NORTH CAROLINA—A new general technical report brings history to life, describing a century of Forest Service research in the southern United States. Through the stories of early foresters, researchers and many other people, the new report shows how forestry needs of the southern U.S. evolved. In 1921, repairing forested landscapes that had been clearcut, plowed, eroded and abandoned was a priority. 

“In only a few decades, early station workers helped develop the basic management guidelines that have resulted in great progress in restoring the South’s forest lands,” says station researcher Don Bragg, who edited the report. “And it’s not just the federal lands that benefitted from this research, but other public lands, privately owned lands, all lands.”

The report discusses the early researchers who applied new principles in statistics to counting trees and describing forests—and shows how forest research has evolved.

Major projects, such as the Southern Forest Survey, are described from the perspective of those who participated in them. Inman F. “Cap” Eldredge and colleagues surveyed more than 200 million acres of southern forests. “We did something like 40,000 miles on foot,’” Eldredge is quoted as saying.

The Southern Forest Survey began in 1932. Nothing like it had ever been attempted. When the results of this first survey were analyzed and published, it revealed that southern forests were regenerating—welcome news to the timber industry, as the report discusses. 

“The success of the first Southern Forest Survey established the credibility of the station in providing data to support the needs of forest industry,” says Bragg. “It also suggested the value of additional periodic forest surveys, which we know today as the Forest Inventory and Analysis program.”

The report also includes biographies for some of the first people of color who worked for the agency, such as Tomatsu “Tommy” Kohara. Kohara, probably one of the first Asian Americans to be hired by the Forest Service, worked primarily as a photographer in the late 1930s. Other pioneers featured in the report include long-time African American fieldworker Jasper Burnes and the first woman trained as a forester to be hired by the Forest Service, Margaret Stoughton Abell. 

In addition to the narratives, the report includes previously unpublished studies, letters, maps, photographs and other primary materials spanning a century of Forest Service research.