Event title: Yale Forest Forum Fall 2025 Speaker Series: A History of Scientific Forestry: From Extraction to Ecosystem Management

Location: Online Webinar (Zoom)

Description: The series examines how European forestry practices influenced the development of forestry in the United States during the 19th century and how the concept and practice of scientific forestry was supported by North American universities—including the founding of The Yale Forest School in 1900. We will trace the transformation of forestry from its early focus on exploitation and extraction in the East, that soon moved westward. This brought on fears of a timber famine at the turn of the 20th century, ultimately leading to efforts to practice sustained yield forestry, and eventually to the development of a more ecological approach to managing the forests of the U.S. This series will explore U.S. forestry by considering its successes and also its problematic legacies in relation to Indigenous land dispossession and settler colonialism. This speaker series will feature scholars and practitioners from a variety of fields, including forestry, history, ecology, sociology, and environmental studies.

This fall 2025 speaker series is co-hosted by The Forest School at the Yale School of the Environment, Forest History Society, Society of American Foresters, and University of Minnesota.

Organizers: Yale Forest Forum

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CERPs/CERPITs: This webinar has been approved for 1 CEC per session.