Women, Conservation, and the USDA Forest Service, 1850-1970
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University of New Hampshire University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository Doctoral Dissertations Student Scholarship Spring 2021 “We Feminine Foresters”: Women, Conservation, and the USDA Forest Service, 1850-1970 Rachel D. Kline University of New Hampshire, Durham Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation Recommended Citation Kline, Rachel D., "“We Feminine Foresters”: Women, Conservation, and the USDA Forest Service, 1850-1970" (2021). Doctoral Dissertations. 2578. https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation/2578 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. “We Feminine Foresters”: Women, Conservation, and the USDA Forest Service, 1850-1970 By Rachel D. Kline Bachelor of Arts, Colorado State University, 2007 Master of Arts, Colorado State University, 2009 DISSERTATION Submitted to the University of New Hampshire in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History May, 2021 This dissertation was examined and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History by: Dissertation Director, Kurk Dorsey, Professor, History Janet Polasky, Presidential Professor, History Lucy Salyer, Professor, History Ann Little, Professor, History, Colorado State University Char Miller, W.M. Keck Professor of Environmental Analysis & History, Pomona College On April 19, 2021 Approval signatures are on file with the University of New Hampshire Graduate School. ii ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © 2021 Rachel D. Kline iii DEDICATION In loving memory of my grandparents, Pierce Wayne and Patricia Lu White. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The idea for this project has been one in the making since my childhood. I grew up hearing stories of my grandparents and their paid and unpaid work for the USDA Forest Service—my grandfather being a fire crew chief and an administrative officer, my grandmother working as a Forest Service wife building a community. As I played along the streams of the Roosevelt National Forest and swirled in my grandfather’s chair at the Rocky Mountain Research Station, I knew that their work meant something. I am so grateful for the support and assistance I have received from so many in writing this dissertation so that I could tell part of their, and so many others, stories. The faculty and staff of the history department at the University of New Hampshire (UNH) have been tremendous in supporting me as a non-traditional student with a full-time job. Special thanks to Lara Demarest and Laura Simard for always keeping me on track. I thank Jeff Bolster who taught me so much about the profession and ways to improve my writing. My committee especially provided significant support. Thanks to Kurk Dorsey for his straightforward approach to grad school, always open door, levity and humor, as well as his rapid turnaround on reviewing my work. He truly helped me get out of grad school, which he says is the whole point. I thank Janet Polasky for the many great discussions and continually pushing me to think past my original conclusions. She was incredibly prompt on her review of my work as well. I give thanks to Lucy Salyer, who always provided encouragement and a place to try out ideas. Thanks to Char Miller for his enthusiastic reception of my project, responding within seven minutes to my email asking him to be on my committee. I so appreciate our conversations as I tried to work out something in my mind and his offering me invaluable expertise. And to v Ann Little, my greatest mentor, who shepherded me through my undergraduate and Master’s in History, I give thanks for her endless support and helping me find my feet and the way forward too many times to count. Many afternoons or evenings were spent on the phone hashing out my thoughts and her reassuring me that I had things to say. I would also like to thank those who provided generous financial support for research and time off from my day job to write. The University of New Hampshire College of Liberal Arts provided me with a summer stipend which allowed me to accelerate my writing. Thanks to David and Ginny Steelman who funded the History Department’s Steelman History Fellowship, which provided me with the means to travel to the Forest History Society in North Carolina for research. Thanks to the Chesley Family Fund too for their support in funding a research trip to Virginia, where thoughts for Chapter 1 began to take shape. The source base for this dissertation was difficult to track down and would not have been possible without the assistance of so many. Thanks to Jamie Lewis and Eben Lehman at the Forest History Society for their immense support with this project, scanning what they could find, directing my time in their wonderful library, and answering my random emails. Particular thanks to Jamie Lewis who provided edits and a dependable foundation on which I could call anytime. I thank Dave Stack, Historian and Curator for the National Museum of Forest Service History who provided me with numerous sources in response to my inquiries. Steve Dunsky, Videographer for Region 5 of the Forest Service, had insightful comments and confirmed some of my suspicions. Many thanks to Carol Henson of the Women of Fire: Wildland Fire Oral History Project who graciously shared her research on women in fire with me. I thank Julie Blankenburg, Librarian for the National Forest Service Library at the Forest Products vi Laboratory, who provided me with much of the material for Chapter 5. She dug deeper than I asked her to and shared with me amazing sources that I had no idea existed. Within my Forest Service family there are so many to thank who have supported my journey, encouraged my work, and enthusiastically received what I had to share. A few include Berlinda Baca, Patricia Burel, Susan Cox and Heidi McAllister and the staff of Conservation Education, Christine Bombard and the staff at Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area, Richa Wilson, Wayna Adams, Kristine Davidson, Valencia Morris, Leighton Quarles, Dan O’Toole, Kathryn Buchholz, Kyle Rothemich, Ken Sandri, Sevrie Corson, Danielle Shelton, Amanda Campbell, and Stan Helin. Special thanks to Nancy Arkin. I am also grateful to Heather Huyck, who encouraged me to find the right program and write something that mattered to me. I thank Lila Teeters, the other half of my cohort at UNH, who was there with me through it all. I thank my cherished friends Stacey Hornbeck, Janet Canon, Kevin Quigley, and Lisa and Courtney Moore who always made sure to check in on me, make me a cup of tea or let me borrow a kayak, and shared so much enthusiasm. To Hilaree Robinson, I thank for her continual prompts to get writing. To Carrie Knight, my dearest friend, I thank her for her constant support and encouragement and always being available to simmer with me on an idea, rework a sentence, or help me research my rabbit trails. I am so grateful that we could do this together. My family deserves the greatest thanks of all. They endured the long hours with me and never ceased to encourage me. Thanks to my parents, Ken and Jenny, parents-in-law, Bill and Deb, as well as Alex, Judith, and Ashley for their love and support. Most of all, thanks and love to my children Jane, Elizabeth, and Hugh, as well as my husband Chris. This dissertation would not have been written without extensive pots of tea provided hourly by Chris, my most devoted vii cheerleader, word finder, and support system. He took on so much of the day-to-day so that I could do this. Ad maiorem Dei gloriam viii TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION ............................................................................................................... iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…….................................................................................... v LIST OF FIGURES........................................................................................................ xi ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................... xiii CHAPTER PAGE INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................... 1 I. SOMETHING HIGHER: CREATING A CONSERVATION CAUSE.................... 44 Discovering an American Nature....................................................................... 47 Cooper’s Legacy: Women’s Conservation in the Progressive Era.................... 65 II.. FORESTERS FAIR: WOMEN AND PROFESSIONAL FORESTRY................... 79 Conservation as Masculine................................................................................. 81 Creating a Forestry Profession........................................................................... 86 Men Wanted!...................................................................................................... 91 Women Applied Anyway……………………………………………………… 97 III. RANGERS’ WIVES: SPREADING THE CAUSE AS A FOREST SPOUSE........ 117 The Wifely Role……………………………………………………………….. 120 Getting to Work in the Early Years……………………………………………. 126 Mid-Century Changes and Building a Forest Service Family…………………. 142 Conservation of the Wife………………………………………………………. 146 IV. “FOREST BUILDERS”: WOMEN IN CLERICAL WORK AND CONSERVATION EDUCATION………………………………………………………………….