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NEWS ABOUT FACULTY AND STAFF

• Henry Gerhold Retires
• David DeWalle Retires
• Beth Boyer Hired as Associate Professor of Forest Hydtology

Henry Gerhold Retires

Henry D. Gerhold, the longest-serving faculty member in the School of Forest Resources to date, retired in December 2007. He joined the faculty in 1956 as an instructor and advanced through the ranks to professor of forest genetics.

Gerhold’s connection with Penn State began even earlier, as a student at Mont Alto in 1948. He completed a B.S. in forestry in 1952 and stayed at Penn State to complete a master’s degree in 1954. He started doing research for the U.S. Forest Service but was offered the opportunity to start a doctoral degree at Yale School of Forestry. After two years of studies, he was invited back to Penn State in 1956 to do research on the genetics of Christmas trees. Gerhold conducted his Ph.D. research part-time, completing that in 1959, and soon after was promoted to assistant professor.

Gerhold served as the School’s chairman of graduate studies (1964-1985), as assistant director for research and graduate studies (1985-1992), as chairman of the Intercollege Graduate Program in Genetics (1978-1992), as interim director of the School in 1988, and as faculty representative on the SFR Alumni Group Board of Directors (1999 to 2007).

He conducted research and published widely on the genetic improvement of Christmas trees, landscape trees, and timber species, and was a leader of the extension program in urban and community forestry from 1990 until retirement.

His awards include the 1992 Pennsylvania Forestry Association Award for Outstanding Achievement in Urban and Community Forestry, National Arbor Day Foundation’s 1995 Book Award for Street Tree Factsheets, the 1998 Education Award of the Utility Arborists Association, the 2003 Dr. Joseph Trimble Rothrock Conservationist of the Year Award of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association, and recognition from Penn State Mont Alto in 2003 as an Alumni Centennial Fellow.

Gerhold published two books published in 2007. A Century of Forest Resources Education offers a detailed history of the School of Forest Resources and A Forester’s Legacy explores the life of Joseph E. Ibberson.

Gerhold was recently selected as one of four 2008 School of Forest Resources Outstanding Alumni. Additional details about his accomplishments will be included in our summer newsletter in which all four award winners will be profiled.  

David DeWalle Retires

David R. DeWalle, professor of forest hydrology and former associate director of the Penn State Institutes of Energy and the Environment (PSIEE), retired on October 1, 2007.

DeWalle is a distinguished researcher on issues of acidification and its effects on forest ecosystem health that has had a long-standing joint appointment with the School of Forest Resources and the PSIEE.

During his tenure, he has actively served the College of Agricultural Sciences and School of Forest Resources. He has served as assistant director for research and graduate studies and Forest Science program chair in the School of Forest Resources. As a Heinz fellow and executive board member of the Center for Watershed Stewardship—a collaborative initiative of the Department of Landscape Architecture and School of Forest Resources—he helped create the graduate Option in Watershed Stewardship, which is an interdisciplinary hands-on watershed planning program funded by Heinz Charitable Trusts. He has served as chairman of various committees in the School of Forest Resources, president and officer of the Penn State Chapter of Gamma Sigma Delta, and member of coordinating council for the Environmental Pollution Control graduate program. He has also served on the faculty advisory committee to the dean and strategic planning committee in the College of Agricultural Sciences.

Since coming to the University in 1969, DeWalle has been major adviser to more than 45 M. S. and Ph.D. students and has authored numerous journal articles and book chapters on acidification and its effects on forest ecosystem health. His area of expertise also includes snow hydrology and he recently coauthored a book on the subject that is currently being published by Cambridge University Press.

DeWalle has a long record of membership and service to the American Water Resources Association (AWRA) that began with his joining the organization in 1980. DeWalle was recognized a Fellow member in 2003. In 2005, he was president-elect and succeeded to president in 2006. His activities include serving as the faculty adviser for the AWRA Penn State Student Chapter, which won the Outstanding Student Chapter Award three times in 1990, 1992, and 1998. He was an associate editor of the Journal of American Water Resources Association.

DeWalle received his bachelor’s degree in forest management and master’s degree in forest hydrology from the University of Missouri, and doctorate in watershed management from Colorado State University.

Beth Boyer Hired as Associate Professor of Forest Hydrology

At the start of the 2008 spring semester, we welcomed Dr. Elizabeth Boyer as associate professor of forest hydrology in the School of Forest Resources and as a member of the Penn State Institutes of Energy and the Environment.
This latest move is a homecoming of sorts for Boyer, who graduated from Penns Valley Area High School in Spring Mills in 1986 and completed a B.S. in Geography at Penn State in 1990. Since then her work has taken her from coast to coast.

Boyer was employed with the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, California from 1990 to 1997 while completing requirements for an M.S. in 1994 and a Ph.D. in 1998, both from the University of Virginia. She served as an assistant professor at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, New York, from 2000 to 2004, and held adjunct faculty positions at Syracuse University and Cornell University during that time. Since 2005, she has worked at the University of California in Berkeley, most recently as associate professor in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management.

Boyer has taught courses in watershed hydrology, forest hydrology, watershed ecology, hydrological field techniques, and interdisciplinary research methods.

Her research is interdisciplinary in nature, and focuses on hydrological and ecological processes that affect water quality (e.g., nutrients, sediments) and water quantity (e.g., streamflow and water yield) issuing from watersheds. Much of her work focuses on how atmospheric emissions, land use change, and climatic variability affect nutrient loadings in streams and rivers. Understanding factors affecting conditions and trends in surface waters is increasingly important, providing a scientific basis for design and implementation of policies and land management programs to mitigate the effects of pollution.

At Penn State, Boyer will teach undergraduate and graduate courses in forest hydrology and will continue her research on atmospheric deposition and watershed processes.  She can be reached at 304 Forest Resources Bldg., University Park, PA 16802; phone 814-865-8830; e-mail ewb100@psu.edu.

Penn State | College of Agricultural Sciences | School of Forest Resources