Highlights of Texas Forestry


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	Highlights of Texas Forestry Texas Society of American Foresters by Dr. Robert Baker, TSAF Historian
	Last revision: February 2, 2002 Note: Some of This Has Not Been Authenticated.
	This publication is the third in series which started as Highlights in Texas Forest History, published by the Texas Forestry Association in 1964. It was published in 1984 by the Texas Society of American Foresters, under the title Highlights of Texas Forestry.
	The Early Years The Twentieth Century: pre-1920 The Twentieth Century: 1920-1935 The Twentieth Century: 1936-1945	The Twentieth Century: 1946-1956 The Twentieth Century: 1957-1977 The Twentieth Century:1979-2000 NEXT >>
.	The Early Years
	1819 One of Texas' earliest sawmills was in operation. Until 1890 the mills were small. In that year big milling was under way; three large mills were operating in Beaumont.
Download this document: Highlights of Texas Forestry (PDF, 201 KB) or (Word doc, 272 KB) Adobe Reader required for PDF file. Click on icon to download free Reader!	1821 Stephen F. Austin and the early Texas settlers benefited by a strange freak of the great east Texas pine forests. Oases of pine were found in Banstrop, Fayette and Colorado counties. The first capitol at Austin was built of pine logs and rock and sawn lumber brought from Bastrop. [WGJ] 1827 The Congress of that portion of the Mexican Confederacy which included the present state of Texas decreed that certain designated towns might cut timber along the Sabine River without payment of tax, provided the cutting was done with a permit. The decree required that anyone negligently causing a fire while conducting such cutting operation had to pay for the damage and plant trees upon the area burned.
	1856 An Act was passed by the State legislature providing for punishment to any person willfully or negligently setting fire to, burning, or causing to be burned, any woodland or prairie not his own. 1860 During the Civil War nearly all milling ceases. [WGJ] 1869 Ranking 24th among lumber producing states, Texas produced 106,897,000 board feet, 8.4 percent of the total national output. 1880 The railroads just began penetrating into the piney woods for the lumber industry. [WGJ] 1883 Sergeant's Report on Forests of North America stated that there were 20.5 billion board feet of longleaf pine, 26.1 billion board feet of shortleaf pine and 20.9 billion board feet of loblolly pine in Texas.
TOP OF PAGE ^	1894 T.L.L. Temple constructed as circular sawmill with 50 MBF daily capacity at Diboll. This was the beginning of the Southern Pine Lumber Company which evolved over the years through many purchases and mergers to the present-day Temple-Inland. The first and foremost of these foresters was Kenneth Nelson in 1932 who rose to Vice President of the company and was responsible for initiating and establishing most of the early forest management practices by this industry. Another early company forester was Frank Speary. In 1984 the company had over 1 million acres of forest land managed by staff of 50 professional foresters. 1898 At the request of Dr. B. E. Fernow, Chief of Division of Forestry of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, W. Goodrich Jones made a horseback survey of the virgin pine forest of East Texas, Jones issued a bleak narrative survey, Dr. Fernow urged Mr. Jones to work toward the establishment of a state department of forestry. This was Jones second horseback trip into East Texas; the first was in 1885. The U. S. Department of Forestry estimated that there were 46 billion board feet of pine sawtimber in Texas.
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