Balancing potential human health hazards versus herbicide spraying, bartering long-term forest improvement for needed short-term profits, gambling on untested energy systems–all are complex decisions that reflect the philosophies and styles of the forest industry executives who make them. In 1979, St. Regis Paper Company banned
Bristol Bay, Alaska–The shallow reach of the Bering Sea crashes between the shoulder and the arm of Alaska’s Aleutian mountain range. The tundra, receding in waves from the ocean, is flecked with small ponds two feet deep. White in winter, pale green in summer. the
Millinocket, Maine–For 85 years, all roads around Millinocket have led to the two Great Northern Paper Company’s pulp and paper mills that sit at the edge of Maine’s huge North Woods. Four generations have enjoyed high-paying, cradle-to-grave jobs. Unrestricted hunting and fishing on the company’s
The cool evening breezes have not yet evaporated the remainder of the sweat between the spectators’ shoulder blades. Shielding their eyes from the sun, they stare transfixed at the rushing water before them. “Yea! Looky there.” Twenty-one heads swivel in time to catch a shadow
Yale University’s David M. Smith, the country’s preeminent silviculturist, once believed it was impossible to clearcut the Maine forest so totally that it wouldn’t immediately renew itself naturally. “I was wrong,” he now says with dismay. “I underestimated the impact that heavy-handed clearcutting with ponderous
