FORESTRY LEGISLATION. 25 



INFLUENCE OF THE DIVISION OF FORESTRY ON THE FORESTRY MOVEMENT. 



In 1876, when the first agency to report on forestry was established in the Department, the 

 very word "forestry" was absent from the dictionaries, and the word u forester J1 was defined as 

 u an officer appointed to watch a forest or chase and to preserve the game (English)." 



The idea of an art by that name and of its objects and methods did not exist among our peo- 

 ple, except with a few who had traveled abroad. 



To-day there is hardly a week when not one or more of the daily journals discuss with consid- 

 erable familiarity some phase of interest pertaining to forestry, and it has become a matter of 

 daily conversation, a topic of public lectures and magazine articles. 



That the Division has been the most potent influence in bringing about this change can be 

 readily shown by the constant references to it when the subject is discussed, by the voluminous 

 quotations from its publications, and by the uncredited, nevertheless often almost verbatim, 

 restatements of its utterances by writers for the public press. 



There are in existence now one national (since 1S82) and a number of State and local forestry 

 associations engaged in promoting the subject in their various spheres of action. The Division, 

 or at least its chief, has been either an active member or officer of some of these organized bodies, 

 or else has been instrumental or helpful in bringing them into existence or assisting with advice or 

 contributions to their programme. 



Many other associations organized for the promotion of allied purposes discuss the subject of 

 forestry at their meetings, and their proceedings show not only the stimulating influence of the 

 work of the Division, but contain a large number of contributions to their publications from the 

 same source. 



Some twenty agricultural colleges have incorporated into their courses lectures on forestry, 

 and " professors of forestry," usually the botanist or horticulturist, at these institutions impart 

 their knowledge of the subject in either elective or required courses. The publications of the 

 Division, being the most available technical literature in the country, serve largely as the basis of 

 these lectures or even as text-books. 



The State of New York has gone a step further and has this year established a fully organized 

 professional school, the State College of Forestry at New York University, inviting the then chief 

 of the Forestry Division to assume its directorship. The course prescribed for students who 

 desire the degree of bachelor in the science of forestry is as full as any in other similar branches 

 and as complete as those given at the best forestry schools of Germany. (See Appendix.) 



With the establishment of this first professional school of forestry we may say that the art of 

 forestry, not merely as a matter for discussion, is engrafted upon our system and a new era in the 

 movement for rational forestry methods is begun. 



The most important feature of this novel educational venture is an experimental area of 

 30,000 acres specially set aside to demonstrate the methods of silviculture and forest economy, 

 so as to serve as a model eventually for the rest of the State property. 



FORESTRY LEGISLATION. 



Forest fires have been the bane of American forests. It is estimated that more wood has 

 been burned up in the yearly conflagrations than has been utilized. There could be no expecta- 

 tion of applying rational forestry methods until forest property is protected against immediate 

 loss and destruction by fire. There were laws against incendiaries on the statute books of nearly 

 every State, but they were inoperative and inefficient. The first effective law against forest fires in 

 active operation was drafted by the writer in 1885 for the State of New York, and was inaugurated 

 the same year. It provided for a well organized system to suppress fires. Substantially the same 

 law, with minor modifications, has been adopted by the States of Maine, New Hampshire, Wis- 

 consin, and Minnesota, the Forestry Division being at least the means of making the methods 

 known through its reports and correspondence. 1 



Nine States have special forestry commissions or other agencies charged with taking care of 

 the forestry interests of their States or else to investigate and report on desirable legislation, and 

 three or four other States have charged some existing commission with similar duties. In many 



1 For this legislation and other specific information regarding conditions in the United States Bee Appendix. 



