334 
With these preliminary statements, we may now turn to our im- 
mediate subject, The Growth of the Forestry Idea in Pennsylvania. 
In 1877, the State Board of Agriculture began an active advocacy 
of forest restoration in this State; no less than five papers dealing 
with the different aspects of the problem were printed in its report 
for that year. In 1878, there were two brief papers. The current 
was started, and from that time on to the present, each year has 
witnessed a more or less extended presentation of the subject in the 
agricultural reports of Pennsylvania. 
Among the contributors are Prof. Meehan, Josiah Hoopes, Frank- 
lin B. Hough, Thomas J. Edge, Prof. William A. Buckhout, Dr. John 
P. Edge, Dr. W. S. Roland, and the writer. The report of Dr. Roland 
is, up to this time, the most painstaking and satisfactory that has been 
produced on the trees of Pennsylvania. It serves, however, to illus- 
trate how much the State is in need of a full, reliable report bear- 
ing on every aspect of the subject. Nothing better than the report 
of Dr. Roland could have been produced at the time and under the 
circumstances. In 1885, the Senate resolved and the House con- 
curred in a resolution requesting the Governor to appoint one day 
each year as ‘‘ Arbor Day.’’ This resolution received the Gover- 
nor’s signature: but for some reason, a similar resolution was 
passed at the next session of the Legislature, 1887, which resolution, 
however, originated this time in the House. What the ultimate 
outcome of the day may be here, it is impossible to predict ; though 
the promise is not encouraging. It was natural enough that Arbor 
day should have been eagerly adopted in treeless States. The case 
is wholly different in a Commonwealth ranking as the second 
lumber-producing State in the Union. ‘There was not only indif- 
ference, but actual hostility, in some quarters, to any agitation of 
the forestry problem. Until within a brief period even the lumber- 
men recognized neither utility nor sense in it. 
The year 1877, however, produced another active force in mould- 
ing public opinion in favor of forest conservation and restoration. 
The legacy of F. Andre Michaux (commonly here called The 
Younger Michaux), a member of this Society, became available as 
a fund which could be legitimately devoted to the support of a 
course of forestry lectures, 
It would be clearly improper to fail to record the fact that the 
earliest funds available in this country for instruction in a science 
which every other civilized government had come to recognize as 
