JAMES WALLACE PINCHOT.

By JOSEPH A. ARNOLD, Editor and Assistant Chief, Division of Publications. James Wallace Pinchot, the subject of this sketch (see frontis- piece), was born at Milford, Pike County, Pa., in March, 1831. His father, Cyril Constantine Desire Pinchot, a soldier of Napoleon, was compelled to leave France in 1816, upon the restoration of the Bourbons, because of his republican tendencies. He came to the United States and with his parents settled on the upper Delaware in Pennsylvania, becoming one of the largest land owners in that region. He was a man of great energy tind was well known throughout the State of Pennsylvania and was selected by the President oí the United States to visit western Indian tribes and settle differences between those Indians and the Government. The mother of Mr. Pinchot was Eliza Cross. Pinchot. Her grand- father was a Belgian nobleman, held a commission in the Continen- tal Army, and ultimately settled in Pennsylvania, In 1850, when 19 years old, Mr. Pinchot went to New York City, where he hegsm business with William Henry Sheldon & Co. Later he became a member of the firm of Pinchot, Warren & Co., which was engaged in manufacturing in New York and Pennsylvania. He was a successful business man, and was able in 1875 to retire from business and devote his energies to philanthropic and other public undertakings. Soon after he went to New York, Mr. Pinchot began to take an active interest in the artistic, literary, and educational development of the city. Greatly interested in art, he was one of the early sub- scribers to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and his intimate friends among artists and literary men included Sanford Gifford (for whom his eldest son was named), Launt Thompson, Bayard Taylor, Edwin Booth, Parke Godwin, William CuUen Bryant, John Bigelow, E. C. Stedman, Whittredge, McEntee, and many others. Later General Sherman and General Stone were numbered among his intimate friends. He was one of the early members of the Century Club, the Union League Club, the Players' Club, and the Grolier Club in New York. He took an active part in establishing the National Academy of Design and the American Museum of Natural History, to both of which he contributed largely. He was a member of the New York Chamber of Commerce. He was the first treasurer, and a member of the executive board, of the Pedestal Committee of t^e Barthol^i 22428~-08—^2 495 496 YEARBOOK OF THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. Statue of Liberty, to which he was an important contributor. He was active in organizing the first association in this country for providing model tenements for the poor, a subject in which he was deeply interested. In Washington Mr. Pinchot was a member of the Cosmos and Metropolitan clubs. He was vice-president of the American Fores- try Association, an associate of the Society of American Foresters, a patron of the Washington Academy of Sciences, and a member of the National Geographic Society. Mr. Pinchot became interested in forestry through his observa- tions of forest practice in France before the subject had attracted public attention in the United States. Later he became one of the founders of the Yale Forest School. His principal interest in forestry, however, centered in the Yale Summer School of Forestry, which he established and which is held upon bis estate of Grey Tow- ers at Milford. At this school the members of the entering class of the Yale Forest School receive their preliminaiy training in the field, and in addition about thirty young men acquire each year a prelimi- nary knowledge of the forest and forest work. In addition to the Yale Summer School of Forestry, Mr. Pinchot established, at Milford, the Milford Forest Experiment Station, the first to be established in the United States, at which experiments to determine the characteristics and uses of native trees are carried on. Although he had traveleà widely, Mr. Pinchot never lost interest in the town of Milford, where he was born. The old homestead of tlie Pinchots has been transformed into à free public library. Forest Hall, a large stone building, has been erected principally for the use of the Yale Summer School of Forestry, and in many other ways the town of Milford has felt the influence of his untiring interest in its welfare. Mr. Pinchot was to the last a man of singularly keen interest in public affairs, of penetrating mind, of great vigor as,well as great sweetness of disposition, and of an old-fashioned courtesy which peculiarly distinguished him. in 1864 Mr. Pinchot married Mary Eno, daughter of Amos E. Eno, of New York. Their home was in New York until 1900, when they came to Washington. There are three children: Gifford, Chief of the United States Forest Service; Antoinette Eno, now Lady John- stone, wife of Hon. Sir Alan Johnstone, British minister at Copen- hagen ; and Amos K. E., volunteer cavalryman during the Spanish- American war, until recently in the district attorney's office in New York, and now practicing law in that city. In 1905 Mr. Pinchot received the degree of master of arts from Yale University in recognition of his services to the cause of forestry and his patronage of the fine arts. JAMES WALLACE PINCHOT. 497 The Statement made by Professor Walker, the university orator, on the occasion of conferring the honorary degrees, is as follows: A patron of art and education who united American birth and patriotism with the spirit of an ancestry derived from France; the son of a soldier of Napoleon who, leaving France in consequence of the Bourbon restoration, found a home in the new world, Mr. Pinchot has been deeply enlisted in efforts to pro- mote friendliness of feeling between the two republics. As a consequence, and by reason of his well-known knowledge in matters of art, he served as one of the committee in charge of the erection in New York Harbor of Bartholdi's statue, " Liberty Enlightening the World.** His clear perception of the ill cer- tain to result to our country from the destruction of its forests led him to prac- tical and efficient efforts for development in America of the scientific study of forestry. By this university his name is beloved and honored as that of a prin- cipal founder of its forest school, by which the training of a competent body of American experts in forestry, long sought by him, is being assured. With peculiar satisfaction we request that one already so usefully identified with Yale, and so helpfully efficient in artistic and educational progress, be numbered of her graduates by the conferment on Mr. Pinchot of the honorary degree of Master of Arts. The following expression of sympathy was made by the Society of American Foresters after a special meeting held Saturday, February 8, at Washington, D. C. : By the death of James W. Pinchot, one of its associate members, the Society of American Foresters feels that the cause of forestry in the United States has lost one of its earliest, wisest, and most effective supporters ; the cause of forest education one of its most generous benefactors ; the society, itself, an interested counselor and genial host, and the members individually a friendly and gracious presence. The society expresses its deepest sympathy with Mrs. Pinchot and with the family in their bereavement. At a meeting of officers of the Department of Agriculture, held in the offiice of the Secretary on February 8, 1908, the following resolu- tions were adopted : Resolvedf That in the death of James W. Pinchot an American citizen of the best type has passed away. Admirable alike for his civic virtues and public spirit, for his personal lovableness and unfailing courtesy, Mr. Pinchot attracted the regard of all who came in contact with him, while his generous gifts to American education give him high place among public benefactors. Resolvedf That, in particular, as a founder of the School of Forestry at Yale University, Mr. Pinchot takes his place among the great benefactors of American agriculture, in that, in the endowment of this school, an influence of far-reaching significance and increasing value to the conservation of our na- tional resources has been set in motion. Resolvedy That the officers of the Department of Agriculture feel a keen sense of personal loss in the passing of Mr. Pinchot, whose thoughtful and kindly interest in their work was often manifested in appreciative ways. Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be given to the press and to the family of Mr. Pinchot. O. HART MEBBIAM, BEVERLY T. GALLOWAY, L. O. HOWARD, Committee,