G]Ik'FO P][NCHOT GiffordPinchot's comervation principles 111 evolvedthroughout hislife. Born into a lure- A Life ' Progress beringand mercantile family, hewas trained intraditional European methods offorest management,a perspective central tohis "Friday,July 1, 1898was a red-letter offer was a shrewd career move. workas first chief of the USDAForest Ser- dayfor me,"Gifford Pinchot wrote in In retrospect,it turned out to have vice.When, asPennsylvania's governor, he his autobiography,Breaking New beena strokeof genius.Driven and Ground."On that dayI becamechief ambitious,Pinchot proved a skillful protectedold-growth forests and later urged of the little old ForestryDivision" leaderwho wasable to generatecon- FranklinDelano Roosevelt tobuy .p private (Pinchot1998, p. 136).Always the op- siderablesupport within Congress and timberlands,hebroke ranks with many for- timist,he "was highly enthusiastic and amongthe Americanpeople. Sugges- esters.Always controversial, heacted as the deeplypleased" with his new job in the tiveof hisdeft handling of thenation's ForestService's conscience until his death in Departmentof Agriculture,in good politicianswas the rapid expansion of 1946. measurebecause the secretary of Agri- theagcncy's budget and staff: in 1898, culture,James Wilson, had given the with 11members, the division's budget youngman a freehand. "I couldap- By Char Miller and point my own assistants,"Pinchot V.Alaric Sample scribbledin hisdiary after interviewing for the position,"do what kind of work I chose,and not fearany inter- ference from him." Yet even as Pinchot cherished the opportunityto runthe Forestry Divi- sion"to suit myself," he recognized that the works prospectswere "somethingless than brilliant" (Pin- chot 1998,p. 135-36). Congress thenwas so skeptical about the agency'spurpose it had de- manded that it account for its continued existence;this de- mand was one of the reasons that Pinchot'spredecessor, -' the eminent forester Bern- hard E. Fernow, had de- cidedto resignin spring 1898. The public also was indifferent to the ForestryDivision's fate, sorarely had its activities cometo people'satten- tion. There was, in short,ample reason for Pinchot, who would become the division's '• fourth chief,to ques- tionwhether accepting : SecretaryWilson's job wasa mere$28,520; one yearlater, industry.From his father, Cyril C.D. tain that the "elaborate" method of with 61 employees,the appropriation Pinchot,James Pinchot had learned Germanforestry would wilt "underthe wasincreased to $48,520;by 1901 howto profitfrom the family's timber pioneerconditions in America,"he both setsof figureshad swelled fur- holdings.To maximizetheir gains, the soughtin subsequentyears to con- ther--179employees worked within a Pinchotshad dearcut forests,collected structa form of forestrythat would budgetof $185,440.These numbers thelogs into rafts, and shipped them in flourishin the"ingenious land of the alsoreflected changes in the agency's springdown rain-swollenrivers to Yankee"(Pinchot 1998, p. 134). rank: in 1901 it was transformed into marketin the portsof Trentonand the Bureauof Forestry,and four years Philadelphia.Once the rafts were sold, Home Front laterit waselevated yet again, becom- the financial returns would be rein- The pursuitof democraticequity ing the USDA ForestService, with vestedin other timber stands,and the would become central to Pinchot's ide- Pinchotas its first chief. By 1905there cyclewould be repeated. ologicalconcerns. As he frequently de- werefew in Washingtonor thebody Theenvironmental consequences of clared:"For whosebenefit shall [nat- politicunfamiliar with the ForestSer- thisform of lumberingwere consider- ural resources]be conserved•for the viceor itsgregarious leader. able,yet it wasnot until the latter part benefitof themany, or forthe use and Yet,as Pinchot acknowledged, "suc- of the 19thcentury that James Pinchot profitof thefew?" Yet after he returned cessdoes not alwaysmake friends." recognizedthe connection between his to the United Statesin 1890, he was From the start, "therewas contention family'seconomic behavior and an notabove pulling family strings to gain galore,"and as "our work became ecosystemdevoid of passenger pigeons, hisfirst job asforester on GeorgeW. knownit raisedup friendsat leastas deer,and bear, of free-flowingstreams Vanderbilt's lavish North Carolina es- fastas foes, in Congressand out" (Pin- andleafy verdure. The practiceof for- tate,Biltmore; his parents were good chot1998, p. 160-61).Fortunately, he estry,he believed,would restorethis friends of Frederick Law Olmsted, enjoyedthe thrust and parry of politi- cutoverlandscape, and just before Gif- Vanderbilt'slandscape architect, and it cal life and understood that controver- ford entered Yale in 1885, James wasthrough him that Pinchot came to sieswere integral to the development stronglyadvised his son to takeup the Vanderbilt'snotice. Although not ex- of publicopinion. Capturing a mass profession. actlya posterboy for socialreform, audience, he well knew, was essential Collegewas more social than acade- Vanderbiltnonetheless gave Pinchot a to successin democraticpolitics. This mic for Gifford,however; it wasonly remarkableopportunity to practiceMs wasan insight that governed the whole afterhis graduation in 1889that Pin- craft,an experiencethat wouldlead ofhis long career in publicservice, one chotbegan his serious education as a Pinchotto proclaimBiltmore "the cra- reasonwhy in fact he was,and re- forester.That fall, he traveledto Eu- dleof forestry." mains,such a controversialfigure. rope,met severaleminent European That mayhave been true, but it was foresters,including Sir William underthe auspices of thefederal gov- Family Matters Schlich and Sir Dietrich Brandis, and ernmentthat the forestry profession re- Born in 1865 to Jamesand Mary then enrolled at L•cole Nationale allycame of age;few contemporaries EnoPinchot, Gifford grew up in one Foresti?reat Nancy, France.There, wouldhave predicted this flowering, of the elite mercantile families of New throughhis studies in silviculture,and however,given the relativelydreary YorkCity. His maternalgrandfather, on his extendedexplorations of the stateof governmentalforestry in the Amos Eno, had amasseda fortune French national forest system,he late19th century. Founded in 1880m throughurban land development, but gainedhis "first concrete understand- reaction to worries that the nation's the Pinchots' life of leisure did not rest ingof theforest as a crop."He readily naturalresources were rapidly being solelyon Eno'slargesse. James Pinchot absorbedthis guiding principle, plus liquidated,and that there was no clear- hadmade a substantialnest egg in the forestry'semphasis on efficiency,ratio- inghousefor informationon the boomingNew York City economyof nal planning,and scientificmanage- Americanforested estate, the tiny Bu- the 1850s. A distributor of domestic ment. That nature could be controlled reauof Forestrygathered statistics and andcommercial furnishings, Pinchot throughhuman stricture would in answeredcitizens' queries about har- flourishedin a marketthat expanded time feedeasily into the Progressive vestingprivate woodlots. It did not rapidlyin thatindustrializing age, so ethos with which Pinchot would be so formulatepolicy governing the vast muchso that by the 1870s,when in closelyassociated in the United States. forestson public lands, in partbecause his mid-40s, he wasable to retire. But with the importantexception it waslocated in the Departmentof GiffordPinchot's future occupation of democraticSwitzerland, for whose Agriculture,and the publiclyowned asa publicservant was not typicalof foresters Pinchot felt an immediate forestsfell underthe purviewof the thismonied environment. But James affinity,most European methods of Departmentof the Interior.The bu- Pinchot was determined that his first forestryseemed too emblematic of the reaudid not advocate regulation of the sonnot continuethe family'stradi- monarchicalstates in whichthey were lands for another reason--its third tionalpursuit of commercialsuccess, practiced.Convinced that such a chief, Bernhard E. Fernow,a German- in goodmeasure because of hisevolv- rigidlyhierarchical profession would bornforester, not only doubted the ef- ing reactionsto theAmerican lumber nevertake root in republicansoil, cer- ficacyof widescalefederal manage- 28 January1999 ment,but even questioned the value of consultingforester in NewYork City. managethe landscapes and the uses ro suchmicrolevel experimenrs as Pin- It wasonly after 1898, when he had re- whichthey were put, and to addressa chot was conductingat Biltmore placedFernow at the Divisionof For- broadarray of attendantsocial prob- (Miller 1992). estry,that he wasable to testhis ideas lems, receivedgreat impetuswhen Pinchot also had his moments of about his profession'splace in the TheodoreRoosevelt became president doubt. The lands around the Vander- Americanpolity and, in the process, in 1901. He grantedlegitimacy to, bilt estatehad beenbadly burned or expandbeyond the European concep- throughhis political support of, a host heavilylogged, and his first task as a tionof forestrythat he had studied. of legislativeinitiatives designed to ex- foresterwas simply to replantand re- Politicallysophisticated, heearly on pandfederal control over public lands storethe landscape(Pinchot 1893). joinedwith otherlike-minded federal andforests, waterways and irrigation Wherehe could,he beganto cut tim- scientistsand governmentexperts, projects;one of his decisionsthat berto demonstratethe