Radio Script #793

Little Talks on Common Things

February 2, 1969

A few weeks ago, on a program devoted to present-day rather than old-time Maine. I stated that 85 percent of the land area of Maine is forest. Today I want to say a bit more about our Maine woods. especially the story of their development in our life and our economy since colonial days.

When the first English settlers came to Maine, the woods were obstacles to be overcome. They would have thought anyone crazy who told them that the day would come when we should have to consider the preservation of those giants that stood in their way — the big trees. All along the New England coast settlement was impossible until trees had been cleared, and the early plows had long to contend with tangled roots from the virgin forest. As late as 1910, when conservation had been well publicized by Theodore Roosevelt and Gifford Pinchot, the attitude of a woodsman in one Maine logging camp was typical. When he saw foresters unloading seedlings for reforestation, he said: “My Lord. they’ve gone crazy. Trees is all I’ve seen all my life. If there’s anything we don’t need around here, it’s more trees.”

So bounteous were the timberlands, not only in Maine. but in most of the nation, that the general belief until well after the Civil War was that the supply could never be exhausted. But as wave after wave of settlement moved across the continent. the situation changed. The trees came down like match sticks. to build homes and factories, railroad ties and telegraph poles; tofurnisn charcoal for the iron furnaces. and potash for soap. So the loggers moved from Bangor to Burlington. to Albany, to Saginaw, to the Lake of the Woods. and on to the giant redwoods of California.

But, as the lumber camps swept westward, they never entirely left Maine. Maine’s forests were big enough and productive enough to outlast the early onslaughts. Although the pines near the coast. marked by the King’s broad arrow for exclusive use of. His Majesty’s ships, were soon depleted. the forests of the great northern area of Maine long remained inviolate, and it was a full century after the coming of statehood before some of the virgin tracts felt the touch of the woodsman’s axe.

From its earliest beginnings in the southwestern part of our state — beginnings recorded in such books as Elijah Kellogg’s “lion Ben” — the lumber industry gradually moved north and east along our river highways, in the finest pine forests on the American continent. Eventually the Penobscot River, in its upper reaches, became the heart of our lumber industry, so that the time came when Bangor shipped out more lumber than any other port in the entire world.As the forests west of New England were opened up, it was Maine lumbermen who led the onslaught. Traces are left in the place names of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota and other states. Stillwater, Minn. is named for the Maine town near Orono. There is a Bangor in five western states.

It was a Maine blacksmith, Joe Peavey of Stillwater, who invented the improved cant dog that bears his name. That tool is just as well known on the Columbia as it is on the Penobscot. Then there is Paul Bunyan. Minnesotans continue to claim him for their own. But Paul Bunyan stories were circulating in Maine lumber camps before the axes of white men attacked the Minnesota woods. Paul and Babe. his blue ox, were known on the Saplin. the big stands of spruce south of Moosehead Lake long before the great operations had begun farther north near Chesuncook and Eagle and Chamberlain Lakes.

Paul’s exploits in song and story went the rounds of the Maine camps. It was told how waves caused by the rocking of his floating cradle had created the mammoth tides of Passamaquoddy. Maine’s thousands of lakes are but waterfilled hollows made by the footprints of Babe, the blue ox. Moosehead was created by Babe lying down for rest. The sandpile where Paul played as a boy can still be seen. Today we call it Mount Katahdin.

Until about 1850 white pine was the wood most sought by the lumber crews. Then followed the reign of spruce a story supremely told by Holman Day in his “King Spruce”. Then came the era of pulpwood. It was in the basement of a sawmill in Topsham that paper from wood was first made in Maine. By 1880 the industry was in full swing. Ten years later in 1890 Maine led the nation in paper manufacture, turning out more than a fourth of all paper made in the United States.

I have already told you that. when Maine became a state in 1820, there was within our borders a vast area of public land — land that was not in the hands of any private owner. By the act of separation that land was equally divided between Maine and Massachusetts, and eventually Maine bought what remained of the mother state’s share.

What Maine then did became a fixed policy that had marked influence on later developments. Most states were granting land solely for settlement. Maine decided to sell areas of her public lands without any hope that they would be settled. The vast northern forests, far from settlements. attracted few people except the lumbermen in search of pine and spruce. Where the lumber had little value. the land was worth even less. So the public lands were bought in large lots of thousands of acres. That is why today the greater part of Maine forest land is owned by the paper companies.

The impetus to some control over the public lands was the danger of fire. The first large fire of which we have any record occurred in 1761, but it was not until 1795 that a Maine forest fire caused real concern. In that year the blaze spread over an area of 200 square miles on the Penobscot. Previous to the present century the worst fire was in 1825. covering a large area in Piscataquis County. The fire sprang up on the same night ;n regions several miles apart. Gale winds spread the blaze rapidly, and it burned for several weeks until rain finally put it out. Its extent was enormous — 1,300 square miles.

The need for protection laws had become clear. In 1855 came a statute making it unlawful to kindle a fire on another person’s land without permission. By 1890 the menace had become so great that the Legislature created the Forest Commission. The measure was supported by the land owners because they needed fire protection. This was the beginning of what became our modern fire warden service. From it grew such other legislation as conservation by selective cutting, protection of recreation areas, and reforestation.

In 1908 came an important decision of the Maine Supreme Court. After a series of disastrous fires, the court decided that it was within the right and power of the state to regulate. on behalf of the public, the manner in which the forest lands shall be managed and protected. In substance that historic decision meant the forests belong to everyone and are not open to wanton, unrestricted destruction. Out of it all developed a policy of sharing responsibility by the owners and the state. To the credit of the great owning companies, it can be said that they have often been ahead of the state in adopting conservation methods. They found it was to their own interests. as well as the public interest, to recognize that the timber was not inexhaustible and must not be wasted.

In 1969 not many of us realize that Maine is the only northeastern state that still has a forest economy. The woods are still the backbone of Maine resources. They supply the logs, the pulpwood and the other products of our largest industry. Our rapidly growing recreation income depends on the lakes and streams that the protective covering of the trees supports. They make possible our water supply that is the envy of the arid regions of the West.

What a boon to hunting, fishing and just ordinary vacationing are the miles of private roads built by the paper companies for 85 percent of that road mileage is open to the public. In central and northern Maine many summer homes, camps and other recreation facilities are on land leased from the industrial owners. The fact is that. instead of hampering the growth of recreation, which in terms of dollars is Maine’s second largest industry, the paper companies have done much to promote it.

Today most of our timberland is being managed for selective cutting and reforestation. But it is still ,true that many people in Maine own wooded land so small that they cannot employ the professional foresters that the big companies enjoy. That is where the State Extension Forestry Service is available. When a landowner requests that help, a state-employed forester goes over the woodland with him. The forester prescribes a management plan that fits the particular tract and the owner’s individual need. The plan may include cutting, tree planting, protection from fire, insects, disease and other matters. The forester helps the owner find cutters skilled in working on marked areas — that is, taking only those trees specifically marked for cutting, and he helps the owner find a market for his timber.

Today the Maine Forestry District contains more than ten million acres held by 650 owners in the unorganized territory of the state. It is clear that Maine is and will long remain a forest state. Our 17 million acres of woodland amounts to 18 acres for every person in Maine, and that is more than six times the national average. The resource is large enough to supply present needs of our wood and paper industries for a long time. In fact our forests are now growing twice as much wood as is being cut. But that does not mean we can continue without constant vigilance and needed adjustments in forest use. In the first place. we earnestly hope that our wood and pulp industry has not reached its peak. We look for it to expand. In the second place. we must face the fact that. in some of the more desirable kinds of trees we are losing ground. The cut of pine sawlogs exceeds the growth. We are losing out on hardwood logs at an alarming rate. In many operations selection of the better trees for cutting leaves behind only the less desirable grades. But both the companies and the Forestry Service view these difficulties with optimism. Research, improved management. and cooperation between private and public sectors can assure Maine people an even greater harvest from Maine forests.

This program has been so long concerned with historical matters that we cannot forbear to close with what a great American historian says about the influence of forests on the development of our nation. In his “Birth of the Nation” Arthur Schlesinger says: “To be sure the settler found it a hard task to clear the trees for the plow. But in all other respects the forest was a priceless asset. It supplied his firewood. the material for his house and its furniture, his wagons, his boats, his pitch and tar, and in some places his sweet syrup. It brought him without cultivation nuts, berries and wild game. The creature of the woods gave him clothing and offered in furs a profitable item of trade. If a treeless expanse instead of a massive forest had fringed our Atlantic Coast. the spread of settlers inland would have been greatly retarded.”

Year: 1976