livelihood as 

 foresters upon the efforts of the economic group, or upon conditions created by 

 these efforts, or else are forced to seek other employment; yet because of the 

 defective specialization in their education these foresters are unable and un- 

 willing in many cases to support this group. Of the two, the economist is bound 

 to have the broader outlook, but he is often impractical. The fundamental 

 defect of a too narrow specialist is intolerance and lack of comprehension of 

 cither one or both of the three phases or aspects of enterprise, which leads him 

 to belittle instead of encouraging those engaged in these other roles, thus oper- 

 ating not to build up the enterprise but to unscrew the bolts which hold it 

 together. 



Specialization without vision is not the result of education but of the lack 

 of it. The laborer is a technician, usually excelling in some line, even if it is 

 hod carrying, and with all the benighted insolence of superiority which this 

 excellence gives when not accompanied by a comprehension of the functions 

 of those who are not technicians. The utter disregard of practical affairs 

 shown by the dreamer of Utopian theories or narrow economist, when joined 

 with this technical bigotry, is capable of consuming the world. The mathe- 

 matical or business specialist, typified by the clerk, has no soul above figures. 

 As the old Yale song has it, " now, which of these three persons would you 

 most prefer to be?" The answer is, " The man behind," w T hich, being interpreted, 

 means the leader or organizer, the one who welds together these three elements 

 which were never intended to be discordant or warring ; the practical man who 

 possesses not one but all three traits harmoniously developed ; who is a thorough 

 technician, understanding the art of successful forestry ; who is a sound econo- 

 mist, understanding human nature and the relations of the industry to demand ; 

 but who above all is a practical business man, an administrator, w r ho can success- 

 fully direct large undertakings and produce, in fact, the perfect cooperation 

 required of forestry as of any other business. 



Such men are possessed of the qualities of leadership, and they wjll become 

 leaders as certainly as oil rises to the surface of water. It is not an accident 

 that a very careful survey some three years ago of all the graduates of the 

 Yale school of forestry showed that over 70 per cent had, in their career subse- 

 quent to graduation, demonstrated this ability for leadership. 



But what is the role of a forest education in producing this type of person? 

 Is he born that way? Can you make leaders by mere school training? There 

 is not one of these three elements that is not better learned outside of college 

 than in it. Economics means the study of human nature, not from books but 

 at first hand, in the woods and factory, in public life. Technique means doing 

 things, and the best way to learn how is to do them or be very close to them. 

 Hence the scorn of the sophisticated laborer for the greenhorn with the edu- 

 cation. And where else can a man learn the rules of business than in the 



