T. J. Starker

Hello, Nelson Olstead here. Today let's meet a professor who practices what he preaches. First, let me introduce Clint Gouber speaking for Pacific Power. Welcome once again to Stories of Pacific Power Land, a presentation of Pacific Power and Life, the company that has been serving the electric needs of the regions, homes, farms, and industries through more than half a century of progress and growth.

Now here's that man of many stories, Nelson Olstead. For some twenty years at Oregon State College in Corvallis, Oregon, a tall, powerfully-built man stood before college classes in forestry and told his students, "'A growing forest is a crop,' farmed and managed just like any other crop, a timber stand will be a perpetual source of income to its owners."

But that was in the 1920s and 30s when a few landowners or lumbermen were ready to listen to such talk. A typical farmer's reaction might be, Well, that half section of timber in my place ain't worth the taxes I pay on it.

Lands too steep and rocky to farm. Don't grow pasture. Timber's only worth about two dollars a thousand board feet. And I got a mind to let the County have it back for all the good it is."

Nonetheless, Professor TJ Stalker at Oregon State stuck to his convictions and he was a convincing man. He said, for us land is one of the biggest assets we have in the Northwest. private landowners would just learn that they don't have to be big sawmill operators to turn a profit from timber. They'd be thousands of dollars ahead right now."

Well, TJ Stalker saw hundreds of young men graduate with degrees in the relatively new field of forestry, saw them take jobs with private industry, with the forest services, and go into business for themselves. Soon he heard his own theories coming back to him.