Forests of the Last 50 Years
![forests50_condensed[1]](https://foresthistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/forests50_condensed1.png "forests50_condensed[1]")
Preserving the Story of Our Forests
The Forest History Society is launching a new project to capture, protect, and share the pivotal stories and records that document the transformation of North American forests over the past 50 years. This project will explore how forests have been studied, managed, conserved, and owned—shedding light on the key decisions that continue to shape our landscapes today.
While forests have always played a crucial role in our history, the past five decades have brought especially significant changes. Yet, these events remain under-documented in archives and libraries and largely unknown to scholars and the public. Through intensive collecting of key oral histories and documents and by convening historians, practitioners, policymakers, and educators, this four-year project will identify the most significant lessons from the past half century, provide important context to today’s decisions affecting our forests resources, and preserve invaluable source material for future generations and historians.
Why the Last 50 Years?
Over the past 50 years, forests have been redefined as vital ecosystems, shaping legislation, fire management, and public debates. Since the 1970s, old-growth logging battles, shifting private ownership, changing forest products markets, and climate concerns have transformed forestry. Today, balancing conservation, economic interests, and Indigenous rights remains crucial to ensuring the resilience of our forests in a changing world.
Why FHS?
The Forest History Society is leading a vital effort to preserve North American forestry history. With 300+ oral histories and state-of-the-art archives, we capture key voices and documents. Expert advisors will guide research, while workshops, webinars, and storytelling will connect past lessons to today’s challenges, ensuring a sustainable forest future.
Our Focus
Of this potentially vast subject, this project focuses on four main areas of inquiry:
- Studying and Measuring Forests—how has forest science and technology evolved?
- Managing Forests—how have approaches to forest management on the ground changed?
- Owning Forests—between private, public, and tribal lands, who had owned forests in this period and precipitated the vast transfers of land?
- Imagining Forests—how have cultural and political understandings of forests transformed in this period and how have our forest futures been imagined by experts and the public?
Project Timeline
During the four-year period of this project, the Forest History Society will conduct 50–60 oral histories of key historical actors who witnessed and were a part of some of the most transformative events affecting our forests. In year three, FHS will convene a major conference that will bring together historians, policymakers, practitioners and others who have a vital stake in our forests. Throughout this project, we invite scholars, historians, forest landowners, and the public to follow our work and offer us their reactions and feedback. To follow this and other projects with FHS, sign up for our newsletter.
People
We gratefully acknowledge the support of our lead donors to this project: Peter & Carolyn Mertz, David Nunes, Jonathan & Jennifer Prather, Michael & Karen Kelly, Chip and Margaret Dillon and PotlatchDeltic Corporation.
