Keith D. Atherholt completed the first two years of his Penn
State degree at Mont Alto, subsequently entering the Wood Products
major at University Park and graduating in November 1979. His first
professional assignment was with Rex Lumber Company of Englishtown,
NJ, one of the largest hardwood marketing companies on the East
Coast. Atherholt worked in sales and marketing for a period of 11
years, supplying many of the prominent wood product manufacturers
in Pennsylvania and New York.
In 1991, Atherholt joined the Dwight Lewis Lumber Company at the
onset of the company’s expansion in lumber sales and marketing
and their diversification toward dimension products manufacture.
By 1995, Lewis Lumber established Lewis Lumber Products, Inc., naming
Atherholt as president. Under Atherholt’s leadership, Lewis
Lumber Products organized an active sales development program linking
their inside sales team with an evolving Internet sales system.
Their growth warranted added investments in molding machinery and
computer-based scan optimizing rip system and allied chop system.
Today their company services wood product manufacturers throughout
a 250-mile radius of Picture Rocks, PA.
Atherholt has maintained an active role with the Penn York Lumbermen’s
Club, Forest Products Society, the Pennsylvania Forestry Association,
the Pennsylvania Forest Products Association (PFPA), and Woodworking
Machinery Import Dealers Association (WMIDA). In 2001, Lewis Lumber
received a first place Technology Achievement Award from the CEDA-COG
region of central Pennsylvania. In 2002, Lewis Lumber received the
national Innovator of the Year Award from WMIDA.
When Penn State announced formal plans for the new Forest Resources
Building at University Park, the PFPA stepped forward with a suggested
donation of laminated beams, paneling, and allied millwork. The
University accepted the proposed gift, with Lewis Lumber Products
working with Bower Lewis Thrower Architects on the final design.
Atherholt coordinated the completion and installation of more than
$600,000 of paneling, moldings, and laminated beams for the building.
Atherholt has maintained a close working relationship with School
of Forest Resources faculty, lecturing in several courses on a continuing
basis. He has also served on the School’s Advisory Board over
the past three years. He is an advocate of the Wood Products major
at Penn State and considers its specialization a primary asset for
entering his industry.
Atherholt has been active with the Kiwanis Club in both Williamsport
and Montoursville, serving as president of the Williamsport group.
He has a strong focus on youth development, both within the Faith
United Methodist Church (Youth Worker of the Year Award), Kiwanis
(1999 Kiwanis AYSO Coach), and as chairperson of the Central Pennsylvania
Kairos Prison Ministry.
BACK TO TOP
Robert
H. “Bob” Bommer earned
his B.S. in forestry in 1956 and then served for two years in the
U.S. Navy, receiving training as a naval officer and naval aviator.
In 1958 he was employed as a CFM forester by the Pennsylvania Department
of Forests and Waters. From 1959 to 1961 he worked for the M.C.
Houseworth Lumber Company in Bedford as a buyer of timber, land,
logs, and lumber. From 1961 to 1968 Bommer became director of procurement
for the Williamson Veneer Company in New Freedom in 1961. In 1965
he received the Juris Doctor degree from the University of Baltimore
School of Law. When the Evans Products Company acquired Williamson
Veneer in 1968, Bommer became the operations assistant to the general
manager. His responsibilities included administration, legal activities,
procurement of raw materials, and production.
Bommer founded his own consulting business in 1971, known as R.H.
Bommer, Jr. Inc., Forest Consultants. He served clients in eastern
United States, specializing in forest management, appraisals, marketing,
feasibility studies, legal cases, veneer and specialty log procurement,
land acquisition and sales, contract arbitration, real estate and
export counseling, land surveying, and shade tree evaluation. He
is a registered professional forester in Maryland, and West Virginia,
a registered surveyor in Pennsylvania, and a certified consulting
arborist. His company continued as Bommer-Geesaman & Company,
Forestry Consultants after Bob retired in 2003.
From 1979 to 1981, Bommer served as a member of the Secretary of
Agriculture's Advisory Committee on State and Private Forestry,
and for five years as a lobbyist for the Association of Consulting
Foresters (ACF) in Washington, D.C. As a member of the National
Commercial Panel of the American Arbitration Association, he has
used his knowledge to help settle commercial cases through arbitration.
In 1982 he received the Outstanding Service to Forestry Award from
the Society of American Foresters (SAF), and is a 50-year member
of that professional organization. Bommer has spoken at national
SAF and ACF meetings.
Bommer has been a strong supporter of the School of Forest Resources
and the College of Agricultural Sciences, having contributed time
and money to several causes including the new Forest Resources Building,
Conklin Hall at Mont Alto, the Ag Arena, and the Bryce Jordan Center.
He helped Tau Phi Delta Forestry Fraternity purchase its building
and served a term as Grand National President. He was named an Alumni
Centennial Fellow of Penn State Mont Alto in 2004.
BACK TO TOP
William C. Bramble
earned a B.S. in Forestry at Penn State in 1929 and a master’s
and Ph.D. at Yale. He is professor emeritus and retired head of
the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources at Purdue University
(1958-73).
Prior to his tenure at Purdue, Bramble was affiliated with the School
of Forest Resources from 1937 to 1958, first as a research professor
and then as director (1955-58). He pioneered studies of Virginia
pine ecology, coals spoils vegetation, Christmas tree production,
and most notably right-of-way vegetation management and ecology
as affected by herbicides. He helped design Ferguson Building in
1937 and served as an officer of the Forestry Alumni Association
in 1946.
Bramble is a Fellow and Golden Member in the Society of American
Foresters. His other awards include a Distinguished Service Award
from the Pennsylvania Electric Association in 1988 for his ecological
research and the Wildlife Conservation Award from the Pennsylvania
Game Commission, also in 1988.
As a captain in the U.S. Army Air Force in Africa and Mediterranean
Theatre (1942-45), he received seven battle stars and two Presidential
Citations. He has been active in his church, the Elks, and Rotary
International.
Bramble and his high standards have been a role model for his students
and colleagues. BACK
TO TOP
John
A. Byerly completed a B. S. degree in Forestry at Penn State in
1968. He served in the U.S. Army (1968-1970) and was assigned to
the 1st Cavalry Division during the Vietnam Conflict. While in graduate
school in 1970, he was inducted into Phi Epsilon Phi, a botanical
honorary fraternity.
Byerly began his forestry career with the Virginia Division of Forestry
in 1971. In 1974, he joined the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s
(PGC) Bureau of Wildlife Habitat Management. He coordinated and
assisted in managing the agency’s Bald Eagle Recovery Program,
a venture that began in 1983, by traveling to Saskatchewan, Canada,
to bring eagles back to Pennsylvania. The program ended in 1989
after seven years of successful captures and releases. Byerly was
given the Agency’s Outstanding Employee Award in 1990.
Byerly’s other positions with the Pennsylvania Game Commission
included Southeast Region Field Forester; Wildlife Impact Review
Coordinator; and chief of the Division of Federal Aid.
Byerly served as the agency’s chief forester until his retirement
in March 2007. In this position he was responsible for developing
policy and management directives for the forest management operations
on 1.4 million acres of State Game Lands, which includes both timber
cover typing/classification and the commercial timber sales program.
He convinced the agency to assemble a Forest Inventory and Analysis
team to survey, inventory, and monitor the forest health on the
State Game Lands.
Byerly also served on the Joint Legislative Air and Water Pollution
Control and Conservation Committees Joint Legislative Task Force,
the Governors Blue Ribbon Task Force on Low-Value Hardwoods, and
the Advisory Board for the Penn State School of Forest Resources’
Ibberson Chair, and represented the Pennsylvania Game Commission
on numerous other committees.
Byerly served as a deputy wildlife conservation officer for 17 years,
retiring in 1999. He has been a member of the Society of American
Foresters (SAF) since 1968, and is currently serving as treasurer
of the Keystone Chapter of the SAF (2001-present) and has been a
certified forester since October 2002.
Byerly is a member of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association and
served as the association’s treasurer from 1996 to 2000. He
was elected to that position again for another term at PFA’s
annual meeting in September 2006.
Byerly is a life member of the Penn State Alumni Association; a
member of Tau Phi Delta Fraternity; a life member of the North American
Hunting Club; a member of the National Rifle Association; and a
member of the Susquehanna Orchid Society.
Dr.
Phillip J. Craul earned his B.S. in forestry in 1954, his
M.S. in forestry in 1960, and his Ph.D. in agronomy in 1964, all
from Penn State. He is Emeritus Professor of Soil Science, SUNY
College of Environmental Science and Forestry, where he was a faculty
member from 1968 to 1994. For 13 years he was senior lecturer in
landscape architecture, The Graduate School of Design, Harvard University.
He was instructor in forestry at Penn State Mont Alto, 1959-1960.
Craul’s professional focus has been on urban soils and their
effects on landscape trees. He has educated generations of students,
foresters, landscape architects, engineers, and others about effects
of soils on trees. His best-known books are Urban Soil in Landscape
Design (1992) and Urban Soils: Applications and Practices (1999).
Craul has authored 35 publications and several books, has presented
papers at 16 national and international conferences, and served
on editorial boards of several national periodicals. He has shared
his expertise with many agencies including the National Capitol
Region of the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, the
state of New York, and several municipalities and conservation districts
in New York and elsewhere. He has also been a soils consultant for
more than 30 years to several large landscape architectural firms.
Craul has been a strong supporter of Penn State Mont Alto. He helped
activate the Maurice K. and Ethel C. Goddard Scholarship in Forestry,
and established the Joanne M. Craul Scholarship in nursing in memory
of his wife who was a nurse for many years. He served as a member
of the Board of Directors, Penn State Mont Alto Constituent Society,
1996-2001, and was named an Alumni Centennial Fellow of Penn State
Mont Alto in 2004.
Craul was elected to several honorary societies, including Sigma
Xi, Xi
Sigma Pi, and Gamma Sigma Delta. He was a Bullard Fellow for Forestry
Research at Harvard University, 1976-1977, and elected to honorary
membership in Sigma Lambda Alpha, the Landscape Architecture Honorary
in 1993.
Throughout his career, Craul has taught that the soil speaks to
us through its properties, telling us how and for what it can be
used. He reminds his audiences that "it is not dirt, it is
soil, the elixir of life.” BACK
TO TOP
Eugene "Gene" Decker earned a B.S. In Forestry in 1952 and
an M.S. in Forestry (Wildlife Management) in 1955. After various
positions in Pennsylvania, New York, Georgia, Montana, and California,
he joined the College of Natural Resources at Colorado State University
(CSU) in 1967. He was professor of wildlife biology for more than
31 years in the Department of Fishery and Wildlife Biology at CSU
where he taught courses in natural resources public relations, wildlife
management, and international wildlife resources. He retired from
CSU in January 1999 and was honored with emeritus professor status.
Decker spent a considerable amount of time serving as a mentor to
international graduate and undergraduate students from Africa, Egypt,
Iran, Indonesia, Australia, and Nepal. His international efforts
in wildlife conservation included work in Iran, Egypt, and Africa.
He has received many awards including The Wildlife Society Conservation
Education Award in 1983 for the Colorado wildlife education program
developed under his direction, and the Best Teacher Award from the
CSU Student Chapter of The Wildlife Society in 1999. He has spent
extensive periods of time developing, coordinating, and conducting
training programs in conservation and in communications/public relations.
This includes the well-known, weeklong Wildlife Management Short
Course at CSU; ecology study tours of east, central, and southern
Africa; and a course in effective personal presentations offered
annually for The Wildlife Society.
Decker's community service includes being the founding director
of the Rocky Mountain Bighorn Society, a citizen conservation group,
in 1977. He has also served as member and chairman of the City of
Loveland Parks and Recreation Advisory Board. His military service
includes active duty in 1952 and active reserve duty from 1953 to
1960; he was honorably discharged as captain in 1962.
Through his teaching, Decker has changed the way natural resource
professionals make presentations. He has also helped federal agencies
develop protocol for public input. A whole generation of professionals
will work with the public in a more realistic and meaningful manner
because of his teaching. BACK
TO TOP
Bruce
M. Edwards completed a B.S. in Forest Science at Penn State
in 1971 and a master’s degree in Forest Biometrics at Colorado
State in 1973. He then worked for five years at Potlatch Corporation
in Lewiston, Idaho, as a research biometrician, helping adapt and
implement computerized stand modeling program for management planning
on the 600,000 acres of Potlatch forest in Northern Idaho. He returned
to the East in 1978 and worked for three years as a consultant forester
with Northeast Timbers Service, Inc., in Hancock, New York, providing
a wide variety of forestry services to land owners and forest products
companies.
In 1981 Edwards returned to Potlach Corporation in Idaho as a research
forester. Two years later he returned to Hancock, New York, this
time to Mallery Lumber Corporation, where he held various positions
including procurement manager, mill manager, and vice president.
During his last two years at Mallery Lumber he managed the Hancock
sawmill and all other operations in the Hancock area.
Since 2000, Edwards has been owner of Starlight Forests LLC and
operator of a tree farming business. Starlight Forests owns more
than 11,000 acres of high-quality timberlands in northeastern Pennsylvania
and southeastern New York.
Edwards has been a member of the Society of American Foresters since
1971 and a member of the Association of Consulting Foresters since
1978. He is a member and past director of the Empire State Forest
Products Association, and a member of the American Chestnut Foundation
and the Pennsylvania Forestry Association.
Edwards has been a Boy Scout volunteer since 1983, and in 2006 received
the Silver Beaver Award, the highest award given in scouting for
lifetime volunteer services. Since 2002 he has been a member of
Hancock Partners, Inc., a group of local businesses created to improve
the economic, social, and cultural well being of the local community.
Edward’s involvement with Penn State includes membership in
the Mount Nittany Society, the Armsby Honor Society, the Nittany
Lion Club, A Friend of the Blue Band, and a lifetime membership
in the Penn State Alumni Association. He is a member of the Development
Committee of the College of Agricultural Sciences, and established
a Trustee Scholarship with preference to Forest Science students.
He was one of our School’s earliest “pioneer contributors”
to the new building project, donating funds for the Edwards Student,
and he worked hard to convince other alumni and corporations to
join this development effort.
Pamela
J. Edwards is currently a research hydrologist with the USDA
Forest Service at the Northeastern Research Station in Parsons,
West Virginia. She completed a B.S. degree in Forest Science in
1981 and MS degree in Forest Resources in 1983. While working on
her MS, she began her career with the Forest Service's Northeastern
Forest Experiment Station at University Park as a cooperative education
student.
After completing the MS, she moved to the research station in Parsons,
West Virginia, and has been employed there since then, first as
a research forester and since 1992 as a research hydrologist. In
1994, she earned a Ph.D. in Forest Soils from North Carolina State
University.
Edwards has been a key research cooperator and principal investigator
in research with Dr. Bill Sharpe and Dr. Dave DeWalle related to
the effects of atmospheric deposition on forested ecosystems. She
has given several special seminars on campus over the past several
years and helped Drs. Sharpe and DeWalle teach a graduate course
in fall 1997. She taught our senior-level undergraduate Watershed
Management course in spring 2001 while Dr. DeWalle was on sabbatical.
In 1999, Edwards was appointed as an adjunct associate professor
in the School of Forest Resources.
Edwards has received several awards for her research accomplishments.
The Forest Service Chief has also recognized her for her work with
students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Her
peers regard her as a well-organized, hardworking, and highly credible
scientist. In her spare time she coaches girls youth soccer. BACK
TO TOP
John
C. "Jack" Good graduated with a B.S. In Forestry in 1941 and
immediately served in the US Army. He was part of the 87th Mountain
Infantry Regiment, our country's first ski regiment. He trained
dozens of new ski troops and participated in several of the big
battles of World War II in France, Belgium, and Germany. After a
battle injury, the army retired him from service in July 1945 as
a full lieutenant and a company commander.
Good began his forestry career in the summer of 1945 as a farm forester
working for the Virginia Forest Service out of Roanoke. In January
1946 he began his career at Bartlett Tree Experts as a trainee on
a line crew and now serves as senior vice president of the company.
No employee of Bartlett's Mid-East Division exceeds Jack's longevity.
Good is active in establishing scholarships for students and recruiting
students to the profession and to his company. He has served many
years on the advisory board at Penn State Mont Alto. His community
service is extensive and includes involvement with Boy Scouts, his
church, the Chambersburg Hospital, and many other groups. He is
also an active member of the International Society of Arboriculture
and other arborist organizations. People in all walks of professional
and personal life consider him a man of highest integrity, professionalism,
and community spirit. BACK
TO TOP
James
R. Grace James R. Grace earned a Ph.D. in Forest Resources
at Penn State in 1978, under the guidance of Dr. Russell Hutnik,
with a focus on forest ecology. His previous academic training included
a bachelor of science in forest management at the University of
Vermont in 1970, and a master of forest science at Yale University
in 1972.
While completing his doctoral degree requirements, he began working
as an adjunct professor at Rutgers University, Cook College. Grace
was an exemplary teacher; he received the “Professor of the
Year” award at Cook College in 1978. In 1980 he became an
assistant extension specialist in forestry at Cook College and soon
was well known in the northeastern region for his innovative extension
programs.
In 1983, Grace accepted an appointment as an assistant professor
and extension forester with Penn State’s School of Forest
Resources. Here he developed the Forest Resources publication series,
began the Forest Resources newsletter, led research on issues relating
to private forest management, and served as chair of the “Year
of the Forest” in 1986.
The “Year of the Forest” was a yearlong event that coincided
with the 100th anniversary of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association
and celebrated the Commonwealth’s forests and all the values
they provide. The Pennsylvania Forestry Association honored Grace
with the Rothrock Award for Conservation that year for his leadership
in that event.
In 1987, Grace accepted a position as deputy secretary in the Pennsylvania
Department of Environmental Resources where he administered the
bureaus of forestry, state parks, and geological survey. He continued
in that role until 1991 when he moved into his current position
as state forester of the Bureau of Forestry. Under his leadership,
the bureau has completed two state forest management plans that
include area-controlled harvesting schedules, ecosystem management,
continuous forest inventory, and the use of GIS technology.
Grace was central to our state forests becoming the nation’s
first certified public forest in 1995. Other states have observed
the advantages of certification and have followed Pennsylvania’s
lead. Grace helped initiate the Ecosystem Management Advisory Committee,
providing the opportunity for various stakeholders to consider and
debate ecosystem management on state forests.
Grace has been active in the National Association of State Foresters,
serving as president and on numerous committees. He serves on the
Sustainable Forestry Initiative® State Implementation Committee,
and is also chair of the board of directors of the Pinchot Institute
for Conservation. Grace is a leader in the forestry profession and
has brought further recognition to Pennsylvania’s forests.
BACK
TO TOP
Joseph
E. Ibberson earned a B.S. in Forestry at Penn
State in 1947 and an M.F. from Yale in 1948. Before college he served
in the U.S. Army from 1942 to 1945.
After graduation from Yale, Ibberson was recruited
and hired by the Pennsylvania Department of Forests and Waters,
Bureau of Forestry, to develop management plans for the two million
acres of Pennsylvania state forestland. By 1955, all of the forests
were mapped and had management plans.
Ibberson then initiated the Division of Forest Advisory
Services—a group of specialists in silviculture, planning,
management, entomology, pathology, genetics, wildlife, biometrics,
and computer applications—to further expand the management
plans and target the preservation of endangered species and wetlands.
He was responsible for innovative programs in forest inventory,
pest control, tree improvement, nurseries, and service to private
forest landowners. He started the first program to control damaging
insects and diseases. This program grew to become the Division of
Forest Pest Management. He started the first meaningful service
forester program and now there is a service forester in almost every
county giving valuable assistance and advice related to proper forest
resources management to private forest owners.
For several years after retiring in 1977 as Chief
of Forest Advisory Services, Ibberson operated a highly successful
forestry consulting business. He practiced what he preached. He
combined more than 2,000 acres of fragmented forested parcels into
several larger tree farms and actively managed them.
Ibberson is also an active member of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association.
He established and funded an endowment with that organization to
foster the conservation and wise use of all forestland in Pennsylvania.
In 1998, Ibberson donated a 350-acre forest tract
to the Commonwealth for restricted outdoor use by the public. It
became the first Conservation Area in the Bureau of State Parks.
His gifts of land, ideas, and advice have paved the way for future
donations that are already underway.
The School of Forest Resources is especially appreciative
of the endowed Joseph E. Ibberson Chair in Forest Resources Management,
filled for the first time in 2002, which will be instrumental in
training future foresters to work with owners of private forest
lands and consultants. Mr. Ibberson has also initiated plans to
endow a second chair in the School of Forest Resources with a focus
on urban and community forestry.
Ibberson’s numerous and well-deserved awards
include the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s Wildlife Conservation
Award (1977), the American Forest Foundation’s (AFF’s)
Outstanding Tree Farmer of the Year Award for Pennsylvania (1988),
the AFF’s Outstanding Management of Resources Award for the
northeastern states (1999), the Forest Stewardship Conservation
Award from the Dauphin County Conservation Commission (1999), and
the Pennsylvania Landowner of the Year Award from the Pennsylvania
Wildlife Society and the Audubon Society (2001). He has been a member
of the Society of American Foresters for 49 years, and was elected
to the prestigious rank of Fellow in 2001.
Ibberson’s entire career
has been devoted to fostering the conservation and wise use of Pennsylvania’s
forestlands. BACK
TO TOP
Alex
W. Kirnak completed his first year of college at Mont Alto
with a full scholarship from the Buhl Foundation of Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. He was awarded three additional scholarships during
his undergraduate program. Serious complications from scarlet fever
required him to complete junior and senior forestry courses during
his final year, still graduating from Penn State with honors in
1937.
Kirnak then pursued his early aspirations of “entering the
lumber business in the Pacific Northwest.” Lacking the money
for train fare, he hitchhiked across the United States and arrived
in Longview, Washington, eight days later with the clothes on his
back, a homemade down sleeping bag and ground sheet, a camera, and
$19. The timber industry was in desperate straits in the midst of
the Great Depression, and was operating at about 30% capacity. It
did not take Kirnak long to realize his chances of getting work
through an employment office were zero.
After several days of pounding on the door of the Long-Bell Lumber
Company’s vice president of timber and logging for a job,
he got results. The vice president made a call to the main logging
camp at Ryderwood, Washington: “I’m sending up a big
green kid. Put him to work. If he doesn’t learn fast and work
hard, run him off!” (Not the usual post-college career launch,
but a Depression was on.) Salary was $110 per month with $40 deducted
for room and board in camp.
The first day in the timber, Kirnak was paired with a veteran faller
(whose partner had been injured), felling old-growth Douglas-firs,
on springboards with hand tools. Kirnak took to the big timber like
a duck to water. Then followed five years of log bucking, yarding,
loading, rigging up, and being involved directly with Long-Bell’s
conversion from railroad operations to log truck operations.
The hard physical exposure of felling and bucking big timber with
hand tools led to his lifelong personal interest in power saws (as
chainsaws were first called), and Kirnak was selected to be on one
end of the first power saw ever that felled an old-growth Douglas-fir.
During these five years, Kirnak developed an improved accounting
system for his camp’s unit (thanks to having taken an accounting
course at Penn State!). Every other Saturday he reported production
and cost results at the main office in Longview. Most of this work
was done in the evenings after working all day in the timber.
World War II intervened and Kirnak served three years in the U.S.
Navy, island-hopping in the Pacific as staff engineering officer
of a flotilla of rocket-firing gunboats in the amphibious forces.
Upon his return to Long-Bell, Kirnak was assigned as trucking manager
in the fifteen-year-old Tillamook Burn. His added wartime experience
with radios led to his installing the first two-way radios in logging
operations. By 1950 he also moved to Long-Bell’s sawmill operations
in the Tillamook Burn, salvaging old-growth timber killed in the
1933 fire.
In 1954, Kirnak accepted an attractive offer by East Asiatic Company,
an international conglomerate, to work as the Pacific Northwest
international lumber sales manager. In that position he provided
leadership in shipping the first pulled-to-length paper covered
lumber cargo to destinations in Europe, Australia, South Africa,
Asia, and South America. This was a prelude to container shipments
that are common today.
After directing marketing and shipping of over half a billion feet
(clear lumber only), Kirnak retired from corporate life in 1971.
He received the Lumberman of the Year award in 1994 from the Portland
Wholesale Lumber Association in recognition of his considerable
accomplishments in logging, milling, and marketing and in community
and industry service.
Following his retirement, Kirnak served as a consultant to the timber
industry. He also was retained as defense expert by United States
and Canadian chainsaw manufacturers in their defense of legal issues
in 21 states and federal jurisdictions.
Kirnak served as co-executor of the estate of his lifelong friend,
Ed Hoener, publisher of “The Timberman” magazine. The
Hoener Trust gave full scholarships to needy and worthy forestry
students at Oregon State University. Kirnak also served on the Hoener
Trust advisory committee that oversees the investment and awards
of the trust.
From his arrival in the Northwest, Kirnak was active in conservation
efforts for wilderness areas and national parks. These activities
included successful ten-year efforts with Olympic Parks Associates
in preventing the 300,000-acre removal of the finest old-growth
timber from Olympic National Park. The activities also included
the fourteen-year successful efforts, until 1972, for congressional
authorization to restore 48,000 acres to the Three Sisters Wilderness,
removed previously by the USDA Forest Service in 1958; and ten years
with the North Cascade Conservation Council, resulting in the creation
of North Cascades National Park in 1968.
Beginning with the camera he took to the Northwest in 1937, Kirnak
documented the harvest of old-growth timber, frequently carrying
his camera in his lunch pail during those early years. He built
an excellent portfolio that depicts the people, timber, and equipment
tied to this historic trade. His spare time in the summer was spent
mountain climbing and in the winter skiing.
Kirnak has maintained an active interest in Penn State’s School
of Forest Resources, both through our Alumni Group and his continued
ties with various School directors.
Edward
F. Kocjancic earned a B.S. in Forestry in 1954. He has practiced
forestry for 45 years, 35 of which have been as a forest consultant.
He is president of Edward F. Kocjancic, Inc., a consulting firm
based in Kane, Pennsylvania, that employs a staff of eight and is
known internationally for its veneer expertise, especially black
cherry. Ed's company offers the gamut of natural resource management
services, including aerial and GIS mapping and domestic and international
marketing.
Kocjancic been a very strong supporter of Penn State's Grand Destiny
Campaign and has also served as a volunteer in that effort. He is
a life member of the Penn State Alumni Association. He has served
on the School's Advisory Board since 1995. His company has worked
in conjunction with the School to develop the latest computer technology
for forest inventory and information gathering. Each fall his company
hosts a visit from the School's sophomore forestry class. His support
of the new forestry building includes funding for a teaching laboratory,
to be named the Kocjancic Forestry Laboratory, that will contain
24 stations for students taking classes in silviculture, dendrology,
timber harvesting, and forest mensuration.
Kocjacnic has demonstrated by example the importance of forest stewardship,
sustainability, and multiple-use in the management of private forest
land. He is an FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) resource manager.
Most recently, in August 2001, Ed was named a finalist in the 2001
Governor's Export Excellence Award. This award recognizes companies
and individuals who are leading contributors to Pennsylvania's expanding
international market opportunities.
Kocjancic's professional affiliations include being a 47-year member
of the Society of American Foresters, a life member of the Pennsylvania
Forestry Association, a director of the Allegheny Hardwood Utilization
Group, a director of the Pennsylvania Forest Industry Association,
a director of the McKean County Conservation District, a director
of the Pennsylvania Council of Professional Foresters, and a member
of the Pennsylvania Hardwood Development Council.
His community involvement includes serving on the Advisory Board
of Northwest Savings Bank, Kane Branch; serving as a director on
the Kane Area Industrial Development Council; and serving as leadership
gift director for St. Callistus Church in Kane, Pennsylvania, where
he spearheaded the fund-raising of one million dollars to help the
church meet its building campaign goal. BACK
TO TOP
Marc
D. Lewis graduated in 1978 with a B.S. degree in Forest
Science. He was an active member of the Mont Alto Soccer Club, Alpha
Gamma Rho, and the Forestry Society. After graduation, he entered
the family business, Dwight Lewis Lumber Company, Inc., and was
engaged in sawmill and forestry operations. This included management
planning on the company’s 16,000 acres of hardwood forest
and the upgrading of mill equipment.
In 1984, Dwight Lewis Lumber Company, Inc. expanded its manufacturing
and marketing base, requiring Lewis’s further involvement
with mill operations and product marketing. By the early 1990s,
the company had installed dry kilns and further expanded lumber
sales and marketing, while also diversifying into dimension product
manufacture. In 1995, Lewis Lumber established Lewis Lumber Products,
Inc, which subsequently led to a near doubling of employment within
both companies. Following the leadership of their father, Marc and
his brother, Melvin, became co-owners of the parent company in 2001.
The two companies have established a reputation within their industry
for high-quality products while maintaining a respect and stewardship
for timber resources, the environment, and the future generations
of people within their region. They are a FSC Smart Wood Chain-of-Custody
certified company and their timberlands are also certified through
Smart Wood.
Lewis has maintained an active role with the Pennsylvania Forest
Products Association (PFPA), formerly the Hardwood Lumber Manufacturers
Association (HLMA), since the group’s inception in 1980. He
has served as a board member and has recruited new members from
Pennsylvania’s industry.
In 2001, HLMA approached Penn State with an offer to complete the
interior of their new General Aviation Building. The resulting design
included hardwood paneling, flooring, millwork, and furniture elements.
Lewis Lumber Company, Inc. and Lewis Lumber Products, Inc. led this
HLMA effort in the donation of lumber, manufacture of dimension
products, and provided overall coordination of the project.
When Penn State announced the formal inception of the new Forest
Resources Building on the University Park campus in 2002, HLMA,
now PFPA, stepped forward with a suggested donation of hardwood
products for this $30 million project. Once again, the two Lewis
companies led the way in the donation, design, and manufacture of
nearly $700,000 of paneling, moldings, and laminated beams for the
building.
Lewis has provided similar leadership to the Pennsylvania Forestry
Association (PFA) over the past 25 years, serving on their board
and various ad hoc and formal committees. He is currently vice president
of PFA. He helped organize PFA’s largest fundraiser and banquet,
traditionally held in Williamsport. He coordinated PFA’s campaign
to name the Director’s Office in the School’s new building.
Lewis has contributed considerable time and effort to the School
of Forest Resources and the College of Agricultural Sciences, particularly
with reference to alumni interests and events. He has been a member
of the college’s Ag Council for the past 12 years, representing
the combined interests of Forest Science and Wood Products, and
has served on the Ag Council board for six years (2000-2005). He
served on the council’s Partnership Committee (2002), chaired
the Publicity Committee (2003, 2004) and the Program Committee (2005,
2006). He organized a Dean’s Tour of six forest products companies
throughout central and northern Pennsylvania in May 2005, again
putting forward the School’s professional interests. He has
been a member of the School’s Ibberson Chair Advisory Committee
since its inception in 2002. He has provided advice and council
to Alpha Gamma Rho as an active alumnus.
Lewis has been active in regional organizations, serving as a member
of the Loyalsock Creek Watershed Association and the Sullivan County
Rural Electric Board of Directors, and serving on the board of the
North Central Pennsylvania Conservancy, the Forestry Advisory Board
of the Pennsylvania College of Technology, and the Board of Directors
of the Williamsport Woodlands Bank.
Robert
C. (Bob) McColly earned his B.S. in Forest Science from
Penn State in 1972. Upon graduation, he started his career as a
procurement forester for the Koppers Company in Salisbury, MD, and
spent time working in northern Louisiana, East Texas, and Arkansas.
In 1973, McColly worked for Mann and Parker Lumber Company in New
Freedom, PA, as a lumber purchaser before returning to Koppers Company
in early 1974. He worked for Koppers Company in the Salisbury area
until 1976, when he accepted a position as procurement manager for
L.A.Clarke and Son in Fredericksburg, VA.
In 1977, McColly joined Forest Land Services, Inc., a consulting
forestry firm based out of Elkins, WV. In 1980, he purchased the
assets of Forest Land Services and became president of the firm.
He expanded by opening an office in Ligonier, PA, in 1986. For the
last 29 years, McColly has been doing consulting forestry work in
West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, and Kentucky. The firm
currently employs three full-time foresters and manages more than
100,000 acres in these states.
While at Penn State, McColly was a member of Xi Sigma Pi national
honorary forestry fraternity, and a member of Tau Phi Delta social
fraternity, where he served as treasurer and alumni chairman. He
is a certified forester with the Society of American Foresters,
and a licensed professional forester in the states of Maryland and
West Virginia. He was named the Pennsylvania Area IV Outstanding
Tree Farm Inspector in 1982.
He has served as secretary, treasurer, and vice president of the
Delmarva Professional Foresters Association, and has been a member
of the Association of Consulting Foresters (ACF) of America, Inc.
since 1978. McColly has been active with ACF, serving as chairman
of the Pennsylvania chapter, president of the national chapter 1992-1994,
chair of the national convention in 1989, and serving on the Practicing
Foresters Institute Trust board of directors four years, including
a term as president in 2002.
McColly served on the board of directors of the Pennsylvania Landowners
Association 19901999, and is also a member of the Forest Landowners
Association. He served on the Pennsylvania Governors Forestry Advisory
Task Force in 1996 and was a member of the Penn State School of
Forest Resources Alumni Board 1996-2000. He is currently a member
of the advisory board for the Ibberson Endowed Chair of the Penn
State, and a member of the School of Forest Resources Advisory Board.
He also served as a member of a composite review committee aiding
and selecting a director for the School of Forest Resources.
McColly has been a guest lecturer at Penn State for forest economics
and timber harvesting courses, and has guest lectured at the University
of Pittsburgh at Johnstown. He was successful in spearheading a
campaign, with Tom Yorke, to raise funds for a Tau Phi Delta faculty
office in the new Forest Resources Building. He also completed an
ACF-sponsored effort to name the Ibberson Chair office in the new
building.
McColly’s civic activities include coaching Little League
baseball in Ligonier, PA, for seven years and serving on the Little
League board of directors for four years; YMCA board of directors
for five years and as vice president; YMCA youth basketball coach
for six years. Currently, he serves on the Westmoreland County Youth
Commission.
Harry
E. Murphy graduated from Penn with a B. S. degree in forestry
in 1943, after gaining experience with a summer fire-fighting branch
of the U.S. Forest Service. With World War II ongoing, Murphy enlisted
in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and was assigned to the Transportation
Corps in England. In his free time, to temporarily escape the war,
he pursued his lifelong passion for plants and the natural world
by earning a "Technical Certificate" from the Royal Botanical
Gardens at Kew.
After the war, Murphy served as a district forester for the Arkansas
Forestry Division before going to Sheffield, Alabama, to work in
the Forestry Relations Division of the Tennessee Valley Authority
(TVA), a large federal landowner. It was through the TVA, that Murphy
met a Yale-educated forester, John M. Bradley, Jr., of Birmingham,
Alabama. In 1952, they formed a consulting forestry partnership.
At that time, the consulting forestry profession was almost unheard
of.
The two men led the way for change, with measures such as loans
that allowed private, nonindustrial landowners to borrow money based
on the value of their timber, the use of the latest technology (including
the first computers) in forest inventories, the acceptance of the
pulp and paper markets by local sawmillers, and the development
of trade associations for landowners, giving them political clout.
The economic value of southern forestland increased as much as 500-fold
over the next 50 years, thanks to consulting foresters like Murphy
and Bradley who, client by client, developed the practice of long-term
stewardship and investment. By 1993, when Murphy retired as executive
vice president of the company, it had been renamed Resource Management,
Service, Inc. (RMS), and was one of the most prominent and highly
regarded consultants in the South.
For his forestry work in the South, Murphy was honored by the Southeastern
Society of American Foresters (SAF) with its Award for Forest Excellence
and named a Fellow in the national SAF. He also worked at the national
level as a member and a leader in the Association of Consulting
Foresters (ACF), where his efforts in favor of forest and tax policy
reforms earned him a national Legislative Committee award. He worked
internationally (mostly in Latin America) on forest resource inventories
and feasibility studies, and was a member of the International Society
of Tropical Foresters (ISTF) and the World Forestry Committee of
SAF. His commitment to natural resources encompassed a broad vision
of forest stewardship, as evidenced by his position on the Alabama
Governor's first "Forever Wild" (preservation) Committee
and his recognition as a recipient of the W. Kelly Mosley Environmental
Award. He has also been honored by the Boy Scouts of America, with
the Silver Beaver Award and by the American Red Cross.
Though officially retired, Murphy maintains an office at the RMS
Building in Birmingham. He is active in several forestry-related
organizations, such as the Forest Landowners Association and the
Society of American Foresters. He continues to serve as the secretary/treasurer
of the Bradley/Murphy Natural Resources Extensions Trust, which
promotes the stewardship of forests and related natural resources
in the private sector. An active member of South Highlands Presbyterian
Church in Birmingham, Murphy backs many ministries. He supports
the Central American Medical Outreach, an innovative nonprofit that
helps connect U.S. and Honduran healthcare professionals and supplies
in the service of building sustainable medical services for one
million impoverished people.
James C. Nelson earned a B.S. in Forestry at Penn State in
1952 and then embarked upon a 41-year-long career with the Pennsylvania
Bureau of Forestry, interrupted by one year of service (1954-1955)
in the U.S. Army.
He began his employment with the bureau as a research forester and
in 1960 was promoted to forest management specialist. There he worked
under the guidance of M.K. Goddard and Joseph E. Ibberson in revising
and expanding state forest management plans. He was instrumental
in developing a new inventory system, computerizing the timber sales
data, and furthering an even-aged management policy for state forest
land. In 1965 he was promoted to forest resources planner and developed
wildlife habitat guidelines and a comprehensive natural area and
wildlife area program for state forests. He authored the “Forest
Resource Plans for State Forest Land” in 1970. Nelson was
promoted to assistant state forester in 1982 and to state forester
in 1989. He was instrumental in establishing the Pennsylvania Natural
Diversity Inventory in the Bureau of Forestry and he promoted the
Forest Stewardship Program aimed at developing a stewardship ethic.
Nelson has been a member of the Society of American Foresters since
1952 and has served as vice chair and chair of the five-state Allegheny
Society SAF, as SAF Visiting Scientist to Clemson University, and
as a speaker at five SAF national conventions. He was elected to
National Council SAF in 1985, and he was elected Fellow in 1992.
Nelson’s other professional memberships include Xi Sigma Pi
(forestry honor society) and Gamma Sigma Delta (agricultural honor
society). One of his hobbies is collecting antique and historical
logging equipment that he has very generously put on display at
countless public events throughout the state; he has also prepared
and presented a popular slide program on the history of Pennsylvania’s
forests.
Nelson’s civic activities include being a volunteer in the
Pennsylvania Forest Stewardship Program, a certified official in
the National Wheelchair Athletic Association, past president of
the East Berlin Historical Preservation Society, and past member
of the board of directors of the Pinchot Institute of Conservation.
BACK
TO TOP
W. R. "Dick" Rossman served in the U.S. Army Air
Force during 1944-46. He earned a B.S. in Forestry in 1950 and began
his 38-year career as a utility forester with the Potomac Edison
Company in Maryland. In 1956 he took a position as forest manager
for the Pennsylvania Electric Company in Johnstown, Pennsylvania,
where he worked until his retirement in 1988. He managed about 10,000
acres of forest land, supervised Penelec’s forestry staff,
pioneered a replacement tree planting program, and administered
a 25-year research project studying pollution effects on trees.
Rossman promoted the “right tree-right place” concept
for years before other utility companies adopted it in many parts
of the United States. The concept led to the founding of the Municipal
Tree Restoration Program with Penn State and the Bureau of Forestry,
and later Pennsylvania's involvement in the America the Beautiful
Program of the U.S. Forest Service. Rossman helped establish the
Line Clearance and Forestry Committee of the Pennsylvania Electric
Association and served as its first chair. He developed the first
erosion and sediment control manual for line construction, which
was adopted for use by utilities in Pennsylvania.
Rossman had an active role in the forestry profession, serving
as chair of the SAF Western Gateway Chapter, president of the Pennsylvania
Association of Conservation District Directors, president of the
Pennsylvania Forestry Association, and cofounder and chair of Stony
Creek/Conemaugh River Improvement Program. He contributed to the
State Conservation Commission, Pennsylvania Hardwoods Council, and
Penn State Agriculture Advisory Council. Since 1997 he has been
president of Western Pennsylvania Coalition for Abandoned Mine Reclamation,
and vice-chair of Pennsylvania Organization for Watersheds and Rivers.
Rossman’s efforts have been acknowledged by way of the Samuel
S. Cobb/Bureau of Forestry Award in 1988, Pennsylvania Forestry
Association Rothrock Conservationist of the Year in 1994, certificates
of recognition by Pennsylvania State Conservation Committee and
by Southern Alleghenies RC&D Area in 1995, Cambria County Conservation
District Director Service Award 1973-95, Pennsylvania Conservation
Hall of Fame in 1996, and election as Fellow in the Society of American
Foresters in 2004.
Rossman has been active in the South Ebensburg United Church of
Christ. His wife of 54 years describes him as quiet, yet committed,
willing to lead, having a genuine love for our country, and desiring
to build our forest and natural resources for future generations.
BACK
TO TOP
Robert
H. Rumpf earned a B.S. in Forestry in 1949. He began his career
with the Pennsylvania Department of Forests and Waters, filling
several assignments between 1949 and 1953, including a tour in the
U.S. Army. After earning a master of forestry degree at Duke University
in 1954, he joined The Glatfelter Pulp Wood Company in Virginia.
In 1961, Rumpf returned to Pennsylvania to open a district office
in Carlisle. While there, he expanded the woodland acquisition program
and installed scientific forest management on company lands. He
also encouraged private landowners to recognize the value of management
and harvesting on their forestlands. He served as area forester,
district manager, administrative assistant, and vice president and
general manager at the Spring Grove headquarters of the company.
He retired in 1993 with 39 years of service.
Rumpf's hard work and keen insights earned him the respect of others
both inside and outside of the forest conservation field. A proponent
of industrial forestry, he is an articulate spokesman for responsible
stewardship on industrial and private woodlands.
Rumpf's service to the profession includes being president and director
of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association, and chair of the association's
Policy Committee and Forest Industry Committee; he was chairman
of the Pennsylvania Tree Farm Committee, chairman of the Mid-Atlantic
Communications Committee of the American Forest Institute, chairman
of the Forest Resource Committee of the Pennsylvania Chamber of
Business and Industry, and a member of the national board of the
American Pulpwood Association. He continues to provide a service
to private woodland owners in his retirement.
Rumpf's service to the School of Forest Resources includes being
a member of the School's Advisory Board (1991-1995), a member of
the Goddard Chair Committee (1992-2000), and a member of the Penn
State Forest Issues Group. He also served on the SFR Alumni Group
board of directors for two three-year terms from 1995 to 2000. He
was instrumental in establishing the Distinguished Lecture Series
in the School in 1993.
Rumpf's service to the community includes being a member of the
North Middleton Township Planning Commission for 10 years, activity
in the Presbyterian Church, and leadership in the Boy Scouts of
America.
His awards include the Joseph T. Rothrock Conservationist of the
Year Award in 1996 from the Pennsylvania Forestry Association, the
1993 Maryland Governor's Proclamation for leadership in Maryland
Forestry, and in 1993 his election as fellow in the Society of American
Foresters. BACK
TO TOP
Gregory
M. Schrum completed a B.S. in Forest Technology in 1967 and
an M.S. in Forest Resources in 1969. His graduate studies were under
the direction of Dr. Henry Gerhold and involved the genetic variations
of Christmas tree characteristics in Scotch pine.
Schrum is a member of Xi Sigma Pi honorary forestry fraternity
and Tau Phi Delta fraternity, of which he was treasurer and president.
He is a member of the Society of American Foresters, and a member
of Pennsylvania Forestry Association for which he serves on the
Communications Committee. He also serves on the School of Forest
Resources Advisory Board.
Schrum served in Vietnam as an Army First Lieutenant. He has worked
for the Pennsylvania Bureau of State Parks for the past 30 years.
His present position is Chief, Division of Resource Management and
Planning, and he is responsible for directing the management of
the natural resources and facility development in the Commonwealth’s
116 state parks.
During the last five years, Schrum has worked diligently to create
a totally new program area in the Pennsylvania Bureau of State Parks
called “conservation area.” His efforts were critical
in formulating a state policy that provides for this designation
for land donated to the Bureau of State Parks and managed for the
purposes of preserving open space, conserving natural resources,
and providing opportunities for passive, non-motorized, low-density
outdoor recreation and environmental education activities. A conservation
area differs from a typical state park because the land is donated
and only passive forms of recreation such as hiking, hunting, and
bird-watching are permitted. Schrum’s personality, perseverance,
patience, and remarkable ability to negotiate made the creation
of conservation areas a reality.
In December 1998, Joseph E. Ibberson (’47) donated land to
the Commonwealth, and through Mr. Schrum’s leadership it became
the first conservation area in the Pennsylvania Bureau of State
Parks. The 350-acre Joseph E. Ibberson Conservation Area is located
in Wayne Township, Dauphin County.
Two other conservation areas have since been established and more
are expected to follow. Schrum’s diligence and dedication
has preserved considerable forested acreage of publicly owned land
for various forms of outdoor recreation without precluding timber
harvesting when necessary. BACK
TO TOP
Thomas
L. Serfass is the first recipient of the School of Forest
Resources Outstanding Recent Alumni Award, created to honor alumni
who have graduated in the previous ten years. He completed his doctoral
degree in Wildlife and Fisheries Science in 1994 under the direction
of Dr. Robert Brooks, professor of wildlife and wetlands.
After several years in a salaried, post-doctoral position with
the Penn State Cooperative Wetlands Center as project manager for
the Pennsylvania River Otter and Fisher reintroduction Projects,
Serfass secured a tenure-track faculty appointment in the Department
of Biology at Frostburg State University. While in that position
he has continued to excel in all missions—research, teaching,
and outreach. He was recently awarded tenure and promoted to associate
professor of wildlife ecology.
Serfass has devoted his professional career to increasing our
knowledge about wildlife and to working diligently to protect and
restore threatened populations. He began his work with otters while
still an undergraduate student at East Stroudsburg University. After
completing his master’s degree at that same institution, he
was accepted into the doctoral program at Penn State. His innovative
approaches to carnivore restoration, and his dissertation, “Conservation
Genetics and Reintroduction Strategies for River Otters,”
have led to numerous publications that have redefined how reintroduction
projects for wildlife proceed. He has always insisted that the utmost
consideration be given to the animal, whether it is an otter, fisher,
or elk. This has led to the development of protocols that address
not only site selection and project evaluation, but also genetic
considerations for the founding members of the reintroduced populations.
In addition, his protocols cover extensive animal handling, and
care involving veterinarians.
Serfass has also implemented well-conceived education and outreach
programs for the public. His attention to detail has led to the
safe reintroduction of hundreds of individual animals, while literally
offering thousands of citizens of all ages a chance to observe seldom-seen
species as they were released. He has written numerous popular articles
for lay audiences, and has helped many news reporters to accurately
cover releases of otters and fishers back into the wild. He has
spent untold hours, driven tens of thousands of miles (often in
his own vehicle at his own expense) to deliver more than 200 informative
and entertaining presentations to children, sportsmen, professionals,
and citizens from all walks of life. These extraordinary and selfless
efforts have furthered the public’s understanding of wildlife
and their habitats.
Serfass’s work has led not only to regional acclaim, but also
to national and international recognition. He has presented papers
in Costa Rica, the Czech Republic, and Chile. He is currently serving
as an adviser to the National Park Service on the potential reintroduction
of river otters into the Grand Canyon. He is also currently the
North American Coordinator of the IUCN (International Union for
the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) Otter Specialist
Group.
Serfass is a member of The Wildlife Society and the American Society
of Mammalogists. He has served as president of the Pennsylvania
Chapter of The Wildlife Society. He has served on several graduate
committees of students in the School of Forest Resources and continues
to be actively engaged with several School faculty members. He has
been invited as a guest speaker for classes at Penn State and other
universities.
In 1993, while still a graduate student, Serfass was recognized
as the Pennsylvania Conservation Professional of the Year by the
Pennsylvania Wildlife Federation, and in 1997 he received the Three
Rivers Environmental Award. Now, as a faculty member at Frostburg
State University, he continues to advance the science and conservation
of wildlife species, while educating the next generation of wildlife
biologists and conservationists.
David
L. Spencer, class of '37, died in February 2000 at the age of
84. He was born near Philadelphia in 1915.
After completing his forestry degree, Spencer worked for a few years
with the Civilian Conservation Corps, and then as a logger in northwestern
Pennsylvania, felling trees and cutting them in to firewood. This
was during the Great Depression and before the invention of chain
saws. Next Spencer borrowed money and enrolled at the University
of Michigan. After completing an M.S. degree in the new field of
wildlife management, he began a job with the Missouri State Game
Commission in 1942. In 1943, with America engaged in World War II,
Spencer enlisted in the Naval Air Corps and became a naval flight
instructor in multi-engine seaplanes at Corpus Christi, Texas.
Spencer was discharged from the Navy in 1945 and soon began working
with Starker Leopold, the son of Aldo Leopold. They conducted bird
studies in Mexico, traveling by foot and horseback; this was a comprehensive
study under the auspices of the University of Wisconsin. Spencer
then began doctoral studies at the University of Wisconsin and it
was there that he came to know Aldo Leopold. After six months he
knew that research was not his preferred vocation and he entered
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1946. Because of his aviation
experience he was a natural to fly the aircraft that the agency
relied on heavily. In addition he had extensive experience in forestry
and wildlife management. He flew duck surveys in Mexico, Guatemala,
Florida and Canada, as well as flying in remote areas of Alaska
in the late 1940s and 1950s.
In 1948, the year he married his wife Eloise, he became refuge manager
of the Kenai National Moose Range. Although there were 14 national
wildlife refuges in Alaska at that time, Spencer was only the second
manger appointed anywhere in the territory. In 1950 his duties were
expanded to serve as supervisor of all the national wildlife refuges
in Alaska. He fought for and guided the Alaskan National Wildlife
Refuge System through the turbulent years of poachers and squatters,
oil development, statehood, emerging wilderness and environmental
ethics, conflicting demands for use of wildlife and their habitats,
and the selection of lands to be added to the refuges for the Alaska
National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA). He was instrumental
in bringing back the Aleutian Goose from the brink of extinction.
With the help of his colleagues, Spencer instigated the establishment
of the Kenai Canoe Trail System. He retired from the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service in 1976 and then worked an additional eight years
for the University of Alaska.
Spencer's professional recognitions are numerous and include the
highest honor of the Department of Interior, the Distinguished Service
Award in 1973; the Alaska Conservationist of the Year award from
the National Audubon Society in 1981; and the Professional Service
Award from the University of Alaska in 1985. In 1997, a unit of
the Kenai Wilderness was named in David Spencer's honor.
Dr. John Craighead provided a letter in support of Dave's nomination
and wrote, "I know of no other who has done as much as Dave
to preserve and manage wildlife and its habitat in Alaska. He was
a humble and soft-spoken man but resolute in his husbandry of the
land and its wildlife. Hi integrity was of the highest order and
this was matched with a passion for the land and its diversity of
like. It is my opinion that he, more than anyone else, set the pattern
for natural resource management in Alaska." BACK
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John
T. Steimer earned his B.S. degree in forestry in 1949.
He was employed for five years as a forester for the Pennsylvania
Department of Highways, and on weekends he worked as a forestry
consultant. In 1955 he decided to help the family business, the
Penn Glenn Oil Company, after his father-in-law died. He thought
he would go back to forestry, but business was so successful that
he founded a sister company, Industrial Terminal Systems Inc. of
New Kensington, that packaged petroleum products and chemicals.
By the time he retired as president in 1990 the number of employees
had risen from 20 to 120, and he passed the presidency on to his
son.
Although Steimer was so busy in those days that he had to hire a
forester to manage his own land, he never lost his passion for the
woods and streams, nor for his alma mater.
In 1989 he and his wife created the John and Nancy Scholarship in
the School of Forest Resources, and the Nancy and John Steimer Professorship
in Agricultural Sciences. In the past 16 years, 60 students have
received Steimer scholarship awards totaling more than $163,000.
The first Steimer Professor was Eva Pell, who later became dean
of the Graduate School, and the second is Marc Abrams, professor
of forest ecology and physiology. The Steimers also supported the
Bryce Jordan Center and the Sarni Tennis Facility, featuring a center
court named for them. Subsequently they gave more than $1.1 million
to the School of Forest Resources for planning and constructing
a new building, and particularly for the Steimer Auditorium.
Penn State named Steimer a Distinguished Alumnus in 1992, the highest
honor it can bestow on its graduates. He has served on fund-raising
committees of the College of Agricultural Sciences and the University.
He is a life member of the Penn State Alumni Association, and belongs
to the Presidents Club, the Nittany Lion Club, the Mount Nittany
Society, and the Laurel Society.
Steimer says that as a student he had no goals to save the world
or save every tree. “Still,” he explains, “the
moment I got involved in forestry, I saw how important it was to
manage our timber lands. Before I retired, I traveled all over the
world and when I came back home, I was always impressed with the
wealth of natural resources our state has to offer. Mother Nature
did a good job in Pennsylvania but we need to help her keep up the
good work.” BACK
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Alden "Denny" Townsend graduated in 1964 with a
B.S. in forestry and started work with the USDA Forest Service in
Oregon that included looking for trees resistant to white pine blister
rust. He developed an interest in tree genetics that led him to
Yale School of Forestry where he completed an M.F. in forest genetics
and ecology in 1966, and then to Michigan State University where
he completed a Ph.D. in forest genetics and plant breeding in 1969.
In 1970 he began his career as a research geneticist with the USDA
Agricultural Research Service in Ohio and later worked at the USDA’s
National Arboretum facility in Maryland. His responsibilities have
included the improvement of urban trees such as elm, red maple,
spruce, and alder. His work in developing a disease-resistant elm
captured national attention. He started by making scores of controlled
pollinations between European and Asiatic elms, germinating the
seed, growing hybrid saplings, and inoculating them with the disease-causing
fungus for the further testing of tolerance or resistance. A long-term
process of cloning and screening followed.
Townsend has developed and released nine of the ten elm cultivars
resistant to Dutch elm disease, and six red maple cultivars that
are more adaptive to urban environments. He has also conducted extensive
research on resistance of trees to insects, air pollutants, deicing
salts, and drought. He has published more than 100 scientific and
popular articles and provided leadership in various professional
organizations including the International Society of Arboriculture,
the Central States Forest Tree Improvement Council, the Metropolitan
Tree Improvement Alliance, the Save the Elms Task Force, and Elm
Watch. Several of his elm cultivars have been planted at Penn State’s
University Park campus.
Townsend is a member of Xi Sigma Pi (forestry honor society) and
Gamma Sigma Delta (agricultural honor society), and has received
the 1982 Award for Arboricultural Research from the International
Society of Arboriculture, a 1996 Certificate of Merit from the USDA
Agricultural Research Service, a 1997 Jackson Dawson Memorial Medal
from the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, and a 1999 Honor Award
from the Secretary of Agriculture. BACK
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Richard
G. “Dick” Wallace earned his B.S. in forestry
in 1956. His subsequent employment as a forester with the Pennsylvania
Department of Forests and Waters was interrupted by two years of
military service. In 1960 he began a 32-year career with Hammermill
Paper Company, which became part of International Paper Company
in a 1987 merger. He held a number of positions with the company
including procurement forester; district forester; supervisor of
wood procurement, Erie operations; wood procurement manager, Wisconsin
operations; and Northern Timberlands manager. He earned the reputation
of being an effective problem solver for the company, establishing
reliable and cost-effective operations and programs wherever assigned.
In the 1980s, Wallace helped found the Northeast Petroleum-Forest
Resources Cooperative, managed by the State University of New York,
to bring together both subsurface owners (oil and gas interests)
and surface owners (forest landowners and foresters) to discuss
concerns and objectives in an open environment. Wallace served as
director of the cooperative for several years.
Also in the 1980s, Wallace convinced Hammermill management to become
a 50-percent owner of NORTIM, a new company that provided much-needed
insurance protection for loggers. As executive vice president of
NORTIM, Wallace was instrumental in developing an affordable worker’s
compensation rate. He was also helped establish the Timber Harvesting
Council (THC) of Pennsylvania, a nonprofit corporation that provided
logger training. In 1994, Wallace accepted for THC the prestigious
Three Rivers Environmental Award for excellence in advancing environmental
quality in western Pennsylvania.
Wallace’s service throughout his career includes involvement
and leadership with many forestry-related associations, committees,
and boards in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, including the Society
of American Foresters, the Pennsylvania Forestry Association, and
the School of Forest Resources Advisory Board and Alumni Group Board
of Directors. He has also been active in Rotary and Exchange clubs.
Since retiring from International Paper Company in 1992, Wallace
has been active as a forestry consultant. He owns and operates Wallace
and Associates, Inc. In 2004, Wallace published Building Family
Wealth by Investing in Rural Land and Trees to address “the
critical need to improve the productivity of our forests while protecting
the environment around us.” A percentage of the sale profits
are being donated to the Penn State School of Forest Resources Alumni
Fund for Teaching Excellence. BACK
TO TOP
Mark
R. Webb completed a B.S. in Forest Science in 1973 and then
worked for a year as a sales trainee for Blanchard Lumber Company
in Wayne, New Jersey, and Albany, New York. Next he was a senior
forester and land manager for Fisher and Young Lumber Company in
Titusville, Pennsylvania, for six years. After that he worked for
a year as general manager for the Endeavor Lumber Company in Ashville,
New York, and in 1980 became a consulting forester and partner in
Nagy and Webb in Titusville, Pennsylvania.
In 1993 he started his own consulting business in Union City,
Pennsylvania, and has been the owner of Mark R. Webb & Co. ever
since. His company offers forest management services for both private
and industrial clients. Services include complete timber sale management,
appraisals and inventories, erosion and sedimentation control plans,
forest stewardship plans, and American Tree Farm inspections. His
company’s work has been featured in Forbes Magazine and the
Case Study for Sustainable Forestry by the MacArthur Foundation.
Webb was elected Fellow in the Society of American Foresters (SAF)
in 2000 and has been a Certified Forester since 1996. He has served
SAF in various leadership positions in the Plateau Chapter, the
Pennsylvania Division, the Allegheny Society, and the House of Society
Delegates. He is a member of the Association of Consulting Foresters
and has been a regional director and chapter chair in that organization
as well. He has served on the editorial board for the Consultant
magazine. He is a charter member of the Pennsylvania Council of
Professional Foresters and also served as chairman of that group
for two years. His other state-level activities include the Pennsylvania
State Committee – Sustainable Forestry Initiative, the Pennsylvania
Rural Development Council Committee on Forest Taxation, the Penn
State Forest Issues Working Group, and the Best Management Practices
for Silviculture Working Group.
Webb served Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences
Alumni Association for two terms as director (1996-2002) and as
financial secretary (1999-2001). He is a student mentor in the new
College of Agricultural Sciences Alumni Society Mentoring Program.
He is a member of the School of Forest Resources Advisory Committee.
Webb is also a member of Tau Phi Delta and has served in several
capacities in that fraternity, including board member and past president.
He is a life member of the Penn State Alumni Association.
Webb and his wife Blare are members of the First United Methodist
Church of Union City. They serve on various committees within the
church; both sing in the adult choir and Webb also rings in the
hand bell choir. He is a member and past King Lion of the local
Lions Club and has served as a trustee of the local hospital for
fourteen years, including seven years as chair. Currently he is
chairman of the Union City Health Care Foundation and a trustee
of the St. Vincent Health System in Erie, Pennsylvania. He also
serves on the Strategic Community Vision Task Force.
Dr.
Darrel L. Williams received his B.S. degree in Forest Science
in 1973 and his M.S. degree in Forest Resources in 1974, both from
the School of Forest Resources at Penn State. His master’s
thesis, under major professor Dr. Brian Turner, focused on computer
analysis and mapping of gypsy moth defoliation in Pennsylvania using
data from a new satellite program called the Earth Resources Technology
Satellite, later renamed Landsat. He was recruited to NASA immediately
following attainment of his M.S. degree. While at Penn State he
was a member and two-year resident of the Alpha Zeta fraternity
-- the national agricultural and biological sciences honorary fraternity.
He was also a member of Xi Sigma Pi, the national forestry honorary
fraternity. He later earned a Ph.D. in Physical Geography from the
University of Maryland in 1989.
Williams currently serves as the Associate Chief in the Hydrospheric
and Biospheric Sciences Laboratory at NASA’s Goddard Space
Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. He continues to serve as the
Landsat Project Scientist, a position he has held since 1992. In
this position he was responsible for ensuring the scientific integrity
of the Landsat 5 and 7 missions currently in orbit. Williams also
serves as the project manager for NASA’s LBA-ECO project in
Brazil that is focused on better understanding the effects of large-scale
tropical deforestation on continental and global weather systems.
Prior to his selection as Associate Chief, Williams served as head
of the Biospheric Sciences Branch from 1991 through 2001. He began
his NASA service in 1975 as a research scientist in that same organization.
Williams served as assistant project scientist for Landsat 4 and
5 during the late 1970s and early 1980s, and as the EOS Deputy Project
Scientist during 1989-90. He has authored and coauthored more than
70 publications in the field of quantitative remote sensing. In
1991 he was named an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland,
Department of Geography.
Williams has received well over two-dozen NASA awards in a variety
of categories. Foremost among these are the NASA Medal for Outstanding
Leadership (1997) and NASA’s Exceptional Service Medal (2000).
He has also received awards from external organizations such as
the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the American Society of Photogrammetry.
He received the Aviation Week and Space Technology 1999 Laurels
Award for outstanding achievement in the field of space in recognition
of his science leadership role for the highly successful Landsat
7 mission.
Williams’ remote sensing research involved the development
of enhanced quantitative techniques for assessing forest canopy
conditions. Landsat imagery depicting some of these techniques are
on display in the “Looking at Earth from Space” room
at the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum, with acknowledgment
to Williams.
In 2002, Williams was recruited by the government of Australia to
serve as an expert reviewer of Australia’s National Carbon
Accounting System, which was developed to conduct continental-scale
assessments of carbon stocks (that is, forests) in Australia using
Landsat data.
Williams served as a member of the editorial board of the International
Journal of Remote Sensing from 1990 through 1998, and has also served
on the editorial board of the International Journal of Photogrammetry
and Remote Sensing. Williams has served as NASA science officer
for several sponsored research projects at Penn State, including
projects of Dr. Wayne Myers in the School of Forest Resources. He
has served on the advisory board for Penn State’s Environmental
Resources Research Institute (now Penn State Institutes of the Environment).
Williams has served his community as a member of the Queen Anne
School board for six years, and has coached several youth sports
teams. In 2000, he was invited by his high school alma mater, Punxsutawney
Area Senior High School, to give the commencement address to the
first graduates of the new millennium.
Dr.
James J. Zaczek is the second recipient of the School of
Forest Resources Outstanding Recent Alumni Award, created in 2002
to honor alumni who have graduated in the previous ten years. Zaczek
completed his doctoral degree in Forest Resources in 1994 under
the direction of Dr. Kim Steiner, professor of forest biology. His
dissertation focused on the cloning performance of red oak (Quercus
rubra L.).
From 1983 to 1997, Zaczek was a research assistant and then senior
research assistant in the School. He assisted other faculty and
graduate students in the design, implementation, and analyses of
projects relating to forest biology such as artificial regeneration
of forest tree species on forested and disturbed lands, and genetic
testing of forest and Christmas tree species.
In 1997, Zaczek was hired as assistant professor of forest biology
in the Department of Forestry at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale
(SIUC)—his other alma mater; he completed his B.S. and M.S.
degrees in forestry there in 1980 and 1982, respectively. In 2003
he was promoted to associate professor.
Zaczek is primary instructor of three courses at SIUC and a team
member of several others. He received the Donald M. Elkins Excellence
in Education Award in 2001 as college-wide recognition for his teaching
achievement. He also serves as faculty adviser of Xi Sigma Pi, the
forestry honor society, and as faculty fiscal officer of the SIUC
Forestry Club.
Since earning his Ph.D., he has authored 24 refereed publications
(in 13 refereed journals) and 21 other publications. Since starting
at SIUC, he has brought in 17 grants. He currently advisees six
graduate students and serves on the graduate committee of 21 additional
students.
At SIUC, Zaczek is active at the department, college, and university
levels, having chaired the department’s Peer Review Teaching
Evaluation Committee, the college’s Faculty Policy Committee,
and serving as a member of the university’s Plant Science
Ph.D. Development Committee.
His professional memberships include the Society of American Foresters,
the Association of Southeastern Biologists, and the International
Plant Propagators Society. He is a certified pesticide applicator
in Illinois as well as Pennsylvania.
Zaczek’s high personal and professional standards are fully
evident in the breadth, quality, and extent of his achievements
since his graduation in 1994. He is proving to be an exceptionally
valuable member of the faculty of Southern Illinois University. BACK
TO TOP
Keith D. Atherholt
Robert
H. “Bob” Bommer 
John
A. Byerly completed a B. S. degree in Forestry at Penn State in
1968. He served in the U.S. Army (1968-1970) and was assigned to
the 1st Cavalry Division during the Vietnam Conflict. While in graduate
school in 1970, he was inducted into Phi Epsilon Phi, a botanical
honorary fraternity.
Dr.
Phillip J. Craul earned his B.S. in forestry in 1954, his
M.S. in forestry in 1960, and his Ph.D. in agronomy in 1964, all
from Penn State. He is Emeritus Professor of Soil Science, SUNY
College of Environmental Science and Forestry, where he was a faculty
member from 1968 to 1994. For 13 years he was senior lecturer in
landscape architecture, The Graduate School of Design, Harvard University.
He was instructor in forestry at Penn State Mont Alto, 1959-1960.
Eugene "Gene" Decker earned a B.S. In Forestry in 1952 and
an M.S. in Forestry (Wildlife Management) in 1955. After various
positions in Pennsylvania, New York, Georgia, Montana, and California,
he joined the College of Natural Resources at Colorado State University
(CSU) in 1967. He was professor of wildlife biology for more than
31 years in the Department of Fishery and Wildlife Biology at CSU
where he taught courses in natural resources public relations, wildlife
management, and international wildlife resources. He retired from
CSU in January 1999 and was honored with emeritus professor status.
Bruce
M. Edwards completed a B.S. in Forest Science at Penn State
in 1971 and a master’s degree in Forest Biometrics at Colorado
State in 1973. He then worked for five years at Potlatch Corporation
in Lewiston, Idaho, as a research biometrician, helping adapt and
implement computerized stand modeling program for management planning
on the 600,000 acres of Potlatch forest in Northern Idaho. He returned
to the East in 1978 and worked for three years as a consultant forester
with Northeast Timbers Service, Inc., in Hancock, New York, providing
a wide variety of forestry services to land owners and forest products
companies.
Pamela
J. Edwards is currently a research hydrologist with the USDA
Forest Service at the Northeastern Research Station in Parsons,
West Virginia. She completed a B.S. degree in Forest Science in
1981 and MS degree in Forest Resources in 1983. While working on
her MS, she began her career with the Forest Service's Northeastern
Forest Experiment Station at University Park as a cooperative education
student. 
John
C. "Jack" Good graduated with a B.S. In Forestry in 1941 and
immediately served in the US Army. He was part of the 87th Mountain
Infantry Regiment, our country's first ski regiment. He trained
dozens of new ski troops and participated in several of the big
battles of World War II in France, Belgium, and Germany. After a
battle injury, the army retired him from service in July 1945 as
a full lieutenant and a company commander. 
James
R. Grace 
Joseph
E. Ibberson 
Alex
W. Kirnak completed his first year of college at Mont Alto
with a full scholarship from the Buhl Foundation of Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. He was awarded three additional scholarships during
his undergraduate program. Serious complications from scarlet fever
required him to complete junior and senior forestry courses during
his final year, still graduating from Penn State with honors in
1937.
Edward
F. Kocjancic earned a B.S. in Forestry in 1954. He has practiced
forestry for 45 years, 35 of which have been as a forest consultant.
He is president of Edward F. Kocjancic, Inc., a consulting firm
based in Kane, Pennsylvania, that employs a staff of eight and is
known internationally for its veneer expertise, especially black
cherry. Ed's company offers the gamut of natural resource management
services, including aerial and GIS mapping and domestic and international
marketing. 
Marc
D. Lewis graduated in 1978 with a B.S. degree in Forest
Science. He was an active member of the Mont Alto Soccer Club, Alpha
Gamma Rho, and the Forestry Society. After graduation, he entered
the family business, Dwight Lewis Lumber Company, Inc., and was
engaged in sawmill and forestry operations. This included management
planning on the company’s 16,000 acres of hardwood forest
and the upgrading of mill equipment. 
Robert
C. (Bob) McColly earned his B.S. in Forest Science from
Penn State in 1972. Upon graduation, he started his career as a
procurement forester for the Koppers Company in Salisbury, MD, and
spent time working in northern Louisiana, East Texas, and Arkansas.
In 1973, McColly worked for Mann and Parker Lumber Company in New
Freedom, PA, as a lumber purchaser before returning to Koppers Company
in early 1974. He worked for Koppers Company in the Salisbury area
until 1976, when he accepted a position as procurement manager for
L.A.Clarke and Son in Fredericksburg, VA. 
Harry
E. Murphy graduated from Penn with a B. S. degree in forestry
in 1943, after gaining experience with a summer fire-fighting branch
of the U.S. Forest Service. With World War II ongoing, Murphy enlisted
in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and was assigned to the Transportation
Corps in England. In his free time, to temporarily escape the war,
he pursued his lifelong passion for plants and the natural world
by earning a "Technical Certificate" from the Royal Botanical
Gardens at Kew. 
James C. Nelson 
W. R. "Dick" Rossman 
Robert
H. Rumpf earned a B.S. in Forestry in 1949. He began his career
with the Pennsylvania Department of Forests and Waters, filling
several assignments between 1949 and 1953, including a tour in the
U.S. Army. After earning a master of forestry degree at Duke University
in 1954, he joined The Glatfelter Pulp Wood Company in Virginia.
David
L. Spencer, class of '37, died in February 2000 at the age of
84. He was born near Philadelphia in 1915. 
John
T. Steimer earned his B.S. degree in forestry in 1949.
He was employed for five years as a forester for the Pennsylvania
Department of Highways, and on weekends he worked as a forestry
consultant. In 1955 he decided to help the family business, the
Penn Glenn Oil Company, after his father-in-law died. He thought
he would go back to forestry, but business was so successful that
he founded a sister company, Industrial Terminal Systems Inc. of
New Kensington, that packaged petroleum products and chemicals.
Alden "Denny" Townsend
Richard
G. “Dick” Wallace earned his B.S. in forestry
in 1956. His subsequent employment as a forester with the Pennsylvania
Department of Forests and Waters was interrupted by two years of
military service. In 1960 he began a 32-year career with Hammermill
Paper Company, which became part of International Paper Company
in a 1987 merger. He held a number of positions with the company
including procurement forester; district forester; supervisor of
wood procurement, Erie operations; wood procurement manager, Wisconsin
operations; and Northern Timberlands manager. He earned the reputation
of being an effective problem solver for the company, establishing
reliable and cost-effective operations and programs wherever assigned.
Mark
R. Webb
Dr.
Darrel L. Williams received his B.S. degree in Forest Science
in 1973 and his M.S. degree in Forest Resources in 1974, both from
the School of Forest Resources at Penn State. His master’s
thesis, under major professor Dr. Brian Turner, focused on computer
analysis and mapping of gypsy moth defoliation in Pennsylvania using
data from a new satellite program called the Earth Resources Technology
Satellite, later renamed Landsat. He was recruited to NASA immediately
following attainment of his M.S. degree. While at Penn State he
was a member and two-year resident of the Alpha Zeta fraternity
-- the national agricultural and biological sciences honorary fraternity.
He was also a member of Xi Sigma Pi, the national forestry honorary
fraternity. He later earned a Ph.D. in Physical Geography from the
University of Maryland in 1989.
Dr.
James J. Zaczek is the second recipient of the School of
Forest Resources Outstanding Recent Alumni Award, created in 2002
to honor alumni who have graduated in the previous ten years. Zaczek
completed his doctoral degree in Forest Resources in 1994 under
the direction of Dr. Kim Steiner, professor of forest biology. His
dissertation focused on the cloning performance of red oak (Quercus
rubra L.).