University of California - Berkeley University of Cal ifornia . General Library/Berkeley Regional Oral History Office WALTER F. McCULLOCH FORESTRY AND EDUCATION IN OREGON, 1 937- 1 966 An Interview Conducted by Amel ia R. Fry Berkeley 1968 Produced under the auspices of Forest History Society and Hill Family Foundation At Forest History Society luncheon "Mac" McColloch receives his interview from interviewer Amelia Fry in Portland Oregon, August 16, 1968. Below, Society president Paul Dunn presents Mac with award making him a Fellow of Forest History Society. Paul M. Dunn, left, and W. F. McCulloch, April, 1964 INTRODUCTION Walter F. McCuIIoch, Dean of the School of Forestry at Oregon State College from 1955 to 1967, defines his job as "educating the whole man." Other forestry school deans, like Dr. McCuIIoch, may write professional dicta on the problems of forest resource use; like him, they can sport graduate degrees, both earned and honorary; they probably also have developed a modus operandus which allows them to run an academic subculture with varying degrees of competence and happiness. The place where "Dean Mac" becomes unique, and the reason why the Forest History Society of Yale University had long tried to persuade him to tape-record his memoirs, lies in the major role he played in develop ing a school of forestry that maintains a tough academic competence while at the same time it assists in as sensitive a way as possible the college student's task of maturing into a useful member of society. "Our concern is for the man, his capacities, his wishes, and his hopes," he says in the interview. "We're not interested in the total number of bodies in the school." Mac came to Oregon State College in 1937 as a young instructor in silviculture. In 1942 he interrupted his teaching career In favor of a three-year stint to administer the new state regulatory law for forest practices. It was when he returned to the College as head of the department of forest management that the forestry dean, Paul Dunn, gave him free reign to revise the curriculum and to institute a i student personnel program. This highly personalized approach to pro ducing future foresters had evolved in Mac's head for nearly a decade, growing from his natural interest in students, their individuality and potential as human beings. Perhaps the ideas had begun to take form during his work for the Master's Degree in Forestry, which he won in 1936 at Syracuse and which included a minor in Education. Then his further graduate study in education at the University of Southern California and the University of Oregon reinforced his conviction that something was needed in addition to the forestry academic pro gram of management, engineering, and forest products. Still later, while he was working in the State Forester's Office, his own conversa tions with practicing foresters produced practical evidence that the forestry student should also learn how to be a "leader of men." Mac, as wel I as many others over the past half-century, has helped the field of forestry keep up with changes in engineering techniques, fire control methods, management principles, and precepts in silviculture and genetics. But few educational leaders have laid out a program which consciously contributes to the profession's dis tinguishing earmark: the forester's zeal, a commitment which has pre vailed through the years, sometimes to the dismay of its antagonists. This spirit of commitment can be traced at least as far back as 1900 when a handful of foresters, in forming the Society of American Foresters, met with Gifford Pinchot and pledged themselves to "further ing the cause of forestry." Forestry has continued to be more than a profession. It is a brotherhood. If the commercial threats to the permanency of America's only renewable natural resource have contributed ii to the astonishing longevity of The Cause, so has the idealism inherent in individual members and in the courses of several schools of forestry. Walter McCul loch's story of the operation of the School at Oregon State College (later changed to Oregon State University) gives us an insight into how such professional fervor has been nurtured in the organized program that began in 1945. The professors gave more time to counseling the students. Students interested in other fields, such as journalism, were encouraged to transfer out. Occasionally a boy was told to leave on evidence of low moral character. Many others were victims of the natural attrition because, as Dave Mason says, "Mac won't have loafers in his school." New courses were added to aid and abet leadership, such as courses in English, speech, and public admin istration. Those who managed to remain in the School had the advantage of continued counseling, plus the use of the "Self-Learning Center," where tapes and transparencies are available to enrich class lectures. The collection is not entirely factual material. Here the aspiring foresters can hear a tape of a lecture by one of his professors or by leading foresters the world over. He can also hear the American pris oners of war in Korea who defected to China, a tape kept on hand to "shock students into a sense of responsibility for their actions." To evoke a sense of commitment, there is a talk by Bob Richards, the Olympic pole vaulter who became a missionary. "It puts a spiritual tone into our program," says Mac. In other words, the student who goes through the program at Oregon State University learns not only what makes a Douglas fir grow, i ii but why foresters, in the Pinchotian tradition of guardianship, are honor-bound to balance the longevity of the fir with the economic need of human society. In the summer of 1967, when the Forest History Society asked the University of California's Regional Oral History Office at Berkeley to undertake a tape-recorded interview with Dean McCulIoch in Corvallis, Oregon, this interviewer set about the task of carefully organizing the interviews. The sessions would have to be lean and brief for Mac was fighting Parkinson's disease, and he warned that his daily condi tion was so unpredictable that he might not even be able to participate once the interviewer had flown to Corvallis. His wife, "Mrs. Mac," who had been a productive writer, was in a nursing home unsuccessfully cop ing with a severe arterial disease. The project was a gamble, and funds were limited. However, his bibliography is long and inclusive, touching on topics that range from his emerging theories on forestry education to his analysis of the operations of the Oregon forest practices act, and of course, his de lightful dictionary of expressions used by loggers, definitions he had spent long years collecting. The tape recordings, it appeared, should serve only as a supplement to tie this material together and to fill in the spaces. He had already taped some anecdotes, "yarns," of his earliest recollections of experiences in the woods, and these were on hand in the Sel f-Learni ng Center and could be copied for deposit with the interview in both Yale and the Bancroft Library at Berkeley. We agreed beforehand that we would organize the sessions along a priority system of "first things first," in case he had to call off the iv interview abruptly. However, when the time came for the actual tape recording, Mac was able to be interviewed for the allotted time, the morning and afternoon of August 10, 1967. In addition a final session was held the following morning to "mop up" details that were left out the previous day. Forestry leaders and cohorts of Mac's in California and Oregon had offered various tips for questions to include in the interview: ask about his contribution as an educator, as the first administrator of the Forest Conservation Act, as a promoter of forest research, as a man of widely varied experiences in his youth in British Columbia. In addition, each of these men added some variation of, "You'll enjoy interviewing Mac. He's a charmer." They were right. We met briefly in the late afternoon at the School. At his desk, we discussed the outline and agreed on a priority system for the topics to record, and he helped collect several pounds of writings by and about him and his world which 1 would pore over later that evening. The meeting was hurried and brief, for it was apparent that Mac was uncomfortable and washed out. The next morning, at the door of his neat brown and white house, which sits on a city lot near a park, Mac greeted me with the easy smile that has helped along his reputation as the "charmer." The tall gauntness gave him a youthfulness his sixty-two years did not deserve. Once inside, we set about the busy business of placing the micro phone, arranging the tapes, and angling chairs so we could talk easily. Mac interrupted. "Wouldn't you like to relax a minute before we begin, maybe listen to a little Telemann?" This was certainly a different twist in the usual interviewing procedure, and a happy one. And perhaps too, it was an example of Mac's much-neralded social sensitivity that led him to guess, and rightly, that his interviewer was a chamber music enthusiast. As "The Concerto for Diverse Instruments," filled the living room, I noticed it was mercifully insulated from the intense heat of the summer outside, and that on the walls were water colors of mountain and forest landscapes. A built-in high-fidelity system was in one corner, with Northwest Indian artifacts placed on the book shelves nearby. There also was a model of an old logging train, made and pres ented to him the previous year by his faculty in acknowledgement of his fruitful deanship and his work as a youth on the railroads. After the first hour of talking, we turned off the tape recorder for a few minutes while Mac brought out tea, imported from his favorite shop in Victoria, British Columbia. ("Or would you rather have a Java-mocha blend of coffee?") He discussed his physical condition honestly and expressed his frustration that he was not able to enter tain his visitor for dinner, as obviously had been his usual custom. He was honest in answering questions during the Interview. If he felt restrained from frank discussion about a sensitive topic — particularly the tumultuous times at the School in the years just prior to World War II— he refrained altogether. Later, during the editing, when I protested his exclusion of this subject, he wrote: "Barney Standing, an old friend recently deceased, was a highly successful personnel officer in the U.S.F.S. He applied vl three criteria to his statements where men were concerned: is It true, is it necessary, is it kind? My remarks were true, but I feel I did not adequately meet the test of the other two criteria . . . ." Nor could he be convinced to put the sensitive passages under seal. Barney Standing had won out. Mac's initial response to the transcript was, "To my chagrin, DD found I had made the same mistakes as numerous other speakers [whose tapes I have listened to]." He was meticulous in his revisions, correcting the ambiguities of speech, both his own and the interviewer's, and also inserting sections where more development was called for than our economic dialog had allowed. He took the transcript to his long-time friend, retired Dean Paul Dunn, who approved Mac's rewrite job. This office then re-typed and indexed the manuscript, and Mac, after some persuasion, provided pictures of himself and his wife to illustrate it. For deposit at Berkeley and at the Forest History Society at Yale, the transcripts of Mac's earlier tape-recorded "yarns" were photocopied by the School of Forestry at Oregon State University. That office also provided copies of Mac's articles that serve as appendices in the primary copies of this interview. Amel i a R. Fry I ntervlewer VI CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 1 CHILDHOOD AND COLLEGE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA I THE DEPRESSION YEARS: WORK AND SCHOOLING 20 GRADUATE SCHOOL AT SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY 31 RESEARCH AT MICHIGAN STATE COLLEGE 34 TEACHING AT OREGON STATE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY, 1 937- 1 942 38 ADMINISTRATION OF THE STATE FOREST CONSERVATION ACT 1942-1945 46 OREGON STATE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY, 1945-1955 62 Education of the Whole Man 62 Development of Research 68 DEAN OF OREGON STATE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY, 1 955- 1 966 78 Forestry Education and the Hill Family Foundation 94 THE MAKING OF WOODS WORDS 103 THE THIRD TILLAMOOK BURN 116 TRAVELS AND OTHER ACTIVITIES 126 PARTIAL INDEX 135 APPENDIX 139 vii CHILDHOOD AND COLLEGE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA Fry: Are you ready to start with the day you were born? McCuIloch: O.K. I was born In Vernon, British Columbia, in 1905, March 21. Really the locale was by accident. It was the nearest town that had a hospital. Fry: You mean Vernon was an accident? McCuIloch: Yes. Daughter! It could have been somewhere else just as well, but there was a hospital in Vernon. My parents at that time were living in Sicamous on the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railroad. Fry: What did your father do? McCuIloch: Let me backtrack just a little bit. In the earlier days my dad, Arthur C. McCuIloch, was a steamboat man on the rivers and lakes of central British Columbia. He came from a family of seafaring men, the youngest of nine in the family, as was my mother in her family. My dad came west to work on the rivers and on the lakes running the old paddlewheel steamers in the frontier days. Then he transferred to railroading. It was apparent that steamers would be superseded by railroads eventually. As a youngster I spent a lot of time in the wheelhouses of steamboats and In the cabs of engines and the cupolas of cabooses. Fry: Did this give you any particular knowledge of engines? McCuIloch: Oh yes, of the men who ran them particularly, because 2 McCulloch: they were the pioneers. When I was a youngster the men In charge of trains were chiefly the men who had built the railroads in British Columbia. In fact, my father in 1914 was on the construction of the last trans continental line, the Canadian Northern, and in 1915 was conductor on the first passenger train of that railroad out of Vancouver, B.C. Fry: Were you with him by any chance? McCulloch: No. I met him at Kamloops and we had a very brief visit as he was going through. To back up just a little more, my mother as a youngster, almost a babe in arms, was brought out west in a covered wagon, which gave me a little additional affinity for history. Her name was Elsie A. Fraser, same as the river. Fry: She used to tell you stories about her early days then? McCulloch: Yes, about the prairies in Manitoba. Fry: She came from where to where? McCulloch: From Ontario to Manitoba, down through the United States because there were no through roads across Ontario in those days. She became a school teacher. Fry: What did she teach? McCulloch: Everything that was in the curriculum — a one- room school, al I grades. Fry: This was the school you went to? McCulloch: No. This was when she and my father were courting, so to speak, in the early years. 3 McCulloch: One thing 1 should put in about forestry is that in 1910, the year of the terrible fires, we were living at Sicamous, and for several days everybody in that little town, everybody, piled possessions in railroad box cars and sat in the box cars, waiting to leave if need be. A fire did come to within a few hundred yards of the town. This was the year when there were fires throughout the entire Northwest from top to bottom and fore and aft. Fry: Yes, that's the landmark year. McCulloch: In later years every summer was still marked by an almost incessant pall of smoke. Many times I've seen the trains running in the middle of the day with headlights on full. They didn't do that just as a safety measure but out of sheer necessity. Fry: You had that many fires up there? McCul loch: That's right. Fry: Do you remember how you felt about this destruction at the time? And was the prevalent attitude one of shrug ging this off as inevitable? McCulloch: It was a kind of a "God's-handiwork" sort of thing, and you gave up because the fires were so big and so many, and there was no way to get to them, no roads. It's only in recent years that some roads have been built through that country to provide access to fires. From Sicamous we moved to Kami oops, to Revel stoke, and to Penticton. These were all small towns concerned 4 McCulloch: with the railroad because in those days my father worked out of these towns on railroad construction. So I went to a variety of public schools and in between, when I couldn't get to school, Mother taught me. Fry: I was wondering if you didn't have a lot of your education at home, with a mother who had had all this experience teach i ng . McCulloch: And a father who on the side was a botanist of considerable local repute. He had a very good school teacher when he was a boy in Nova Scotia, a man enthusiastic about botany who gave part of his enthusiasm to my father. So Dad and I had many an expedition looking for a certain flower which was supposed to be in a certain locality. Generally, we found it. Fry: You say your dad had some repute. How was his reputation established? McCulloch: People knew he was interested in flowers and would bring him all kinds of things to identify. And he used to bring back rare species for use in the local high school. Fry: Did you have a lot of books and botanical reference material around home? McCulloch: Quite a little revolving around Gray's Botany, which was the bible for many years. I don't think I have it here now, but somewhere around the house 1 have a botany book with a little orchid pressed in the front cover. It's been in there for over fifty years, a reminder of a 5 McCuIloch: plant collecting trip with dad. Fry: Then what did your mother teach you? McCuIloch: Mostly English composition. 1 never had a course in for mal grammar. We went from town to town following the railroads, and I happened to miss grammar In high school, public school. My mother was also fond of geography and perhaps I got some of my later ghost-town-chasing from her. I went to high school in Kamloops and in summers went into the woods with the next door neighbor, Mr. A. J. Bruce, and his son, Alfred, who was my age. Fry: What was he doing in the woods? McCuIloch: He was guardian of the forest. Fry: This was a provincial post? McCuIloch: A Dominion position at that time, in a federal forest. Of course there were many survey parties and timber cruising parties working in this forest in the summer, and so I became acquainted with the early day professional foresters. So from the early days In the woods with the Bruces, 1 knew a man who later became Chief Forester of Canada, D. Roy Cameron. Fry: And this started about 1913, is that right? McCuIloch: Yes, that's right. Fry: And some of these stories that you've tape-recorded for the University* here relate to experiences you had with *McCu I I och , W. F., "Old Days in the Woods," I, II, Ml. A transcription of tapes in The Self-Learning Center, School Fry: Mr. Bruce? McCuIIoch: Most were related to the early twenties. Fry: But If the story Is set before 1922, it would refer to your Bruce period. Is that right? McCuIIoch: I think what you are referring to Is that story about the son, when we were on the same timber cruising party, and he acquired the claw marks on his chest. That was Alfred Bruce. Fry: And also there Is a speech of yours that I read last night In which you contrasted practices in forestry In 1913 with 1953. McCuIIoch: That's right. The old gas car with Its acetylene head light — a kerosene locomotive head light, as a matter of fact— was unsold so long in Portland that It became a col lector's item. It was about three feet high. This was displayed in a railroad equipment store In Portland. Fry: Did you really enjoy these summers around 1913? Did this have some Influence on your wanting to go into forestry? McCuIIoch: Undoubtedly. These were the finest summers that any boy ever spent. Let me reminisce just a moment at this point. Also the finest thing that could ever happen to a boy (I mentioned riding around In the locomotives and the steamboats) was the greatest event of the week when I was living in Kamloops. of Forestry, Oregon State University. Copies of transcript also in Appendix of this volume in Bancroft Library, Univer sity of California, Berkeley, and Forest History Society, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut. 7 McCulloch: We small boys would go down to McCannell's livery stable where we would watch the hostler harness up the four-horse team of the North River Stage. And if the hostler had been sober for a while, which was unusual, and if we had been well-behaved for a while, which was also unusual, we got a ride In the stage from the livery stable up to the Grand Pacific Hotel. There we would occasionally sneak a look under the swinging doors and see some "Knuckles O'Toole" banging away on the old piano. With a great flourish the stage driver would leap to the seat (he wasn't a humble person like the hostler; he was a person of great significance), crack his whip, and away he'd go with people screaming bloody murder because he'd careen around the corner on two wheels to make a spectacular start. This was marvelous of course for small boys. And meeting the train at seven in the evening coming in from Vancouver was a great event, too. Fry: What did you do when you met the train? McCulloch: Well, you watched the wily passengers who had been there before-hand who knew not to get off too fast. The Ig norant would jump off the train and rush into the omnibus to get a seat to go up to the hotels — each hotel had its own surrey with the fringe on top, that sort of thing, a real old omnibus with two horses. The wily men would wait until the omnibus was full, and then stand on Its back step so when they came to the hotel they got off first and 8 McCulIoch: got the best rooms i n the house. The omnibus early bird, last off the carriage, had to sleep on the billiard table or on the floor. ClaughterU Those were the days. And then a couple of people would get a little hasty and there might be, hopefully, a fist-fight or two. And then there was always a restaurant in the station and the proprietor would have a huge school bell and jangle this thing up and down and make a great clatter. Persons would pour off the train and rush into the restaurant for a quick meal in ten mi nutes. Fry: Now, are we talking about the town of Kamloops? McCulIoch: That's right. These were all Kamloops enterprises. Fry: What kind of music was that on the piano? You played a Telemann record for me a while ago. Is that where you picked up your interest in baroque music? ClaughterU McCulIoch: I'm afraid not. This differed a bit from the baroque. It was latter-day-nostalgia type of music. Fry: The old 1890's-type barroom music? McCulIoch: That's right. Fry: The "Bird In the Gilded Cage"? McCulIoch: And the long black sleeve protectors pushed up to one's elbow.. Those were sateen arm covers to keep shirts clean, had a rubber band at each end. Saloon piano players always wore them. So did the bar keep, and used them as an extra wiper now and then. 9 Fry: Well, what did boys do to make money in those days? McCulloch: I swept out a store. I got fifty cents a week for that. And we'd do errands and be delivery boys before they used automobiles as delivery wagons. In fact, 1 shouldn't say this, but certain unnamed small boys around Kamloops made life miserable for the first automobile owner. He had what would be the equiva lent of a democrat (The democrat was a light wagon.) with a cranky engine under the seat. The huge wheels had wooden spokes, and if boys ran fast enough they could poke a long pole into the spokes and the whole thing would come to a grinding halt. D aughterU Fry: You'd poke the pole through two wheels opposite each other? McCulloch: Yes. What do you mean j_ did this? daughter] Fry: I didn't say a word. I said opposite each other — the pole. McCulloch: I thought you said, "you" did it. Fry: That's your guilty conscience working over time. Daughter] McCulloch: Also the motorist was afraid to get off, and then he'd have an awful job trying to get the car started again. Fry: Did he keep this car, or did he decide he'd better go back to horses? McCulloch: Probably thought horses were better. I remember two great excitements in the town: in 1912, 10 McCuIIoch: Kamloops had its centennial of the founding of the Hudson Bay Post in 1812, the first Hudson Bay post in that territory. Fry: What was the centennial like? McCuIIoch: There was a big parade in which I rode in a white Vauxhall automobile with tremendous enjoyment. The parade con sisted of practically everything that could move. Some folks dreamed up the idea of trying to recapture the early days of the trading post with Indians and fur traders riding around the town. Of course there were speeches by the mayor and others; and fireworks, particularly fireworks. In those days the railroad ran right down the main street of town, so they had a parade on the rai 1 road as wel I . Fry: With a locomotive pulling all the floats? McCuIIoch: That's right, on flat cars. Fry: And everyone was dressed suitably, something old? McCuIIoch: Right, all those who could find something to dress in. There were a good many Indians In town because there was an Indian reservation right across the river, and they enjoyed this parade more than anybody, I believe. Some of them were fortified internally of course, and that added to the excitement. Fry: And the second big event? McCuIIoch: An airplane appeared in 1918. We had been forewarned so were busily watching the sky from the crack of dawn. At last it appeared, an occasion long remembered, because I II McCuIIoch: was watching the plane so intently I forgot to watch the road and rammed my bike smack dab into a telephone pole. Considerable damage to btke and rider. When the plane took off, the shadow passed over our back yard and threw the chickens into a panic. Biggest hawk they had ever seen, so they scuttled into the hen house and stayed there the rest of the day. Fry: How did you pick up your interest in history? Was this from your mother or were you marked by this centennial celebration? McCuIIoch: That may have had something to do with it, but 1 always was interested in who lived In the little towns and why. What did they do? How did they get here? What happened, where did they go, and why? Fry: You mean you were the type who always asked questions. McCuIIoch: I'm afraid I was the type who asked too many. But If you don't ask, you don't find out. Of course, sometimes you find out the wrong thing too. Fry: Yes, I wondered If you really got some honest straight answers there. McCu 1 1 och : Oh , occas i ona 1 1 y . Fry: It sounds like you were an early oral historian. McCuIIoch: I was an oral inquirer. Fry: So In other words, you've had this interest in history then since very early in life. McCuIIoch: To be honest with you, I think it came about in this way: 12 McCuIloch: I mentioned that the men who were running the railroads then were mostly those who had built it. They were all close friends of my father, so he would take me over to their homes and we'd sit on the porch and they'd tell me stories of the early days, doubtless exaggerated rather thoroughly. But nevertheless they gave me a feeling for the times. Fry: Well, that was a pretty rare experience too for a little boy. McCuIloch: It was indeed. Fry: I think a lot of little boys might not have sat still for older people sitting there telling them stories about other times. McCuIloch: Well, I got it not only from the old timers but also from my grandfather, who lived with us for quite a few years. He had been fifty-five years in sail all around the world. Fry: And was he a Canadian? McCuIloch: Yes, from Nova Scotia. Fry: This was a grandfather on whose side? McCuIloch: On my father's side. The old man was so tough that his sons made one trip with him and then jumped ship. That's a fact. He was a very hard man. Of course, he had to be in those days. Fry: He was a ship's captain, you say? McCuIloch: That's right, for many years in sail around the world. Sometimes he'd be away from home six or eight years at a 13 McCu I loch: time. Fry: Did he carry any particular kind of cargo, or just anythi ng? McCuIIoch: Just anything that was offered. Tramp vessels like his would pick up just anything that was on the docks so to speak. I shouldn't get started on him. I can go on for a long time about my grandfather. Fry: Do you have any of his stories that you could tell? McCuIIoch: Yes. Suppose I stop with two. Once he had a group of Lascars, East Indian seamen, a very motley crew indeed. They mutinied, and he put down the rebellion. But shortly after, he was standing at the stern of the vessel reading the log, you know, with the little propeller you threw overboard — Fry: Excuse me, but do you know how he put down the rebellion? McCuIIoch: Just with his big fat fist. Captains had to be divine authority on their ships, being away from port as much as six months. Otherwise there would be chaos. Fry: This is the tradition, isn't it, of the sea? McCuIIoch: That's right. It's not important now with radio and fast passage, but in six or seven months at sea without sighting land, you had to have the authority and exer cise it. There was a polished brass cover around the compass, the binnacle at the stern of the ship, and as my grand father stood there watching the rotation of the little 14 McCulloch: log, measuring his progress, he saw in the binnacle a re flection of a barefoot Lascar coming at him with a ralsed-up knife. So he stepped aside just in time, stuck out his foot and the man fel 1 overboard, and my grandfather con tinued to read the log. Fry: And that was the end of the Indian with no further ado, you mean. McCulloch: Precisely. Fry: Did all of his crews jump ship at the first port? McCulloch: No, the men were not as independent as his sons. Fry: Well, go ahead and tell your second story. McCulloch: This one has some sentiment in it. At three o'clock In the morning, off the coast of Africa, my grandfather woke up and said to the mate, "Mary called me." Mary was his wife. He said, "She called 'Ben,' three times." The mate wrote this in the log and signed It. And that same night in Nova Scotia, his wife, my father's mother, was dying, and she sat up in bed and called, "Ben," three times. :-, This was in the log of the vessel. There may be some confusion with the word "log" used twice in such different connotations, but the log my grandfather was read i ng was a little propeller on the end of a string. You throw it overboard and it rotates and actuates a counter which tells you how fast you're going. Fry: Like a speedometer. 15 McCulloch: That's right. And the log book was the daily chronicle of the trip. Well, that's enough of early history. Fry: Do you have any other indications of what today we call extra-sensory perceptions? McCul loch: No. Fry: Then it hasn't necessarily been inherited by you or anyone else. McCulloch: No. Not a bit. Fry: This is such a controversial field right now, it might be interesting to future historians. Then, I wonder if you have any Idea how your grand father gathered up his crews. McCulloch: He had to take what the shipowners gave him and of course they got the cheapest sailors they could find. One reason they didn't jump ship was that they didn't know any better because the life they were leading before they got aboard ship was probably worse. Here's another item which you won't believe about this shipping business. When my grandfather was apprenticed as a young cabin boy aboard ship, he was paid a dollar a month and board, and "board" usually consisted of fairly well rotted salt pork with hard tack and black coffee. No wonder they got scurvy. The young boys learning to run up the rigging were not allowed to wear shoes aboard ship. They were in bare feet, so that as they clambered up the rigging the first mate could pu -sue them with a long stick with a 16 McCuIIoch: needle in the end jabbing their feet to make them climb faster. Fry: In other words, your impression then, in these stories by your grandfather, was that it was a sort of tradition for an authority based on force. McCul loch: That's right. Fry:. How was your grandfather as a person off the ship? Did he appear to be somebody who related to people on a basis of brute force? McCuIIoch: He was tough. Some Spaniards tried to shanghai him one night in Havana. He threw two over the seawall and the fall killed them. It took the British consul a long while to get him sprung out of jail. Fry: He was lucky he even got out. McCuIIoch: That's right. You had to be hard just to stay alive, because in the days of the sailing vessels, law and order were not as well established in seaports as it is today. It was you or the other guy. Fry: What was his name? McCuIIoch: Captain Benjamin McCuIIoch. Fry: Did he have any experiences with pirates? McCuIIoch: Not that I know of. From a forest history standpoint, maybe we should note that at one time log pirates operated on the lower Fraser River and in Puget Sound. Maybe on the Columbia too; I don't know. Log rafts and sometimes their custodians had a habit of disappearing. The big 17 McCuIIoch: operators established a patrol service to protect their booms. The piracy problems also led to the establishment of registered log brands, same as livestock branding. To get back to grandfather, due to him I developed a very sound respect for authority, particularly when he was right at hand. Fry: You didn't challenge him very often, did you? McCuIIoch: Never. I knew better. Daughter] Fry: Well, what kind of a man was your father, who grew up under somebody like this? Maybe his father wasn't home enough to make much difference. McCuIIoch: He wasn't home enough when my dad was growing up. By that time my grandfather was well established as a very capable sea captain and was all around the world, not home very much. Then my father, being the younger of the family, perhaps had it a little easier than the earl ier chi Idren. Well, that takes care of the early years. After high school I went to the University of British Columbia. Fry: What about your undergraduate years at the University — were you pretty well set in your mind what course of study you wanted to pursue? McCuIIoch: Yes. There was not a full forestry curriculum when I attended, so I took botany and graduated as a botanist. Fry: Your father's influence showing up there perhaps. 18 McCulIoch: Quite possibly. Let me say something about college in those days in British Columbia. Fry: What did you do besides attend classes? McCulIoch: Going to college was more of an event In the early I920's than It Is today. I couldn't guess how many of my high school classmates attended University, but It was far below the percentage of today's high school graduates. I can Illustrate the point by saying there was just one university in British Columbia at that time, and I think the enrollment was about 1500. So it was a big event, and I was as much awed by the change to metropolitan life as to the university atmosphere. To help out with ex penses 1 did odd jobs whenever 1 could find them, and as a result had little time for student pleasures. I saw one rugby game in four years, for example. I did join the Outdoor Club and spent some weekends hiking and snow- shoeing. About a dozen of us built a two-story log cabin as our headquarters, not far from the present Grouse Mountain chalet. Had a rude experience there once. We climbed up the mountain after a very heavy snowfall, and to get to the cabin door we had to dig a trench ten to twelve feet deep. The man opening the door was slammed back against the side of the trench as out popped a black bear. He scattered mountaineers right and left as he galloped away, blinded by the bright light. Ap parently he had burrowed under the bottom log on the 19 McCulloch: downhill side. Then the heavy snow filled it In and he got so fat on our winter grocery cache he couldn't dig out again. We couldn't use the cabin for several weeks till the stench died down. My close friend on these expeditions was Ernest S. Gibson, a student in engineering. We met in New York City several years later and shared an apartment there. In 1966, Mrs. Mac and I took Ernie on a motor trip to northern British Columbia since he was badly crippled with arthritis and driving was difficult. Glad we did, for he died a few months later. After leaving the University of British Columbia In 1925, I returned to forestry as an assistant ranger in the British Columbia Forest Service for a brief period. Fry: Where? McCulloch: In the North Thompson Country in central British Columbia. I worked pretty much in fire control with some timber cruising and timber sale administration mixed in with It. Later I got into forest research. "Tin" pants in the 1920 's. No fake photography; they stood up alone. McCulloch, the River Driver, 1925 THE DEPRESSION YEARS: WORK AND SCHOOLING 20 McCulIoch: After that came a period of odds and ends of jobs here and there and everywhere before finally getting estab lished some half dozen years later. Timber cruising, working in logging camps, working on logging railroads. There's a model log train up on top of a speaker cabinet I n my home . Fry: I saw that. That was presented to you last year by the staff? McCulIoch: Yes, when I stepped down from the Dean's job. Fry: Now, more specifically, after you got out of the Univer sity, what did you do? McCulIoch: I worked in forestry, both In British Columbia and in Washington as a private timber cruiser. I worked as a logger, and with an uncle in the construction business in Portland. Then 1 went back East and worked in a ship chandlery with a friend in New York harbor and took over the store when he quit. This was in the fall of '29, and I was planning to go on for a doctorate, but then the roof fell in. Things were pretty tough and the owners of the store at my suggestion decided to close It. So I had to look elsewhere for another job. Fry: This non-forestry interlude is unusual, because so many graduates just went straight into the Forest Service and stayed there. At least in the United States they did. McCulloch as Compassman and Cruiser, 1925 In Forest Research, 1929 McCulloch in timber cruising days, 1928. "Holed up in abandoned logging camp. Note home-made heating stove." 21 McCuIIoch: Well, I left British Columbia to come to the United States and work with an uncle in construction, and then worked at any forestry job I could find. Civil service work didn't look attractive to me, so I did whatever I could. You appreciate that in the depression years, jobs were pretty scarce, there were mergers taking place and re ductions in staff and so on. I might say there were many Interesting experiences there with foreign seamen, as we were supplying their vessels and trying to communi cate. Between my limping French and halting Italian and a little Portuguese, we could make ourselves under stood most of the time. Fry: Could you give us one anecdote to illustrate what you were working with there? McCuIIoch: Well, for one example, the chief engineer of a Portuguese ship came in one time. He called himself a "premier mechanician" so we figured he was the chief engineer. He gave us a long list of supplies with two prices. One, with higher prices, we were to bill to the company, and the other one we were to supply at the real prices and give him the difference. So we threw him out the door. Fry: He was going to make a little. McCuIIoch: He was going to make qu i te a little. He had about a $500 differential there. We wouldn't go for that. We did run into many interesting people. At the other end of the scale were some Ivy League 22 McCuIIoch: men who had yachts. They used to come in and supply their craft from our establishment. So we made some in teresting transitory acquaintanceships. Fry: These aren't people then that you kept up with later in I ife? McCuIIoch: No, particularly since we wound up the business. Following the closing of the store I transferred to the Fox Hill Foundry in Hoboken, New Jersey. This foundry was owned by this same uncle of my friend, the one mentioned previously. And there I had a job on the drafting and a little designing of propellers for the tug boats in the harbor and occasionally the big liners wou 1 d come i n . Fry: How did you, a botanist, get into a job drafting and designing ship propellers? Daughter!] McCuIIoch: 1 was told to do it — more draft than design. Fry: During this period, so many people were out of work that it was all that a Ph.D. could do to get a job. But you stepped in and started doing something totally out of your experience. McCuIIoch: I had done some mechanical drawing and knew a little about ships. Fry: What kind of propellers did the foundry design, for instance? McCuIIoch: Oh, we had a terrific overhaul job on a ship which had bent two of its four propellers. It actually had four 23 McCuIloch: fourteen-foot propellers. I should say that the Fox Hill Foundry was practically the sole source of supply for the tug boats around the harbor, and had a spare propeller for every tug of the Moran Tugboat Company. They're still operating. It was very interesting work. For example, the little charter fish boats, similar to those along the coast here at Depoe Bay, would like to start from the Battery on a Sunday morning and rush to the nearest new wreck first, to get the fish from around it with their sea-going parties of fishermen- amateurs. If they could get a propeller that would give them a knot an hour faster, they'd beat the other boats. So they always wanted the shop to design a faster propel ler. Fry: Did you say nearest wreck first? McCuIloch: Yes. When a barge or a vessel is sunk in shoal water, at first the fish will congregate all around it, and if you're there first with your charter fishing party you're going to get a lot of fish. But if you come out in the second or third boat, you're not going to get much. But these fellows didn't realize what It meant in terms of fuel or added horsepower to get added speed. If, for example, a boat were making twenty knots an hour and burned five barrels of oil, maybe you could get twenty- one knots but then you would have to burn maybe ten 24 McCulloch: barrels of oi 1 . This had to be explained to them, and they wouldn't listen. Sometimes you got mad and gave them the propeller they wanted, and It was so large and left such a big hole in the ocean, they would fall back into it so to speak. Fry: That's why some of the ships had their noses up In the air. McCulloch: And that's how we made Christians out of some of these wise guys who didn't know about propellers, [laughter] Fry: Did you actually design any new kinds of propellers? Did you make any Innovations? McCulloch: No innovations. Fry: Part of this period, you were back in British Columbia, weren't you? McCulloch: For a while before this time as propeller-draftsman. After I had been at the Foundry for some time, things got tougher in the East too. It seemed desirable to search for greener fields, and that's when I went on the Erie. Fry: 1 see. How did you get your job on the Erie? McCulloch: By talking to the president of the railroad. The vice- president, excuse me. He was Mr. Robert Woodruff, a very f I ne man . Fry: You went straight to the top. [laughter] McCulloch: Yes. He later was president. 25 Fry: How did you happen to go to the vice-president? McCulIoch: Because I went to a lecture in New York one night by the chief of the American Railroad Association, the in dustrial organization representing the railroads at Washington. He mentioned that in spite of the depression, opportunities were still available for college men on the railroads. And he mentioned the Erie Railroad. So I talked to him after the meeting and said that 1 wanted an introduction to somebody in the Erie. So he gave me a note to Mr. Woodruff, the vice-president. Fry: So you had a position then in which they used college men? What was this? McCulIoch: This was a job in which you started somewhere at the bottom, firing engines, switching and working with a track gang. But as the depression worsened and things got tougher on the railroads, they had to take care of men with seniority, and I could see that I was losing ground faster than I was gaining. Eventually there came a day when I had no job. So I worked as a track hand on the same railroad. Eventually I got to be a foreman of a new track-cleaning crew. After four years, I decided to go back and finish my interrupted forestry education at Syracuse. Fry: Mac, you had a number of rich, varied experiences before finally settling in Oregon in 1937. You didn't, as so many people did in the depression, go into CCC work or 26 Fry: live under a protective umbrella of government forestry. This might have been a period in your life when you ac quired a great deal of experience, and a great deal of wisdom, and a great deal of respect for the Innate qualities of men, which In turn lead to your educational theory here. McCuIloch: You're right in all respects except the acquisition of wisdom; 1 didn't gain much. But the other things 1 did, and it was very useful. When the chips are down you suddenly establish a new sense of values. In the middle of the depression before I was married, Steve Gibson, who had been at the University of British Columbia with me, and 1 shared a very crummy apartment in the tenement area of New York. One Saturday he came home and said, "Mac, I'll have to depend on you for eating money this weekend; we didn't get paid." 1 said, "Steve, I was depending on you because I didn't get paid either." So there we were, facing a long weekend and not a nickel in the pocket. So Saturday morning we got up very early and went out and took a big pack sack with us and made a note of the location and picked up milk bottles and peddled them to grocery stores, a little farther away than our local neighborhood, and so we got eating money for the weekend. Then on Monday or Tuesday of the next week when we got paid, we put the milk bottles back again. When you're reduced to those 27 McCulIoch: straits, you think of things a little differently there after. There are some fresh realities in the world. You view men and their problems differently than If you'd never had those experiences. Fry: And your system of ethics becomes quite realistic suddenly. McCulIoch: It does indeed. We figured we weren't stealing, >we were borrowing. While on the subject of stealing, our front door was flush with the sidewalk on West Twenty-third Street. If you wanted to get rid of anything, wrap It In paper, tie a string around it and put it outside the door, and in five minutes it would be gone. Fry: You mean just set it there and someone will come along and take it? McCulIoch: Never more than five minutes. Gone. So it was a little bit back to the jungle, every man for himself. Fry: This was almost as primitive then as some of the condi tions you speak of in one of your tapes at the Self- Learning Center where you and your friend were under conditions of extreme stress in both the task you were doing and the weather in an Isolated section of the woods for ten days. You both felt that you were getting — McCulIoch: "Timber fetched." C laughter] Fry: "Timber fetched," the day before the sun came out.* *lbid, I, p. 19, typed transcript. 28 McCuIloch: That's right. You realize then how close to the surface are the primitive responses. The civilized veneer Is not very thick. Fry: And so did you feel at the time that there was much con nection between a situation like that back in the woods « and a situation in the middle of a metropolis with thou sands of people around where you were really up against it? McCuIloch: Well, actually we were so far mowed down on that expedi tion in the woods that I couldn't think constructively. It was a close call for both of us really. You can't Imagine the day-after-day grind: wet clothes, wet tent, cold food most of the time — sometimes we couldn't get a fire going. And doing very hard work, and the terrain getting worse Instead of better as you went along, and the flies driving you crazy (those were the days before insecticides). It's a rough thing to go through, but It soaks out some of the complacency in you. Fry: And now you know the limitations, too, of a human being. McCuIloch: Yes, you don't ask some man in the future to do some thing which you know he can't get done. Fry: Had you had any particular religious training in your home? McCuIloch: Not specifically. We were members of the Presbyterian Church and it was pretty much a fundamentalist church, hell's-flre sort of thing. And they weren't very good compromisers. There was black and black and white 29 McCuIIoch: and white. Fry: And It doesn't take very long to get everything black by their standards does It? daughter] McCuIIoch: ' That's right. Fry: And so you more or less set up your own beliefs with your own experience, I guess. And when you were living pre cariously and going from job to job like this In the de pression, have you ever looked back to see just what you got out of all this wide experience? McCuIIoch: Those experiences sound a little more important than the bare facts justify. They were rather dissimi lar experiences, but they were realistic. I lived through them and they gave me a kinship with working men which I have found usefiil ever since. I'm not at a loss when I talk to men who work with their hands. Fry: You can feel that/you're one of them, down underneath It all. McCuIIoch: Sure. When you shovel coal all day long, you know what It is to work. Fry: Well, I guess you must feel a kinship with a wide span of humanity. McCuIIoch: Yes. Although in these later years with the rapid advance of science, I've lopped off that end. It's too much for me. Fry: 1 think most people feel that way about the fields they're 30 Fry: not In direct contact with constantly. McCuIIoch: That's right. GRADUATE SCHOOL AT SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY 31 McCulIoch: In 1934, we went ahead and moved to Syracuse where I worked on my Master's Degree In Forestry for two years. Fry: You said "we" went to Syracuse. Were you married by this time? McCulIoch: Yes. Fry: When did you marry? McCulIoch: 1931. Fry: That was really a low year financially wasn't it? McCulIoch: Yes it was. Fortunately Mrs. Mac had a good position. She was Public Health Supervisor of twenty-two nurses In one of the most populous counties in New Jersey. She has a degree in Public Health Education from Teachers College, Columbia, and a Master's Degree in Home Economics from Oregon State University. Fry: You must have met her, maybe, when you were working at the Fox Hill Foundry? McCulIoch: Yes. On a Sunday afternoon excursion to Rye Beach, Connecticut. That was the popular thing to do in those days, take a steamer trip. And in the depression the price had been lowered to the point where you could afford to go now and then for fifty cents or something like that. Fry: And what Is her name? McCulIoch: Margaret Mildred Neher. The first two years we were married we were around metropolitan New York with the 32 McCulloch: Erie, and the next two years, 1933-34, In upstate New York and Pennsylvania. At Syracuse I got a Master's in Forestry with a minor in Education. Fry: It was unusual for married students to go to school In those days. McCulloch: Yes, because the grant we got was $62.50 a month. Fry: How did you get the grant? McCulloch: Applied for it. Fry: This was a scholarship at Syracuse? McCulloch: That's right. Fry: Did you live on it? Or did your wife work? McCulloch: There wasn't any job available to her at Syracuse, but we hadn't counted on that. We lived on the $62.50. We paid ten dollars a month rent for a four-room apartment. Fry: Was that about the normal^- McCuIloch: That was the normal rent, yes. Fry: And what date was this? McCulloch: This was in 1934. I was in the Adirondacks at the Syracuse forestry summer camp as an instructor for two summers.. My wife was a counselor at a YWCA summer camp, also in the Adirondacks. She had an offer to go to Labrador In Sir Wilfred Grenfell's Public Health opera tion but was not able to get away. Fry: What instructors and courses stand out In your memory? McCulloch: The most Important gain at Syracuse was not in subject matter but in friendships. Some of the staff had been 33 McCuIloch: in almost on the ground floor of forestry and brought fine personal reminiscences into their teaching. I was most! closely associated with H. F. A. Meier, my major professor; G. C. Delavan, (I worked for Del two pleasant summers In the Adirondacks); Joe 1 1 lick, Sam Spring, Harry Brown, Bill Harlow, Ed McCarthy, Joe Lowe. In addition I had a more casual acquaintance with most of the other staff members. These friendships still prevail with the sur vivors. Graduate students and their wives had a fine social rapport, and I well remember weekly shopping expeditions with the Lowes, hunting for bargains to make that $62.50 go farther. RESEARCH AT MICHIGAN STATE COLLEGE 34 McCulloch: About a month before graduation at Syracuse, I had an offer to take over the small forest experiment station which was operated by the Forestry Department of Michigan State College as It was known In those days. It was located a few miles from Sault Ste. Marie and we moved there In 1936. Many signs of winter were still In evidence though It was then May. Fry: You left a month before graduation, but you got your degree anyway? McCulloch: Eventually. Oh, the registrar and I had some words about It. He wanted me present for the graduation ceremonies, a requirement which I didn't agree with. In fact, I never have been handed a diploma. On graduation day In British Columbia, 1 was fighting fires, and before I got the degree In Syracuse, I was working In Michigan; and when graduation time for my doctorate came here in Oregon, I was back In New York. Fry: 1 suppose these diplomas were mailed to you. McCulloch: At long last. I didn't get a diploma handed to me at any time. In fact, I'm still on probation at the University of Washington because I entered there In 1927 as a graduate student with only three years of high school. And the fact that three years of high school was all there was In Canada In those days, made no difference. I was a de linquent graduate student, and I'm still delinquent. 35 McCuIIoch: The fact that I had previously graduated from the Univer sity of British Columbia, which had a fairly good reputa tion, made no difference at all. I had had only three years of high school; therefore I was automatically a deficient student. Registrars can be very positive at t I mes . Fry: Later on when you became a dean, were you able to apply rather flexible standards to admitting students who had variables like this crop up In their high school transcript? McCuIIoch: We have to follow the regulations of the State System of Higher Education, but it is still a good habit to culti vate registrars. Fry: They're pretty powerful. McCuIIoch: Yes indeed, because they can always find a rule which covers someth I ng . Fry: The Michigan job was your first experience in research, is that right? McCuIIoch: No, I'd been in research in the British Columbia Forest Service earlier, mostly concerned with reproduction on cut-over land, survival of seedlings and similar studies. Fry: What kind of research did you have at the Michigan Station? McCuIIoch: Well, a number of things. This had been a little agri cultural school operated by the County, but they couldn't make a go of it of course, and the College took It over. We were concerned with pulpwood production pretty largely. Also we had a nursery supplying all of the i 36 McCulloch: Upper Peninsula with planting stock and even some of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan; this was a Clarke-McNary nursery, operating under cooperative state-federal funding. The second summer we were there, the Michigan State College Forestry School summer camp on the Station property had engaged a man from Oregon State College to come and teach forest engineering. We got along very well together. Fry: Who was that? McCulloch: C. J. Budeller, a well-known logging superintendent In the early days here In Oregon. He and I got to reminisc ing about logging and the early railroads, and he said, "You ought to come back to Oregon." When he got back to Oregon State at the close of the summer camp, he found there was need for a new staff man, and he put my name In the pot and here we are. We were glad to leave Sault Ste. Marie, as a matter of fact, because we arrived here In Oregon on the twenty- first of October, 1937, a warm Indian summer day, and before we had left the "Soo" we'd already had_ temperatures below zero and a foot of snow In the yard. On Easter Sunday that year, Mrs. Mac and I walked down the Charlotte River. There were still several feet of ice and four or five feet of snow on top of It. It's a long, long winter In northern Michigan. Fry: Your work in the research station there must have been Mrs. McCulloch and her collie, Lady, Easter Sunday, 1937, Charlotte River, Michigan State Forest Experiment Station 37 Fry: pretty demanding physically, then, if you had all of this weather to contend with, and the snow. McCuIloch: We certainly did. We moved down to Lansing for the winter to the headquarters of the Forestry Department, where I taught a short course for Conservation Department employees, Fry: In what, timber management? McCuIloch: In general, yes. In general forestry practices, because of the Conservation Department employees there, as well as foresters, also fish and game managers, and what not. They didn't have a state forestry department, as such. 38 TEACHING AT OREGON STATE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY, 1937-1942 Fry: You are ready to discuss forestry education now? McCuIloch: O.K. From about 1937 to 1947 or so, substantial changes were made In the School of Forestry at Oregon State Univer sity (Oregon State College, In those days). George W. Peavy had been a very forceful dean and was fiercely devoted to "his boys," as he called them, and "his School." So when he became President of Oregon State he retained the forestry deanshlp. This move also retained him as a member of the State Board of Forestry, where he exerted considerable influence for the betterment of forestry In Oregon. Due first to a decline in Civilian Conservation Corps activity, and later to World War II, forestry enrollment in this period fell off drastically, from a high of 555 to a low of less than 25. Peavy and other forestry leaders in the state felt that this time of reduced activity was an appropriate period in which to lay plans for the Inevitable postwar expansion of the School. When Peavy retired as President of Oregon State, the forestry deanship also be came vacant. It was felt that strong leadership and strong relationships with the forest industry were both needed. After a considerable search, the deanshlp was offered to Paul M. Dunn, who was a very successful dean at Utah State. Paul accepted, came to Corvallls In 1942, and at once began planning for the recovery of the School, postwar. 39 Fry: How did he do it? I don't know Mr. Dunn. McCuIloch: Well, he left Oregon State in 1955 to go on to a much larger enterprise, which illustrates his ability; he is now one of the vice-presidents of the St. Regis Paper Company. Paul spent a tremendous amount of time and effort traveling the state, interviewing public and private for esters and industry leaders, trying to put all the pieces together, and he did it very well indeed. When Paul be came dean he sought all the helpful advice he could find. Especially as a member of the State Board of Forestry there was excellent opportunity for him to become ac quainted with industry leaders. Paul talked with them and with all the faculty members he could find; some of course had gone to war. Looking for staff to cope with the unex- pected rush of veterans, Paiiil asked me to return to the School when the war was over. Fry: I wonder if you could say some things about your first semester's teaching at Oregon State University? McCulloch: Well, of course it was a rat race because I came from the administration of a Forest Experiment Station In Michigan directly to Corvallls and walked in the classroom and began. Also I followed one of the most famous members of the forestry staff, T. J. Starker, a man of great renown in the Northwest. Fry: You mean he left as you came on the faculty? McCulloch: No. He left the silviculture class. In 1937 there was a 40 \ McCuIIoch: flood of students, due to the Civilian Conservation Corps program when everybody wanted to be a forester. There were one-hundred more students in the school then than there are even today. So all of a sudden the School had to hire four new staff members of whom I was one, and T. J. Starker gave up some of his work. I took one of his major classes. Fry: I see. This was in what? McCuIIoch: Silviculture. Three other men who came at that time were Henry Vaux, Clarence RIchen, and Bob Evenden who is now with the Morrison-Knudsen Company. Fry: And then Vaux later became Dean of Forestry at the Univer sity of California and Clarence RIchen is now— McCuIIoch: A vice-president in charge of Northwest timberlands for Crown Zel lerbach. Fry: In your first classes, did you notice anything about the students then that were different later on? McCuIIoch: That's a little hard to answer because there's such a wide variety In men. To my dismay my class had as many as one-hundred men enrolled. Fry: That was a big class. McCuIIoch: That was an enormous class for forestry, because up to that time there had been maybe twenty or twenty-five In upper division courses. But also I had the task of for getting the ten years I had spent back East and trying to 'place myself suddenly back In the middle of the Northwest 41 McCulloch: forests. I spent many nights on books frantically keeping ahead of the classes. Fry: Adjusting to Douglas fir in the western states? McCulloch: True. Fry: But, you apparently did this and became rather successful in it. Were you able to do much research or writing dur ing this period? McCulloch: A little of both. Not a great deal because I spent so much time keeping ahead of things. And then too I had resumed work on my long-neglected doctorate, which 1 had had to give up way back in 1929. Fry: And this was being done where? McCulloch: The University of Oregon. I had spent one year as a graduate student at the University of Washington, and the two years at Syracuse University which 1 mentioned before, and then the equivalent of two years at the University of Oregon. Fry: In what field were you getting the doctorate? McCulloch: In Education, the Ed.D. in 1947. I had a marvelous ex perience because I took courses from such men as Dean Jewell of the School of Education at the University of Oregon, the Dean of Education at Syracuse, the Dean of Education at the University of Southern California, and Dean Hill of Education at Yale. Also at USC I took all the courses offered by Dr. W. H. Burton, who was leaving to administer the teacher training program at Harvard. 42 McCuIIoch: (Interesting sidelight: Bill Burton was a freshman forester In Corvallls In 1907.) Fry: How did you manage to go to these various campuses and take courses under these men? McCuIIoch: I was majoring in silviculture at Syracuse and took a minor in Education for my M.S., and then later went down to the University of Southern California where a number of these men were teaching in summer school, and attended two summer schools down there, then two more at Oregon. This was a very enriching experience, not just drudgery. Fry: And this was made possible because you were on nine- month duty here? McCuIIoch: That's right, for my first five years. Fry: Would you like to say anything now about the relation of the School in those days to the needs of government forestry and commercial forestry, so that you can con trast it with the period of the 1950's and I960's? McCuIIoch: Well, at that time of course the forest Industry was not as far advanced In forest management as it is at the present. So in the management department specifically (which was most of the School) there was quite a little emphasis on preparing for civil service careers. Most of the men in management looked toward the junior forestry exam for the U.S. Forest Service as the chief employment opportunity. Professor Starker for many years very suc cessfully ran a seminar in regional forestry pointed at 43 McCuIIoch: this exam. Actually this course was several things: a review of forestry operations around the country, a brush- up on vocabulary, and some sound advice on how to be suc cessful In answering different types of exam questions. This course enabled many men to pass the exam who might not otherwise have done so. Fry: So you felt then that at this time the men in the pre-war years were getting a pretty good technical education in management? McCuIIoch: That's right. Also in products and engineering, the other two departments in the School. But at the same time students were lacking in comprehensive, all-around educa tion, and their communications ability was very low; so we've worked on those things since. Interestingly enough, Dr. Re I chart, who is now in charge of the School's Self-Learning Center here, at that time was a professor of English as well as Education. He Initiated a voca bulary building course which enabled many men to extend their vocabularies so they could get by the federal exams, whereas otherwise they would not have succeeded. So Dr. Relchart has been a friend of forestry for a long time. Fry: This was in general vocabulary or In technical forestry vocabulary? McCuIIoch: General. It's astounding that college students can com municate successfully with relatively few words. For example, In an examination I gave the students shortly 44 McCuIloch: after arrival, I used the word "preponderant," a very ordinary word. There was a good deal of complaint that I was using esoteric terminology which they'd never heard before. And probably they were right — because "preponder ant" Is in a nine-thousand-word vocabulary level, and most college students then had six thousand. Fry: And do you think their vocabulary is larger now? McCuIloch: I'm afraid it has suffered considerable erosion In the intervening years. Now we find men better prepared In math because they can see an Immediate use for that, but they quarrel and struggle and strain to avoid English, not realizing that they are avoiding a career by so doing. Fry: Then this situation of a dwindling vocabulary is not improving? McCuIloch: I would say not. Fry: At least in forestry students. McCuIloch: That's right, and I find the same complaint in the English Department about other students. So we work quite vigor ously with students on English. We give a comprehensive test at the end of the second year, and those who flunk must take more English. Fry: I noticed that in both old curriculum and new curriculum you require nine hours of English, three courses, as a minimum for all students. McCuIloch: That Is basic-, and If a man's performance isn't satis factory, we require additional writing and additional 45 McCulloch: vocabulary In two more courses. Fry: That's very unusual isn't It? V McCulloch: I think It Is. This goes back to the feeling of employed foresters that they lacked sufficient facility In English. Ed Heacox, who was In charge of timber lands for Weyer haeuser for some time, once said that he had reached the point where he would not hire a forester until the man could put on Ed's desk two reports, or theses, or what-have- you, which would Illustrate his competence. Ed was tired of re-writing reports from men In his department. Recently the largest Industrial forestry firm in Canada — McMlllan- Bloedel and Powell Rlvei — advertised for a forest mensura- tlonlst. A major stipulation In addition to technical ability was that candidates must be fluent In writing and speaking. 46 ADMINISTRATION OF THE STATE FOREST CONSERVATION ACT, 1942-45 Fry: You were gone from the School during the war years, weren't you? McCulIoch: Yes. I was asked by Nels Rogers, the State Forester, to be the Assistant State Forester In charge of the new Forest Conservation Act administration. 1 had known Paul Dunn previously and we soon got together, and I spent quite a little time during those three years conferring with him on School affairs. Also tied in with this while 1 was Assistant State Forester, I traveled the length and breadth of the state trying to put across the Forest Con servation Act. But while meeting with foresters every where, in addition to the State's business, I made it my own business and School business to buttonhole every forester I could find and ask> him what he most lacked in his forestry education. Two things emerged: the first was English. They all felt a lack of communication ability. And secondly, the old standard programs in forestry did not Include personnel administration. As a man goes up the ladder, this he must have. So when I came back to the School in '45, we introduced a course In what we called forest administration, which is really administration of men rather than of trees. Fry: When you left the School, had you already sent out feelers to see if you could get placed somewhere else? McCulIoch: No, I was asked to take this Job with the State Forester 47 McCuIloch: before I ever departed from the School. Actually I had volunteered for service in the Air Force, was accepted and was given an officer's rating. Then six months later, about a week before I was to report, 1 received notice that I was ineligible because at the time of initial application I had lacked six weeks of being an American citizen for ten years. So, after all this monkey business it was too late to do anything constructive along that line, and the State needed me and asked me to go to Salem and help out. Fry: So that's how you avoided the Air Force and happened to get into the State Forester's Office. McCuIloch: Well, not quite. The Air Force avoided me. Part of our forest conservation job at Salem was to try to get logs for the war effort without denuding the forest. It was a question of education with the operators. I would say that some very fine things were done unselfishly and constructively by members of the industry. Governor Charles Sprague was one of the original forces behind the Forest Conservation Act, and he was aided by Dave Mason particularly. This was putting into practice some of the forward looking and very laudable aims which had been talked about during the period of the Blue Eagle, NIRA [[National Industrial Recovery ActD. Fry: You mean in Article Ten of the Lumber Code? McCuIloch: Yes, that's right. That was an outgrowth of a foiling of responsibility on the part of the industry leaders that 48 McCuIloch: the time had come, in fact'had come and gone, when we should have started to look Into the future farther than we had to date. As long as the future supply of timber appeared to be limitless, there did not appear to be much purpose In spending time and effort and money to grow new timber. This had been the feeling. But it was sensed by industry leaders that this was no longer good enough. Fry: You're talking about after NRA and Article Ten, but before the Conservation Act was passed in 1941? McCuIloch: Yes. So this gave impetus to the passing of the Act. Fry: Yes, I've read in a number of places that even after the NRA was ruled unconstitutional in 1935, industry went ahead and said, "We'll do this ourselves anyway." And that this tied in directly with the Conservation Act in Oregon in 1941. Did it really? McCuIloch: That's right. Forest conservation became much more attrac tive to many people because it had industry's approval. If we in the State Forestry Department had tried alone to put this into an Act, it would have been difficult or impossible. Fry: What part of industry pushed this? McCuIloch: The larger, more responsible operators, and this is not throwing rocks at anybody. But It is true that the money to be made In logging and lumber manufacture during the war years attracted a great many fly-by-night operators. One of them could set up two so-called sawmills in one quarter-section of land and Just mow it down overnight 49 McCulIoch: practically. So the responsible segment of the Industry could see that this would put all companies In bad odor with the public. Fry: But this was after the Act was already established, if it was during our participation in World War II. McCulIoch: Yes, but it operated at a very low ebb for the first year or so. Fry: Oh, before the subsequent amendments. McCulIoch: That's right. Fry: I see. Were there provisions of the Act which related directly to some of the NRA code that industry had adopted up here? McCulIoch: Well, I can't cite them specifically but the same principle of maintaining the resources was tied in with the code. Fry: And did you have pretty much the same leadership in in dustry, the same men, the same companies, that had been active in working under Article Ten? McCulIoch: Yes, that's right. Fry: What were these? McCulIoch: Weyerhaeuser, Crown Zellerbach, U.S. Plywood, Booth Kelly, people like that. Fry: Who were the men in these companies with whom you had most contact on this? McCulIoch: That's hard to recall. It was twenty-seven years ago. Among the more active was Ed Hayes, recently executive vice-president of Weyerhaeuser, a moving spirit. He had 50 McCulloch: the long range vision and was eloquent In persuading his fellow operators to go along with him. Ed Stamm of Crown Zel lerbach was another. Nelson Rogers was the Oregon State Forester then. He was highly regarded by industry. Nels was one of the leaders in this thing. And of course Dave Mason; he was the father of the sustained yield idea. Fry: And Dave Mason was not connected to a company? McCulloch: He had his own consulting organization, Mason, Bruce and Girard, a company widely known and widely respected. Fry: And I guess had contacts with all the timber companies. McCulloch: And worked for the U.S. Treasury and knew his way around in Washington and had been with the Western Pine Associa tion, also on the staff at the University of California. So he had a tremendous background. Colonel Greeley, of course, was also a major Influence behind all of it. Fry: Oh, how was that? With his position— McCulloch: As executive secretary of the most influential and the biggest organization of forest products people in the country CWest Coast Lumberman's Association]. And Greeley was such a natural leader that what he said was gospel to a great many people. Fry: Did Greeley and Mason work in tandem or — McCulloch: Well, they worked very closely. Fry: Now how did you fit In? You were still on the faculty at 51 Fry: Oregon State. I've been told you wrote the bill. McCulloch: No, that's not accurate. It was the handiwork of many people with many amendments and changes. Suggestions to fit various points of view were brought In to make It palatable to the largest number to get It passed. Fry: Do you remember the evolution of this bill? McCulloch: No, frankly, I don't. My participation was Insignificant until the time the proposal was enacted Into law. After I became the first administrator of the Act, I was In the thick of the changes that went on for several years thereafter. Fry: So Mason and Greeley had something to do with writing It? McCulloch: Well, I'm quite sure they did. Their views were reflected In the end result. And Governor Sprague — I can't begin to tell you how much we owe to Charles Sprague, not only for this Conservation Act but In tightening fire control and In the formation of "Keep Oregon Green." Fry: Did Sprague actually take any Initiative In this? McCulloch: Yes, he did. Fry: How did he do that? McCulloch: He said, "Come on boys, let's sit down at the table and talk this over." Fry: You mean he suggested coming up with an Act? McCulloch: I don't say we can lay It solely at his door, but he made sure that the cooperation continued and that It did get through. 52 Fry: Was there any partisan lineup on this? McCulIoch: None, fortunately. Fry: So you didn't have that to contend with. McCulIoch: No. Fry: In getting the bill through, dJd It go through the first session that It was presented? McCulIoch: Yes. Fry: Just sailed right through. McCulIoch: I couldn't say that It went through at the first reading, but the 1 94 1 Legislature passed It without undue quibble. Fry: How did your official work begin with the Act? McCulIoch: My association with the Act came when Nels Rogers, knowing that the Air Force had decided to dls-accept me, asked me to go into Salem and lend him a hand. Being a man of vision, he was particularly concerned with the long term impact of the war on the forests and how we could make a reasonable compromise to obtain logs and to obtain future forests at the same time. So I was asked to make a survey of the functioning of the Act during Its first year. I prowled the west side of the state doing that, and one of my colleagues at Corvallls, Herbert Wllllson, took the east side. I combined his remarks with mine In a report to the State Forester. Fry: And there Is a copy of your report. We'll refer to that.* *"Forest Conservation In Western Oregon/' a report one year after the enactment of the Oregon Forest Conservation Act. December, 1942, State of Oregon. 53 McCuIloch: There's a report of sorts, yes. Fry: What else do you have to add to It? McCuIloch: Well, after filing the report, Nels asked me to stay and be Assistant State Forester In charge of that activity for the Department. I made up a kit of kodachrome slides Il lustrating good and bad practices and went to every state headquarters In Oregon and put on a little training show for the forest Inspectors. This was all new to them. At first we assigned two or three conservation In spectors to visit the logging operations, but they had to cover too much ground so we finally arranged to Inform the regular protection Inspectors more thoroughly. They learned what was acceptable under the Act and what was not; what could be a legal compromise and what could not. This way they passed the word on to the logging operators. I would say the first two years of the Act were spent In education instead of rigid enforcement, because If you crack down too hard on something brand new you're only going to get It tossed back at you. Fry: Educating the Inspectors and through them the operators? McCuIloch: Right. Fry: Were these Inspectors men who were already on the State Forestry staff? McCuiloch: Yes, that's right. Fry: And had been In other types of work? McCuIloch: Yes. What we tried to do was to Integrate the new 54 McCulloch: conservation duties with the existing logging inspections. I'm talking of f i re inspections now, making sure that the operations had adequate tools, equipment and men to take initial action on a fire. Hazard reduction and other pro tection practices were regularly reviewed on inspection trips. So to this existing work load was added conserva tion inspection, checking the operation for compliance with the provisions of the law. One trip to a logger's show then sufficed to examine compliance with both fire safety regulations and conservation regulations, saving travel time. This was important because there was a great war-time upsurge in cutting in Oregon's forests, and we needed a large force of .inspectors in the field. The extra conservation burden was made tolerable by the short course on standards using slides as I mentioned earlier. The conservation work could have been confusing without the in-service training in this area. Fry: Did you feel that you had enough inspectors, or were they spread too thin? McCulloch: Well, in terms of the tremendous fire protection job, the inspectors were spread a little thin, but this was the best we could do and eventually it worked out all right. Immediately following the war, I think we had something like fifteen to sixteen hundred mills in the state. Now we have about six hundred but the cut is still the same. However, today there is much higher quality and of course 55 McCulloch: much higher productivity. There were many f ly-by-nighters sawing ties for example. They would take any kind of tree, slab off four sides, make one tie, and waste as much wood as they sold. So when making Inspections, we tried to get In a little missionary work with them. Fry: For better utilization? McCulloch: Right. Fry: With so many different operators, it meant that you had many more Inspections to make then than you would have, for Instance, right now. McCulloch: Oh yes. Also, after twenty-five years, the Act Is well received and Is now accepted as a daily routine by operators. Fry: So the first few years were the hardest both quantitatively and then In the nature of your work, In Introducing it as a new th i ng . McCulloch: That's very true. We soft-pedaled the last little comma and dash In the law and instead tried to get the men to work with us reasonably well, getting them to see Why they should be doing It. Fry: In this "gentle persuasion" era, did you have any problems with any of the larger companies? McCulloch: No, our problems were. with the smaller ones who were here today and gone tomorrow. The bigger ones knew It was to their advantage. Some of them went beyond the require ments of the law even In the very early stages. Fry: Would you like to mention who those were? 56 McCuIIoch: Crown and Weyerhaeuser particularly. This doesn't say that some others didn't, but those two specifically because they had so much at stake. On private lands within the Forest Service boundaries, the Service took care of fire control for the State and the State took care of some Forest Service tracts, swapping back and forth to reduce travel time. So the Forest Rangers of the U.S. Forest Service also then became conservation Inspectors for us along with the fire Inspection of those operations. So I went to all the U.S. Forest Supervisors' offices in the state and talked to their field men with the same set of slides. Thiiis we had a coordinated approach and each man was thinking of the same situation at the same time when he was out on Inspection. Fry: 1 was going to ask you about amendments because In your report and in subsequent papers, you gave suggestions for amendments and recommendations. McCuIIoch: Well, some were a little ahead of their time, but were accepted later. Others were accepted at the time. It was just a question of give and take. We got what we could in the way of advances in the Act. In other words, we started out with a cost of $2.50 an acre for replant ing If the management had clearcut and left no seed sources. Fry: And the State Forester was empowered to go In and replant It at a cost of no more than $2.50 an acre? McCuIIoch: That's all they could assess the operator. Now I think 57 McCuIloch: it's up to around twenty dollars. Fry: Yes, and I remember reading that your recommendation was for doubling the original price to five dollars. McCuIloch: That was thought dangerous at that time. It was too big a jump ahead. Fry: Then there was the problem of seed trees and where the seed trees should be left and what kind of seed trees should be left. Did you have much resistance in getting this tightened up? McCuIloch: A little because initially some of the small operators thought that anything that had one green branch was a seed tree, or some old totally incompetent tree that they wanted to leave could be called a seed tree because they couldn't sell it. Daughter!] Of course, it \s_ a little tricky to tell a man that he should leave a thousand dol lars' worth of trees on an acre. Fry: Yes, I should think you would have had a lot of opposition to this. McCuIloch: Well, we did at first but eventually, since it was reason able and fair and long-range and for the good of the state as well as the operator, it came to be accepted. Fry: Which of these recommendations were resisted and went more slowly than the others? McCuIloch: The resistance depended on whose ox was being gored. Where a man would suffer unreasonably if required to do a certain thing, we tried to avoid requiring that kind of 58 McCuIIoch: compliance and would substitute for it something both logical and legal. Fry: The larger companies were the ones who had the most In fluence in the Legislature, weren't they? McCuIIoch: Not necessarily so. Fry: Well, your trade associations like West Coast Lumberman's Association and Western Forestry and Conservation Associa tion, I suppose, have a certain amount of lobbying power' with the Legislature, and I would have expected this to work In your favor. McCuIIoch: It did, with this reservation: some legislators appear to be "agin" anything big, whether the highway department, a chain grocery, or a large lumber company. However, we did have some very fine men at the Legislature represent ing the forest industry of Oregon. Charlie Ogle was probably the best known, and thoroughly respected by both houses. He was a great help with all forestry bills. Later the forest industry association merged with the general business community of the state. They have a man within this organization who's working at the Legislature now on forest problems. Fry: You mean it was the State Chamber of Commerce? McCuIIoch: No. The Associated Oregon Industries is an association of business and Industry within the state. Fry: I'm trying to remember the name of the organization which represents a number of small loggers and small landowners. 59 McCuIIoch: Western Forest Industries Association. Fry: And how did they perform? McCuIIoch: They were just getting started at this time, so they took no active part in the Conservation Act. The Industrial Forestry Association, the forest production group, many of whom were in the West Coast Lumberman's Association did take an active Interest. The industry supported good forestry legislation at the biennial meetings of the Legislature. Fry: The Western Forest Industries Association was the one which opposed the sustained yield cooperative activity. McCuIIoch: Yes, that's right. They felt that this would tie up tim ber which otherwise would go to some of their small operators. Fry: Yes, it would tie up timber which otherwise would go to other large operators too, by definition. McCuIIoch: Yes; this they didn't recognize at first. Fry: So I thought that maybe since this conservation legisla tion was also considered more difficult to comply with by small operators, they would oppose it too. McCuIIoch: They did not evidence much concern. Fry: But, at any rate the bill went through and it's been amended I guess almost every session since then. McCuIIoch: It has been improved as acceptance improved. As I say, twenty-five years ago, if you said "thinning," people looked at you as if you were odd: "What's thinning?0 But 60 McCuIIoch: It's done by big and some small operators today. Fry: Were there any technological advances at this time that helped the cause of forestry? Perhaps the use of tractors 01 — McCuIIoch: No, tractors were well established. Let me say paren thetically that I was one of the fellows who laughed at the idea of a tractor in the woods because back in the Twenties, the tractor was an animal with big awkward steel wheels that would hardly pull itself . But the bull dozer changed all that picture, the bulldozer and heavily powered trucks. Fry: ' I guess it was the trucks that really came in after World War 1 1 . Is that right? McCuIIoch: That's right. Many trucks prior to that time didn't have enough umph to pull up even a slight adverse grade. Fry: And did this make any special difference in the advance ment of forestry? McCuIIoch: Yes, because it enabled operators to reach small volumes of timber at a reasonable cost, whereas if you had to go by railroad, you'd be forced to let it sit there. Also trucks gave a good deal more flexibility to an operation. You could quickly move from one place to the next wherever you had a road system established a^id pick up diseased or infested trees following an epidemic. Thi. nas a great advance. It was economic rather than technologic but it had the seme impact. 61 Fry: Have there been any amendments in the law over the years which reflect changes In Industrial techniques? McCulloch: No. Actually the standard operating equipment used In the woods Is very effective In meeting the requirements of the Act. Fry: I guess I was thinking about some of the diameters men-'M tioned In the Act. Wasn't there a diameter limitation on trees that could be felled? McCulloch: Yes, at first. It wasn't adequate and It was changed. Fry: And then this I suppose had to be decreased as utilization of smaller pieces of timber became possible. McCulloch: Yes, actually the chronology of the Act was that it has occasionally moved ahead of what was in practice, or oc casionally has fol lowed practice as we could get support for the change. Fry: Have you followed this Act in your own active interest? McCulloch: No, that is not part of my current activities. One thing more I should say is that the general acceptance in Oregon by the operators has made it possible to sell the Idea elsewhere. Both Washington and California subse quently came up with their own acts of a similar nature. Fry: Yes, but Oregon was the first one. McCulloch: Oregon was the first. OREGON STATE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY, 1945-1955 62 Education o_f_ the Whole Man Fry: Would you like to continue discussing Oregon State now, as It was after your three years in the State Department of Forestry? McCuIloch: All right. Fry: Could you tell us how you made the change-over from the State Department of Forestry back to Oregon State in 1945? McCuIloch: Well, actually there wasn't much to it. Dean Paul Dunn then needed help at Oregon State and asked if I would come over; we had an understanding that when we got toward the end of the war period when other men would be able to pick up the work, I would leave Salem and come back to Corvallis. And that was done. With return to the School in mind 1 had a couple of assistants working with me at Salem and they took over the administration of the Forest Conservation Act when I left. Fry: The School of Forestry was probably somewhat different from the way you had left It In 1942. Can you say what some of its distinct characteristics were when you returned? McCuIloch: What made my return most pleasant was the generous willing ness of Dean Paul Dunn to experiment and to give me a free hand In curriculum revision. Having made curriculum one of my major fields In my study of education, I was able to call on help from professional curriculum planners. We realigned the three departments In the School. What had been technical 63 McCulIoch: forestry became forest management; what had been logging engineering became forest engineering, a much wider scope; and what had been wood products became the forest products department. Fry: You came back in 1945 as a professor, right? McCulIoch: And headed the Forest Management Department. Fry: So this gave you some administrative power within the School . McCulIoch: Let's say "opportunity." Fry: "Opportunity." [laughter] There were two other department heads also. McCul loch: That's right. Fry: And did they agree with you pretty well? McCulIoch: Yes, in fact the ground was laid before they were engaged. They came in '46 with an understanding of the School program. Fry: Who are they? McCulIoch: W. A. Davies is head of the department of forest engineering, and W. I . West became head of the department of forest pro ducts. He is still with the School but not as head of the department; he's gone back to full-time teaching now. In addition to departmental obligations in timber management, I was also personnel advisor for the School. Fry: This was student personnel? McCulIoch: That's right. We felt that personal development was an inseparable part of a forestry education. A personnel program was put into effect and is still being carried on. 64 McCuiloch: Doing it today Is Dr. W. P. Wheeler, a very capable per sonnel man. Some twenty years ago, the late Dr. Joseph lIMck who was then Dean at Syracuse, made a trip around the country looking at the various forestry school pro grams. He was highly pleased with our emphasis on develop ment of the whole man. In those days when I was asked what I was doing or what was my business, I said, "Men," and that floored quite a few people. Our major concern was not how many credits accumulated In the registrar's office; that did not equal a professional forester. We tried to develop, and to measure, the whole man. Dr. Illlck was very much Impressed with the effort which was put Into the program at that time; In fact, he said that we were doing more toward personnel development than other forestry schools. I think probably that was true. Fry: Do you know if other forestry schools picked this up too? McCuiloch: Pieces of it, because In meetings of forestry school deans, Paul Dunn and myself were asked to discuss the School's personnel work with the other deans, and some segments of It were tried in other places and improved upon. Of course we've updated our program right along. In 1947 I had a one-term sabbatical, and spent the time asking the major forestry schools what they did In personnel development. Fry: Did you get any good Ideas there from others? McCuiloch: Oh yes. Some of the best Ideas were not being used — through Inertia and habit, custom and tradition that you don't 65 McCulloch: interfere with the student outside of class hours, you just teach him ?n the formal class-room. We don't believe in that proposition at all. Our real concern is with the development of the whole man, and we have had testimonials from important people saying that this pays off. Dick McArdle, formerly Chief Forester of the United States, has i been very kind In his assertion that the development of the whole man Is a fine thing In this School. Fry: Maybe we should mention here that the technical and the academic preparation of the man Is not neglected In all of this. McCulloch: Oh not at all. It's complementary. There Is no use gradu ating a man with a straight A If he's not well-adjusted socially and professionally, and so we try to mesh the academic and the personnel program and give them equal weight in the School. Along this line one of the most Important, or at least one of the most rewarding things we did was to obtain a sum mer work report for every student so we knew what he had done to prove himself in the field. The employers like this too because when they come to hire a student, they have access to a personnel file where prior employers have reported, "He's a good man" for this, that or the other thing. Also, within the School, when we got a report back and found that Joe Doaks was failing on the job or not do ing as well as he should because of Item X, then we. worked 66 McCulloch: on Item X and the next summer we expected Joe to produce. Fry: Now as I understand it, one of the main ways that this program was actually put in operation was by giving pro fessors credit for the time they spent on student person nel work and releasing some of their teaching and research time. Is that right? McCulloch: Well, that was our hope. But It didn't work out because we had such a flood of students after the war that it was impossible to shake the professors loose. At one time I was trying to be head of department, personnel advisor, and teach sixteen credit hours. You find with that load you don't research on the side, or you omit something else. It just doesn't work. Fry: Well, I don't understand then how the professors had the time to do all this counseling of students and writing the reports on them and "looking at the whole man." McCulloch: The School made it the prime responsibility of every pro fessor to develop men, and they were all ready to do this. In fact, they were hired with the assumption that they would give major emphasis to developing the whole individual. And so we just worked and worked, and sawed wood as best we cou I d . Fry: And you didn't have any faculty uprising from the long hours? McCulloch: No. Foresters have always been hard-working fellows any way, so this just meshed in with what they expected to do at the School . 67 Fry: Did you pick up these Ideas for the student personnel pro gram in your contact with these leaders in the field of Education during your summers at the other universities? McCuIloch: Some, but most of it I got right out of the horses' mouths by buttonholing foresters at work during the years I was with the State. Fry: Could you trace this idea of educating the whole man to any other experience that you ran across, or books that you read, or people you talked to? McCuIloch: Well, it was just a point of view that developed gradually as I found that here was an area of weakness in forestry education generally, so we should try to find some way of correcting it. Here is a real problem. How len in forestry education, and it ->robably should be recorded nome- wberc '>ut put 'under ne-?l for, say, tv/enty yenre. 7»->e ?.ocs of accreditation ie soneta~n/> that should be exoL.inod b*r nnr.eone 30 that v/hea a hintor;/ is written it .oan have oone eenhl • r.co of accuracy. The subtleties of oernonalitieo involved, w^ica you mentioned, rare faotore thnt won*t bo found in the old records, I have a aerox of the deleted pa^ee, but it would be better to use the oriHtnals v;hich I sent you, if you still have them. Both Yule aad U.C, have procedure set up to «b- oplute.ly guarantee the integrity of the eeal for aa Ion;1; ae you f.ieera it necessary. Sorry if I retired you so presumptuously. Anyhow, it be accurately stated now, I hope the coming of spring in beautifxil Corvallifl v/ill aerve to lighten the unpleaa&at burden with which you cone froia day to day, Y our nice conpllment about the interviev/o certainly lightens my day. 2!hanlc you. Cordially, OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY CORVALLIS, OREGON 97331 SCHOOL OF FORESTRY WIIKT RESEARCH lABOUTOtY February 20, 1968 Mrs. Amelia Fry Regional Oral History Project Room U86 The General Library University of California Berkeley, California 9U720 Dear Chita: While you were here I should have taken time for more detailed ex planation of the sensitive situation. Thought of it once then forgot to give you the word. There are still valid reasons for forgetting the affair entirely. Barney Standing, an old friend recently deceased, was a highly successful personnel officer in the U.S.F.S. He applied three criteria to his statements where men were concerned: is it true, is it necessary, is it kind? My remarks were true, but I feel I did not ade quately meet the test of the other two criteria. In such a situation I would very much prefer to have the few sensitive paragraphs of the ori ginal script eliminated, as I have done in the re-write. I offer you as solace two pertinent facts which I hope will provide a satisfactory an algesic for historical pangs. (1) Actually Chita there is a misunderstanding to which I may have contributed. In Oregon we tend to say "the industry" even when referring to just one of the industry leaders; on a given issue he is not nec essarily speaking for the whole spectrum of the industry at all. Right now there are sufficient differences of opinion that one industry associa tion is suing another association over lumber standards. Reference the third paragraph of your good valentine letter: "The part you took out is a good example, however, of industry applying its weight to a problem in forestry education...." This really was not so. The official associa tions did not apply weight, nor did the leaders as a group. Several of the leaders did confer with Paul on a personal basis and were helpful to him. But there was no official posture taken by "the industry," or the industrial associations; no mass movement involved. It was instead a man-to-man discussion; and therefore the statement re industry can be re phrased as I tried to do, with greater relevance rather than loss. (2) The accreditation matter should have been recorded in deteil in the SAF files years ago, because a report must be made to the coun cil on all accreditation proposals or actions. (In some instances the early day accrediting representatives really investigated, in one re port naming names of two persons alleged to be guilty of biological in discretion). I don't have the original draft pa?es because I tried at first to make editorial change right on the draft. With so much interlining it became an almost illegible palimpsest. With kindest personal wishes, Sincerely, W. F. McCulloch wf mj lea cc Woody REGIONAL OHAL HI3TOHY OFFICE ROOM 486 February 26, 1968 Dr. v/. P. McCulloch School of Forestry Oregon State University Oorvallis, Oregon Dear Mao: I accept your reasons for forgetting the more candid explanation of the " sensitive situation" and I also accent the solaoe, except perhaps for a natural skepticism th-tt anything a Bout the accreditation could be found in the S.A.F. files now. Thanks, too, for clearing up any overly-generous At tribution to industry's "pressure" that I nay have seen in c$e2aring up the dilemma. 1*11 check the final na-m script to make sure that this ambiguity does not exist there; I think I picked it up just from talking to you or from extrapolating from the interview. Rest assured that this remains one of our better inter views, largely because of your realization of what should be selected for historical preservation— out of a rich and varied life. That includes the tales about your incredible grandfather ae well as the harder stuff on forestry and edu cation. I'll let 'Voody wrestle with the dinosaurs and their his tory. I'm kind of glad that you and I are off the hook there, You could probably do a real job on it, with a little additional research, but if I "helped" the results would be disastrous, considering that I can't distinguish an axle from a drum stake. (And I couldn't even have written that sentence if your Y/oods \Vprdrg Weren't here beside me.) I hope we can see each other sometime again, Mac — either here aa you pans through going South again, -or up there if a trip should materialize for me. Meantime, the final cony of The Work is under production here. Sincerely, con y affeccion, American Forests Vol. 62 #7 July 1956, p.40-m THE FOREST AND THE TOWN W. F. McCulloch In gentle little village long ago Clear upon the morning air came cheerful sound Of hearty men at work. Sea-girt the town in front And back behind two winding streets The serried rank of forest ranged afar. A wondrous wood it was of oak and pine Well fit for keel and hull and spar. And so the forest green Became the treasure of the town, As iron men wrought wooden ships And spread a great renown To distant shores. Bright chips Of mighty oak new-hewed from rib And plank, and tangy curls of pine From 'neath the builder's plane Bestrewed the busy shipyard on the main. A special kind of oak it was Which seemed by Providence bestowed Awaiting there in forest dim Against the day when shipwrights Searched for timber staunch To fashion fair a hull. The great tall pine so straight and true Was set for masts, the billowing weight Of canvas bearing 'gainst the winds Across the oceans1 reach of all the world. So sound the ships, so truly built That soon the yard could not keep pace And spawned another yard And once again and then again As all above the shore rang day and night The clangor of fine ships abuilding. Ax tunked, auger squeaked, and Sharp adze bit, in giving shape and size, And splendor to great logs, the Bounty of the forest green. Then to the youth, the dwellers of the town. There came a vision bright: * These barques of ours that bravely Sail the distant seas, need not be lost Beyond the ken of those who built them well. Lay down the tools, take ship, Our argosies we'll captain for oursel' And to this native strand bring back The ransom of the world." So to the master of the school they hied And had him teach the compass And the stars, the fickle wind, and Currents dread in roadstead distant far And teach he did, so well 'tis said That ever afterward in normal company Of men, no scholar lad of his Need ever feel unread. Then quieter grew the town as one by one The sons took ship and fared away Fathers bereft upon the shore Still toiled and still stout ships were built But slowly now as aging muscles Shrank from double chore. Fast fled the years, and evermore, scanning the Sphinx-faced sea, the sad-eyed Fathers watched for welcome sign Of sons returning. Blank, the sea Stared back, as through long years The sons , enmeshed in commerce Far and wide, forgot the promise Freely given and nevermore sailed home. Storied lands of spice and copra, Tea and teakwood , gold and silver They knew well, but not their native heath. And so the fathers and the town Both sore at heart, declined. Nor This alone the end of all their woe ; At first *twas scarcely felt, then More and more with crushing Weight the steamship cast a cloud On aging men and wooden sailing ships, And knelled the shipyards to their doom. Silent the ax and adze and auger, Quiet the clamor, quiet the men. Then fate another blow to all condemned, As grievously now the forest Kindled by stupid men fell all a-prey To flames and none there were Stout to defend the woods. To earth Sank trees in smoke and char. Scarce knee to brace a hull, or spar To fit a mast was left unharmed. Once rugged rocks of men, Now lacking sons and joy of building, lost Will to live. Then quick the sharp-edged Scythe of Time to cut them down. Greened once more the woods and weeds , Warmed by sun and washed by rain And soon with vigor as of yore, But not the town. Once happy homes with joyous Childish shouts awash, grew Still. Great gnarled elms above The solituded street a fitful shade Cast down o'er gaunt grey houses Skeletoned in untenanted dismay. Swift-running seasons, winter snows And summer suns, beat on hollow House, reft shingle from the roof, And door from hinge. While on the Waterfront, the one time lifeblood Of the town, the barren bones Of shipyards groaned as ebb and flood Of tide persistent gnawed them down Across the years. Came then a day when empty Gaped the town, forlorn, forgot, undone, With scampering mice now boldly Coursing in the sun, While up aloft a callous crow, claw Hooked on limb, rasped a raucous Curse on all mankind and on his works. But cursed the crow in triumph Yet too soon, for as the docks Decayed and weathered houses fell The greening forest burgeoned all about To hide the scars. New treasure Here for town a-new, and this time Town for evermore, As men mayhap a lesson learned Wisely to use the forest at their door. t To cut with care and not cut all , To use full well and waste not, This the creed of men who came Again; this time to crop the woods, not maim. Not to lavish spars of pine and hulls Of oak on all the seven seas, Sending sons to boot . Not to Garnish tree with fire to quicken Forest to its end, but here Instead unfailing wood to yield And town support for aye. Then Haply once again great spreading elms Bright house and cheery urchin guarded "NeairTi their shady crowns. Echoed again on winding street Chattering tongue and busy feet. Again the erstwhile brazen mouse Crept timidly about the house Of night, lest lethal cat should bound. And once again work's cheerful sound Came clear upon the morning air And joy again bedecked the village fair. LOGGING—OLD AND NEW By W. F. McCulloch Mac McCulloch speaking. This discussion of logging comes mostly from a talk at one of the Sierra Cascade Logging Conferences, Redding, California. It comes also from early experience in a coast logging camp, from a knowledge of logging history, and from personal acquaintance with some of the old men who made it. Since we are right in the middle of things that are new, most of the emphasis here will be on things that are old. It should be pointed out, however, that just because something is old, it is not necessarily worthless. Even an old newspaper is quite useful if you own a canary. This line I'm going to hand you can be shoveled into two piles, the bigger one dealing with ox team days and the much smaller one with the present and future. If you think my reference to a shoveled pile may be incorrect, you've just never worked around an ox barn. I don't know how a man qualifies to talk about the future in which naturally he has had no experience; but I have had some woods experience in the past, and qualified or not, I'm going to say something about logging. A valuable lesson in talking to loggers was learned at the Pacific Logging Con gress in Vancouver, B.C., about 192h. We had Prohibition here in those days but the more enlightened citizens up north suffered no such restraint on their social habits. When our loggers hit town they were eager to take advantage of this marvelous situa tion. With commendable foresight they prepared themselves against snake bite in case the lobby of the Vancouver Hotel suddenly should become infested with rattlers. Some characters indeed applied themselves to this happy task so vigorously that they proofed themselves with preventive medicine for 2-3 years ahead. As a result, come the opening session next morning you never in all your life saw such swivel-nosed, cross-eyed, wobble- kneed rigging slingers. First man on the program lurched up to the speaker's table, missed, fell flat on the floor, snuggled down comfortably in the deep carpet and promptly went to sleep. Both of the members of the audience still able to speak hollered "leave him lay." So the chairman did and called the next speaker. This was a terrible mistake because this man knew nothing about his subject, and with great determination shared his ignorance in every last detail with members of the Congress. On and on and on, he read a miserably dry paper, never once looking at the audience. After what seemed a lifetime, he quit, and the chairman innocently asked one of the natives, a dour old Scotsman to comment on it. Said the old man, "that was a damn poor paper and it was damn poorly read." This was a valuable lesson. First: speakers should confine their talk to things that they know, and second, it's time to quit before the audience dies on the vine. Thinking about logging history, the years go by so fast that suddenly you find you've been standing in the middle of history without recognizing it. For example, the first summer I was in the woods, sailing vessels were loading lumber in West Coast ports; kerosene locomotive headlights were on sale in Portland; the Booth-Kelly Lum ber Company of Eugene was advertising Oregon pine, meaning Douglas-fir; an employers1 organization was urging all operators to quote "combat the plague of the IWW with a YMCA in every camp to preach the doctrine of a purer and better lif ej" . The IWW meant International Woodworkers of the World, a very militant labor group with far left ideas. At the same time an artificial limb company was offering to replace lost arms and legs with wooden ones just as good; loggers were wondering how the opening of the Panama Canal would affect freight rates on West Coast lumber. All this is so fresh in mind it seems only yesterday, but it was 1913. Personal acquaintance with men and methods of the woods in those days came by working in a tie camp, on a river drive in the northern interior, in cedar pole camps using horses, and for a short time as assistant superintendent of a steam logging camp in the coastal fir. In all these jobs there were pleasant associations with men who were big loggers in the early days. One of them put camp-run logs into Puget Sound for $h and thought he was doing all right. Camps were ru>^ed, full of fleas, and many things that went on there differed somewhat from Sunday School classes. I can't be quite as specific about the early ox team logging, because it started before 1850, and I was less active in the woods at that time. The first recorded use of ox teams was in Mendocino County in Northern California in the summer of l8Ulu Early logging was indeed a quaint operation by today's standards. Cross-cut saws were at first unknown, axes were used for falling, and redwood choppers must have been men of great strength and skill. Logs were cut into very short lengths. Some were slowly dragged as you would pull a heavy trunk along on the ground; some were par buckled, like rolling a tremendous great barrel. It didn't take long for the ancient loggers to realize they'd never get anywhere at this slow pace, and they commenced dragging logs endo on short skids laid across a road. The big logs were quartered, first by black powder, later by saws. Whether quarter or whole log, dragging on skids was a great improvement over rolling the short pieces, and the skidroad was a wonderful contribution to logging. At this point another use/ of the word skidroad should be clearly defined. It has a second meaning, a street in the tougher parts of West Coast towns where loggers hang out. Careless reporters with dirt in their ears did not hear properly and have written skid row r-o-w so often that this miserable phoney term is accepted by the ig norant. There's no such damn thing as skid row and there never was. The street of saloons, card rooms, flop houyses, sporting houses, etc. is the skidroad, r-o-a-d. The present day use came from the famous skidroad built by Henry Yesler to skid logs from the woods to his mill on the Seattle Waterfront in l8f>2. After it was no longer used for skidding it became just a road, and stores, saloons, and other establishments dear to the hearts of loggers grew up alongside. So when the crews hit town they headed first for the skidroad. Much of Yesler' s old road remains in Seattle today but is known by the more genteel name of Yesler Way. In the woods, the most important man on the skidroad was variously known as a hair-pounder, bull puncher, or teamster. He was a man of great ability, agility, and profanity. All these talents were needed in great quantity daily. Some days it was very tough to be an ox. If the puncher had a hangover, or a liver complaint, or some other disagreement with the world, he was like as not to take several washers off the end of his goad stick so it would jab deeper into the bulls. While this certainly pained the bulls, it did haul a lot of footage in a hurry. Exploits of bull punchers are legendary but too mixed up with faulty memory, ex aggeration, and just plain lies to cite any particular feat of skidding as a record. However, onfcskidroad operation must be recognized. Malcolm MacFarland operating on the lower Columbia did establish a record for an extraordinary kind of ox team skid- road. Around 1890 he built a ?ood big tunnel to shorten the haul for his prized yoke of bulls. This tunnel is still in reasonable repair alongside U.S. 30 a couple of miles toward Portland from Westport. You can see it without getting out of your car. After the discovery that it was easier to skid logs than to roll them, the next change in the woods was made by a seafaring man. He was Dolbeer, of the famous Dolbeer and Carson firm in Eureka. For his logging operations on the northern California coast he brought ashore a little steam engine. It was hardly big enough to be rated in horse power so it was called a donkey engine. It turned a capstan, a vertical spool on which were wound several turns of Manila rope. By keeping the line tight on the capstan it was possible to pull in logs a few hundred feet. From the donkey, the bulls could then take over and haul logs down the skidroad. A so-called line horse pulled the rope or line back out to the logs. We don't know the pulling power of the early donkeys, but Manila rope soon proved too feeble for big logs and wire rope was introduced. The man known as the spool ten der used a stick to keep this wire rope feeding smoothly on the spool. Sometimes he became so expert he could kick it into place, instead of using the stick; then later after he got back from the hospital he would sometimes gingerly use his new wooden leg for the same purpose. A' real step forward was made when the donkey spool was turned over to run horizon tally, and widened out to hold line, instead of merely pulling it. With this large drum capacity it was possible to reach out long distances and some big wide-face road donkeys held 8,000 feet of line. Once you established the principle of having a line coming in on one drum, it was a natural to think of paying it out on another. Some smart logger did so, and the two-drum donkey then handled a haulback as well as a main line. This development changed overnight the future of ox teams as Stewart Holbrook said, "from harness to hamburger." They were all through. Here was the beginning of a second revolution in logging, just as Dolbeer sparked the first with his capstan. The two drum donkey contributed half the change and the - spar tree provided the other half. Logging by bull team, Dolbeer, or other early don key had always meant the frustrating, exasperating, cumbersome ground lead, with logs forever hung up on rocks, stumps, and rough ground. When the two drum donkey and the spar tree teamed up to make the high lead possible, that is to say yarding with the ends of the logs off the ground, logging became the slam-bang highball show which it is today. One of the first recorded high lead operations was on Discovery Bay in Washington in 1906. I have heard that the spar was an adaptation of a mast and rigging originally used by a Captain Robertson to build log rafts in the Columbia; can't prove any part of this story. Appreciative loggers latched onto his idea with glee, and soon the whole West Coast logging woods was using spars. However, it turned out that Captain Robertson hed thoughtfully patented his idea and so it is said, he sued almost the entire lo.^in? industry o.f Western North America for this infringement. Luckily the lowers, with commendable foresight, had tied up the best legal counsel in the land. This formidable array of talent convinced the judge that the spar tree conferred a universal benefit on mankind, like the sun by day, and therefore it could not be pa tented. The captain was understandably unenthusiastic about this verdict. At first loggers used the spar only on the far end of the line as a yarder tree, end IOTS were pulled alon^ a fore-and-aft road (a trough made of lo.^s) by road donkeys. A string of 3 or h steam road donkeys displaced the oxen formerly used on the sicidroad. This was a slow and costly system and it soon becama evident that you had to get wheels or water under logs as quickly as possible. Readers went out of tne picture, and rail- road spurs were built right to the yarders. Then followed an era of big men and big camps in big timber. With his customary inventive genius the logger quickly developed 3 and lj and more drums on donkeys, eventually winding up with 20 drum monsters of skid ders which yarded and loaded at the same time. Some skidders were so big that the yarding engineer on one end had to pack a lunch if he wanted to visit the loading en gineer on the other end. The high lead soar tree was parlayed into a bewildering array of skylines, slacklines, North Bend, South Bend, O'Gorman, and other pet systems too numerous to mention. Nothing was too tough to try and loggers persistently worked out ways to lo? every conceivable kind of show. Paraelleling donkey development, railroad engines grew from the original 6 ton "Ant" in Mason County, Washinton, to 125 ton mal lets. Bigger and better and stronger machinery was the cry, especially bigger. Enormous machines were built, and because of si?.e, like the dinosaurs, eventually they ran out of hay. Camps which had to support flocks of skidders ana as many as 20 locomotives were surely bound to run out of enough big timber to keep them running. The steam era in the woods was doomed by diesels anyway, but sheer hypnotism with bigness killed it off faster. Things are different now. Smaller and faster diesel cats, donkeys, and trucks are operatinr profitably in timber stands considered untouchable by steam standards. Now let's take a look ahead. When the big old-growth timber is gone, the managed stands which replace them will be logged when younger end smaller, if for no other rea son than taxation. Smaller timber will drastically affect machinery needs. The fate which overtook steam skidders and mallets will eventually overtake cats 3 stories high and other gigantic equipr.ent. A drug store can't peddle prescriptions in a ten ton truck. The future will see another revolution in logging machsnics with as ;-reat a wallop as the Dolbeer and the high lead in their day. There will be smaller, lighter, faster, more economical machines in the woods, and new devices yet unknown; lo.^s may be scaled with r:iins which use radio-active isotopes; there will be marvelous mechanical advances to make the eyes of old ox team lowers fall rir^ht out of their heads. Probably the sky will be used as a skidroad. There are no taxes to pay on this right of way and it Cf-r-f n<) needs no ballast, bridges, or maintenance. Helicopters, and tail blocks or butt m^ere tied to balloons have already been tried experimentally. Jet propulsion will be adapted to many purposes where piston power is used today. The equipment developments of the future will be terrific, judged by today's stan dards. None the less their impact on losing will not be as emphatic as the prodigious population explosion now underway. Historically there has always been a marked increase in birth rate following wars. Nature appears to restore war time losses by making females more willing and males more urgent. The flood of small fry now in schools is evidence that this method works. How ever, qglte unlike previous post-war periods, the bumper crop of babies still continues. It is apparent that the opportunistic American male is (-jetting a lot of mileage out of tforld V/ar II. This has a most important bearing on the future of lo.fjp;in^. In the 300 years behind us, lowers could always retreat into the back country to f*et away from people; to interior Mew England, to the far ed'Tes of the Lake States, to the Northwest Coastal areas, and finally to the last stand of the lovjrin.? pioneer, northern California and southern Oregon. Now we are fresh out of back country. Already people are so numerous it is almost impossible for any mar. to find a remote place where he can be lonely in comfort. Loggers in the future will be bothered no end by people; there will be veritable pr.rades of house trailers on logins* roads; there will be in satiable demands for hunting and camping privileges to en extent undreamed of today. Belligerent people will watch every little creek for si.lts.tion which they blame on lo'1;- ~ers; crafty people will slyly transfer their own tafces to forest lands. People in a • hundred other ways will mr>kn life irksome for the careful as vmll as the careless lo'^er. 8 The biggest factor governing logging decisions in the future therefore will not be machinery, or roads, or timber sale clauses, but the tremendous problems caused by millions more people in the woods. So let us be warned — the next revolution in the timber will involve people — all of them with a vote. We will have to solve the operating problems which affect the public adversely, if we are to survive in the years ahead. We will be watched more critically than ever before, because we won't be working in the empty back country. We'll be right smack in the public eye, because the public eye will be everywhere. Loggers tomorrow must promote public understanding of loggers' difficulties; and we will have to operate so as to justify public cooperation in solving those problems. If we do not succeed in these things then the huge public majority will impose its uninformed and unsympathetic decisions upon the small logging minority. Self- discipline is required in the logging woods to avoid the heavy hand OT" uninformed pub lic disciplines. The actions of a very few can give the industry an enormous head ache. Therefore, if we ever could — (1) We can no longer afford to use streams as roads and refuse dumps. We ought not to brag about how we can tear hell out of rivers with a cat, as was done in a recent equipment film and in a recent advertisement in a lumber journal. This spits in the eye of the fish people and they will spit ripht back — with justification. If we ever could — (2) We can no longer afford to Vise the sir as a great big garbage can and fill it with dirt, fly ash, cinders, and other noxious by-pro ducts of industrial operations. — ^ e_ver could — (3) WR can no longer afford the loss of soil and wster which follows a carelessly torn up forest floor. i£ W£ ever could — (U) We can no longer afford to throw away tomorrow's logs by mashing down today1 s reproduction. (5) Finally, I repeat that we can no longer afford to be care less about public opinion. There will be far too much of it to be ignored. In the future we must not only move faster but think faster; use the forest bet ter, make better use of all its products, and give thought to public interest as we do. In so doinp;, we can earopublic acceptance of our practices and public coopera tion in solving our problems. Opinions from The Hill , ,- • an ntttDt il»le f*rp>l*ri ntarii. taf t» OtcD In 11MB to tt«««tt< hot* «f lb» fortltrr m>ni(. abutments, part of an ambitious schema to run a railroad from ** the S,V, main line to the coast. Farther west are two vine- •*»Vrt«i«?"ution.?l*' covered abutments south of the highway, standing forlornly in , a field. Same hoped-for railroad. Before reaching Elkton, high- th/'B.i',«X J"Brur.h"c,i,L"I, Wfly M lim3 tnrou«h a substantial tunnel, bui't for trains, not with * B.A. *•»«• in i«», from syr* C4M- Those early railroaders were apparently short on cash •UK «N«* Tor* gut. c*n«t» There were many well known roads and trails in the early | jears but not much of them can be identified today. Trails left |'a fleeting impression on the land, and if the roads followed &n acceptable line of travel they were absorbed in the state's 'road building program. In the foothills west of Corvallis passed the Portland and Umpqiia Valley Military road, the Hudson's Bay Company trail to a fur-buying outpost, and the Applegate - trail bringing pioneers. The Applegate party came from the face of th* land Is hatched with multi-billion dollar" Humboldt county of Nevada through Surprise Valley, that little bulldozer track* M men and machines briskly change wild .j lost comer of northeast California, then across Goose Lake bed, rivers into managed waterways, India*, trails into four-barrel j and via Klamath and Southern Oregon, leaving their name on freeways, and frontier hamleta Into urban sprawls. In thtiths Applegate river. Women of the party brought small fruit process, bulldozers shove aside, demolish, or bury many of the trees in tubs all the way from the east, at times goinf historic beginning* which laid the earliest foundations for to- thirsty to make sure that the precious trees survived. day's progress. The end of the line for the Lewis and Clark travellers has In many regions the efforts of pioneers have been thoroughly recently been re-established south of Astoria as Fort Clatsop layered over with asphalt or housing developments and it it National Monument, and well repays a visit. Too late now to no longer possible to appreciate a sense of pioneer days. For- visit Celilo Falls where Indians conducted their fishery for over tunately Oregon's historic past Is not far distant, the state is l"0 years, based on a treaty with Lewis and Clark, not yet swamped with people and structures, so it is still There is still time, and a visit is recommended, to the possible here to stand in the middle of history. Some example* McLoughlin House, another National Monument, in Oregon City, are noted below. Here are perserved possessions of Dr. John McLoughlin, chief The State Highway department has done a great service; factor of the Hudson's Bay Company. He was almost a feudal by showing on annual road maps the route of the Old Oregonj governor without portfolio, rendering judgment over a large Trail and by marking its crossing of present highways. The j part of the Northwest. In those days beaver were of prime secondary rortd from Vale to Adrian runs over a height of importance in the Beaver State, and the Hudson's Hay fur busi- land, and at this low pass the deep ruts of the Trail are still ness was very big business indeed. McLoughlin was also our visible, as they ar« at some other points in Eastern Oregon, pioneer lumberman. In 1827 he shipepd to the Sandwich Islands The Highway department has also published a fine Oregon1 the first cargo of boards from a tiny waterpower mill at Fort Trail bulletin Showing the location in careful detail. Vancouver. Greatly renowned among western woodsmen was the bull These brief illustrations are a few examples of the richness team tunnel built by Malcolm McFartand, a famous Lower of Oregon history available to those who will take time to Columbia logger, in the 1880's. He dug the tunnel to avoid a read, and to look. They can read more readily, and look with long detour around a rocky point. It is still there, right along greater reward, by joining the Oregon Historical Society, 235 the south side of U.S. 30 a short distance east of Westport, S.W. Market street, Portland. The Society is not just a col- After bulls were succeeded by steam engines the tunnel was lector of ancient artifacts, it is a preserver of the early begin- used by a logging railroad. nings of the great Oregon country; it is a publisher of repute; There are many other interesting remnants of early daji it is a fine library; it is a service agency without parallel, and railroading. The railroad known as the Corvallis and Eastern, jt merits the support of all who have a regard for this state. Oregon Pacific, and other names now conliriues to run t*- & - 1 - ifc \/ Phil— Leader? bottom line. Also— fill in blank at beginning of that paragraph. It may refer to another department that took the lead in student personnel work.\ ^)r» ___ . Syracuse? Is the membership of the FPCC stated cor rectly? Some words may be omitted. - 2H— a House committee? Do you know first names ^ of Preston and Shirley off the top of your head? If you're not sure, we'll look theij, up here.. line 3-- right word? Also date of Mclntyre- Stennis program. ) - 10— spelling of John Aram? also 1.. 5 and 6: Is this what you said? bottom: Governor Sprague's first name? If you don't have it, we'll look it •4£»« 72.- 20— this was transcribed, wrong, and I may have guessed, wrong.. Please write in your cor rect sentence.. near bottom — Can't hear the word.. Also — I filled! - in "1'954"— date given in "50 Years of Forestry". But is that the research division (Forests Experiment Station) you mean? - 6 lines from bottom: correct phrase in parentheses? also line 4 from bottom. Who is "he I1? (Write this on attached yellow sheet.) - 5 — legislators fur people? also, is that middle paragraph accurate the way it reads now? - middle: spelling Dean Lemon? 6 lines "below.. Also, word is missing Amelia R. Fry Graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 1947 with a B.A. in psychology, wrote for campus magazine; Master of Arts in educational psychology from the University of Illinois in 1952 , with heavy minors in English for both degrees. Taught freshman English at the University of Illinois 1947-48, and Hiram College (Ohio) 1954-55. Also taught English as a foreign language in Chicago 1950-53. Writes feature articles for various newspapers, was reporter for a suburban daily 1966-67. Writes professional articles for journals and historical magazines. Joined the staff of Regional Oral History Office in February, 1959, specializing in the field of conservation and forest history. 12 9457