Edward P. Cliff Interviewer: Layne R
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Edward P. Cliff Oral History Interview—7/2/1964 Administrative Information Creator: Edward P. Cliff Interviewer: Layne R. Beaty Date of Interview: July 2, 1964 Location: Washington D.C. Length: 17 pages Biographical Note Cliff, Chief of the Forest Service, Department of Agriculture, discusses John F. Kennedy’s (JFK) 1963 U.S. conservation tour, JFK’s interest in forestry and conservation, and the formation of the national forest program, among other issues. Access Open. Usage Restrictions According to the deed of gift signed December 10, 1964, copyright of these materials has been assigned to the United States Government. Users of these materials are advised to determine the copyright status of any document from which they wish to publish. Copyright The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Under certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and archives are authorized to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specified conditions is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be “used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research.” If a user makes a request for, or later uses, a photocopy or reproduction for purposes in excesses of “fair use,” that user may be liable for copyright infringement. This institution reserves the right to refuse to accept a copying order if, in its judgment, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of copyright law. The copyright law extends its protection to unpublished works from the moment of creation in a tangible form. Direct your questions concerning copyright to the reference staff. Transcript of Oral History Interview These electronic documents were created from transcripts available in the research room of the John F. Kennedy Library. The transcripts were scanned using optical character recognition and the resulting text files were proofread against the original transcripts. Some formatting changes were made. Page numbers are noted where they would have occurred at the bottoms of the pages of the original transcripts. If researchers have any concerns about accuracy, they are encouraged to visit the Library and consult the transcripts and the interview recordings. Suggested Citation Edward P. Cliff, recorded interview by Layne R. Beaty, July 2, 1964, (page number), John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program. Edward P. Cliff Table of Contents Page Topic 1 John F. Kennedy’s (JFK) 1963 US conservation tour: Pinchot Institute dedication and Duluth, Wisconsin visit 7 JFK’s interest in conservation and forestry 9 1961 National Forest program formation 11, 14 JFK’s emphasis on increasing conservation research 12 Renewing interest in forestry and natural resources conservation 13 Developing regional conservation programs 15 Italy’s reaction to JFK’s death Oral History Interview with Edward P. Cliff July 2, 1964 Department of Agriculture Washington, D. C. By Layne R. Beaty For the John F. Kennedy Library BEATY: Well Ed, I know that you have had some interesting personal contacts with John Fitzgerald Kennedy [John F. Kennedy] in connection with conservation affairs. Would you tell us about one of those? CLIFF: Yes, I have a very vivid memory of my experience with President Kennedy on the occasion of the dedication of the Pinchot Institute for Conservation Studies in Milford, Pennsylvania, on September 24, 1963, just about two months before his tragic death. This was the first appearance of the President on his conservation tour which took him across the country, and he selected, personally, Milford as the place to start this conservation tour. This is the home of Gifford Pinchot, where he grew up, and where he maintained his residence in his mature years when he was the Governor of the State of Pennsylvania. It’s the ancestral home and had been donated to the United States Government for a site for an institute on conservation studies. The President agreed to make the dedicatory address and the Forest Service worked very hard for several weeks getting the old place and [-1-] grounds in condition for the dedication. We were very much aware that the President would be there for a limited time, he had other engagements during the same day and was working against an extremely tight schedule. We arranged our program so as to accommodate this schedule and it was impressed on us by members of the White House staff and the Secret Service that we must keep the schedule exactly and that it was the desire of the staff and of the President to have the speakers who preceded him to have completed their part on the program before he made an appearance on the platform. We had planned it this way and made some trial runs to check our time. You might remember that the program called for the President to land in an opening near the Pinchot Estate in his helicopter. He was escorted up to the Mansion to meet a group of conservation leaders. We then planned to take him on a tour through the Pinchot Mansion, and it was thought that he would remain in there for about ten minutes looking over the Mansion and the collection of books and furniture and to discuss with Gifford Pinchot, Jr.—Dr. Pinchot—some of the interesting things about the house and the estate and the purpose to which it would be put. During this time I was to take the other distinguished speakers down to the platform, and introduce them and get their talks out of the way. Governor Scranton [William Warren Scranton] had been invited to make the welcoming address and he was waiting down at the platform, but while the President was greeting the [-2-] conservation leaders Governor Scranton proceeded to make the best use of his time and was mingling with the crowd and shaking hands with his friends in the crowd. When I got back down to the platform we had a delay in finding the Governor and getting him on the platform to start the program. I no more than got started introducing the Governor when the President made his appearance. He had walked through the house very quickly, and so at that point our schedule was all upset and the staff was upset and you can imagine the consternation that I felt at not carrying out the instructions I’d been working under. The President’s speech had been laid out on the podium in preparation for him, and he greeted Governor Scranton very warmly and then I proceeded, as Master of Ceremonies, to introduce the Governor and the other speakers. The President sat through these preliminary ceremonies, apparently enjoying them; there was no indication from his reaction or any way you could tell that he was at all irritated. In fact he seemed to enjoy this contact with the crowd and to have enjoyed and appreciated the remarks that had been made even though this was not according to the way that we had been instructed to plan it. I’m sure that anyone in the audience could not have detected that there was anything wrong with the way the schedule was being carried out. After the President realized that we were off the schedule he leaned over to me and asked me to recover his manuscript so that it wouldn’t get lost or put into [-3-] disarray. This was done and we proceeded with the program in an orderly way and the President was introduced by Secretary Freeman [Orville L. Freeman] and then gave a very outstanding conservation talk which was the actual kick-off to this series of conservation speeches which he made later in Minnesota and Wyoming and Montana and other places in the West. BEATY: Mr. Cliff, I was there that day and I recall that in the audience there were a large number of young people, since I think the local schools had turned out for the occasion. Do you think the presence of those youngsters made a difference in what the President said or the way he received the crowd that day? CLIFF: The crowd, the reaction of the crowd was remarkable to me. As soon as the President made his appearance there was a great, great applause from the audience. There must have been between ten and fifteen thousand people on that hillside. It was a beautiful day and there were a large number of youngsters. The greeting was warm and the President responded in a very warm manner. I’m sure that it must have had some influence on his reaction. He demonstrated there that day a very warm and human personality. Another incident that I was very much interested in. Bear in mind that during the program we were somewhat off schedule and I think that we had lost about eight or ten minutes, and the staff people who had had responsibility for getting the President on to his next stop were becoming very much upset and uneasy [-4-] about this lapse of time, because they knew that there’d be another crowd waiting at the next destination and they didn’t want anything to interfere with keeping on the exact schedule. We got a little behind schedule. Mrs. Amos Pinchot [Ruth Pickering Pinchot], the wife of the late Amos Pinchot, who was a brother of Gifford Pinchot, was on the platform with the President and other distinguished guests, and one of Mrs. Pinchot’s daughters [Mary Pinchot Meyer] was a close personal friend of Mr. and Mrs. Kennedy [Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy]. After the ceremony was over the President turned to Mrs. Pinchot and said, “I would like very much to see your home.