World Forestry Center

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Forestry Center Main building

The World Forestry Center (WFC) is an American nonprofit educational institution located in Portland, Oregon's Washington Park, near the Oregon Zoo.

1 History
2 Programs
- 2.1 The Forestry Hall of Fame
3 References
4 External links

[edit] History

Forestry Building circa 1920

The World Forestry Center has its roots in the 1905 Lewis and Clark Centennial American Pacific Exposition and Oriental Fair for which an enormous log cabin was built of huge native trees and advertised as the world's largest.^[1] Public interest in the Forestry Building, which was turned over to the State of Oregon, lasted long after the exposition ended, right up until it was destroyed by fire on August 17, 1964.^[2]

The day after the fire, a group of civic and industry leaders conceived The Western Forestry Center.^{[citation needed]} A new, less flammable forestry building designed by Oregon architect John Storrs was built in Washington Park.^{[citation needed]} It opened to the public on June 5, 1971. The name changed to "World Forestry Center" in 1986 to reflect the center's revised focus on forestry on a global scale.^[2]

On June 30, 2005, after a $7 million, 6-month renovation, the 20,000 square foot museum reopened with new interactive exhibits about the sustainability of forests and trees of the Pacific Northwest and the world.^[3]

[edit] Programs

The World Forestry Center's mission is to "educate and inform people about the world's forests and trees, and their importance to all life, in order to promote a balanced and sustainable future."^[4]

The WFC achieves its mission with three programs: The Discovery Museum, two donated working forests—the Magness Memorial Tree Farm and the Johnson-Swanson Tree Farm—and the World Forest Institute (WFI), which was established in 1989. The primary program of WFI is the International Fellowship Program.

The World Forestry Center campus also accommodates three other buildings: Julian N. Cheatham Hall, Harold A. Miller Hall and Harry A. Merlo Hall, which houses the WFC’s administrative offices and the World Forest Institute.^[5]

[edit] The Forestry Hall of Fame

The WFC Forestry Hall of Fame commemorates people who have made important contributions to forestry. The photographs and biographies of nearly 200 forestry leaders are displayed in three chests constructed of select Black Walnut from the eastern U.S.