How
Theodore Roosevelt created and
preserved the
National Forests

The forest reserves of the United States went from approximately 43,000,000 acres to about 194,000,000 acres under TR. This represents an increase of over 400%. The area of forest reserves established by TR is equal in acreage to all the states on the Atlantic coast from Maine to Virginia plus the states of Vermont, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. This is a greater area than France, Belgium, and The Netherlands combined.

On February 1, 1905, President Roosevelt transferred the Division of Forestry to the Department of Agriculture from the Department of the Interior. Gifford Pinchot was appointed as the first chief of the new agency, the United States Forest Service.

President Roosevelt's policy of forest reserves was opposed by commercial and other interests favoring unrestricted exploitation of natural resources.

Theodore recorded in his Autobiography (1913):
"While the Agricultural Appropriation Bill was passing through the Senate, in 1907, Senator Fulton, of Oregon, secured an amendment providing that the President could not set aside any additional National Forests in the six Northwestern States. This meant retaining some sixteen million of acres to be exploited by land grabbers anq by the representatives of the great special interests, at the expense of the public interest.

But for four years the Forest Service had been gathering field notes as to what forests ought to be set aside in these States, and so was prepared to act. It was equally undesirable to veto the whole agricultural bill, and to sign it with this amendment effective. Accordingly, a plan to create the necessary National Forest in these States before the Agricultural Bill could be passed and signed was laid before me by Mr. Pinchot. I approved it. The necessary papers were immediately prepared. I signed the last proclamation a couple of days before by my signature, the bill became law; and when the friends of the special interests in the Senate got their amendment through and woke up, they discovered that sixteen million acres of timberland had been saved for the people by putting them in the National Forests before the land grabbers could get at them.

The opponents of the Forest Service turned handsprings in their wrath; and dire were their threats against the Executive; but the threats could not be carried out, and were really only a tribute to the efficiency of our action."

The Medicine Bow Forest Reserve in Wyoming had some Colorado lands added to it by TR in 1905. This Colorado land was named the "Roosevelt National Forest" in 1932 as a tribute to TR.

We continuously add links to conservation lands. If you know about a website we should consider for linking, please contact the webmaster at trinfo@cs.com

Note: The status, borders, names, and other details about the projects and areas mentioned in these lists have changed over the years. For instance, some National monuments are now parts of National Parks, while the borders and names of National Forests have been changed in some cases.

Compiled and edited from research done by the National Geographic Society and The Theodore Roosevelt Association staff.
Copyright November 2005 all rights reserved Theodore Roosevelt Association.
Top

Top