Studying Appalachian Forestry - The Morgantown Laboratory

By Jody Brumage

Early in his senatorial career, Robert C. Byrd recognized the potential benefits of expanding the role of the U.S. Forest Service in West Virginia as both a means of supporting conservation, recreation, and the state's timber industry. While the forest service had been a presence in the state since 1915 when the first tract of land was purchased for the future Monongahela National Forest, the agency's activity in the state greatly increased in the early-1960s. In an earlier blog post, we discussed the Forest Products Marketing Laboratory built during Senator Byrd's first term in the U.S. Senate in Princeton, West Virginia. This week's blog looks at a second laboratory, built in Morgantown in 1967.

Senator Byrd and Dr. Ralph Marquis, director of the U.S. Forest Service Northeastern Forest Experimental Station review plans for the Morgantown Laboratory in his office in June 1965.

Prior to the creation of the Morgantown Laboratory, West Virginia University initiated a program in forest engineering, the study of balancing environmental conservation with land uses such as timber extraction or recreation. As the chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on the Interior, Senator Byrd was in a unique position to secure funding for this program, obtaining $400.000 in 1965 to boost West Virginia University's forest engineering research program and an additional $220,000 to study the construction of a new Forest Service Laboratory to assume leadership over the study. The proposed laboratory was green-lighted following the study and Senator Byrd turned his attention to gaining funding for construction. An initial amendment which was intended to authorize funding for construction failed when it was struck from the bill during House Appropriations Committee mark-up sessions. However, Senator Byrd followed this effort by pursuing the funding through the newly-authorized Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC). This attempt proved successful and Senator Byrd secured $468,000.00 in 1966. As a result of this action, the Forestry Sciences Engineering Laboratory at Morgantown was among the first of many projects Senator Byrd funded through the ARC.  

Senator Byrd (center) with Homer Parker (left), the project lead for the Engineering study and another Forest Service official at the dedication of the Morgantown Laboratory on September 23, 1967.

At the dedication of the new laboratory in 1967, Senator Byrd delivered a speech during which he stated "I know the work being done at these three laboratories [Princeton, Parsons, and Morgantown] will insure continued healthy forest growth." The scientists at the Morgantown laboratory worked mainly in two areas of research: forest engineering, including ways to improve the logging industry in ways that would be less harmful to the environment and more conducive to forest regeneration; and wildlife habitat management, seeking to maximize natural resources for wildlife that were threatened by damaging logging activities. Some of this research continues to be done at Morgantown today, while the laboratory also studies the mitigation of invasive species in forest lands as well as other areas of research and development.

The U.S. Forest Service continues to maintain an important presence in the state, through its administration of the Monongahela, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson National Forests, its laboratories, fish hatcheries, national recreation areas, and the Fernow Experimental Forest.