A History of the Six Rivers National Forest... Commemorating the First 50 Years

One example of the changed context that influenced the course of Six Rivers' history is the transformation of Gasquet Ranger District from a ranger district to a National Recreation Area. It is a story deserving of a book, but an outline of events will show that, by the 1960s, the Forest Service and the Six Rivers operated in a socio-political milieu that was deeply divergent from the one to which it had finally adjusted. That is, although the Six Rivers was conceived and matured after the custodial phase of Forest Service land management history, most of its key personnel had deep roots in that era and were steeped in its assumptions. The shift to a paradigm of maximization and intensive use was, therefore, a difficult one that took time to develop its form and substance, despite the rhetoric and hopes of the region's and forest's leadership. The Six Rivers, it seems, had no sooner come fully to grips with maximization and intensive use when the presumptions on which that paradigm was anchored were fundamentally called into question.

As the dialectic between new perspectives and new assumptions played on, a new paradigm ripened and advanced significant changes in the American social and political fabric; many of which had profound implications for the Forest Service and the Six Rivers. The environmental movement was one of the many progenies of this dialectic, and scores of legislative acts were spawned by it. A set of this legislation addressed the nation's rivers, and these had significant implications for a forest renowned for its watersheds. Born from the realization that few of California's major waterways were free of dams, hydroelectric developments, pollution, or diversions, the California Wild and Scenic Rivers Act was passed in 1972. Specifically included for conservation measures were eight rivers and their tributaries... five of them on the Six Rivers. Leading the list was the Smith, the only major watershed in California not yet dammed. Pressure was intense to protect not only the Smith River, but to include it and the surrounding area as an addition to the Redwood National Park or to created a distinct park unit with the river as it's organizing theme. In 1980, Governor Jerry Brown, well-known for his environmentalist leanings, requested the Secretary of Interior to incorporate all eight rivers in the State's wild and scenic rivers system into the national system. Just six months later, 314 miles of the Smith and its tributaries, excluding Hardscrabble Creek, were added to the national Wild and Scenic Rivers system. Efforts to make the Smith River area a national park gained steam and, in 1987, Congressman Lantos introduced a bill to study that proposal.

Six Rivers officials—perhaps with the recent taste in their mouths of having lost the Northern Redwood Purchase Unit lands to the National Park Service—recognized the changed socio-political context. Instead of digging-in its heels and insisting on managing its Smith River area under the rubric of maximization and the primacy of timber management, the Six Rivers—largely under the leadership of Supervisor Jim Davis, made a counter-proposal. This alternative took form in a bill introduced in 1990 that proposed formation of a Smith River National Recreation Area (NRA)... to be managed by the US Forest Service, not the National Park Service. Eight months after its introduction, the Smith River NRA Act passed with the charter to manage it for preservation, protection, and enhancement of the river area's recreation values. In an unusual stroke and perhaps to assuage the fears of those who thought the Forest Service would revert to its previous management practices in the Smith River watershed, a written management plan for the NRA was incorporated into the provisions of the bill. The new, 305,337-acre Smith River National Recreation Area comprised virtually all of the former Gasquet Ranger District.

The 1970s to the present were filled with conflicts and resolutions over issues that would not have been conceived of when the Six Rivers was established in 1947. For example, the concept of the preeminence of timber harvest taking a back seat to that of "forest health;" Native American religious values taking precedence over construction of a key transportation link, the Gasquet to Orleans (or G-O) Road; the expanded public role in forest decision-making; the protection of threatened or endangered non-game wildlife as a potent force in forest management; the professionalization of the Forest Service at every organizational level; the vastly expanded range of special forest uses and practices; and, perhaps most significantly, the numbers and variety of people who visit and somehow use the forest—all of these realities would have been virtually inconceivable to the Six Rivers' first Forest Supervisor, William F. Fischer.

After years in the making, the Six Rivers unveiled its Land and Resource Management Plan in 1995. One of the primary shifts apparent in the document's reflection of Forest Service policy was that of ecosystem management. Although the concept of ecosystem management had been standard since the early 1960s, its introduction into the Forest Service as a central policy and organizing principle—as a new paradigm—flowered in the early 1990s. The Six Rivers, historically a prime timber producing forest, refocused from optimizing tree growth for timber production to maintaining healthy ecosystems: "Tree growth will continue to be optimized when it does not conflict with ecosystem health." Land was reclassified for its capability, availability, and tentative suitability for timber production, and only those lands meeting specified thresholds were identified to be managed for timber outputs and to be included in the calculation of allowable sale quantity. Given these sideboards, about 9 percent of the Forest's 988,470 acres were capable, available and tentatively suitable for timber production. The primary harvest methods, too, had shifted toward greater use of aerial yarding and an expanded role for helicopters in removing logs; use of cable yarding and ground skidding declined.

Down precipitously from the boom days of the 1960s, the target long term sustained annual yield was projected at just under 15,500,000 board feet for the coming decade. Under the ecosystem umbrella, the Six Rivers' forest management goals also mirrored fundamental changes in perspectives and priorities, with biodiversity and ecosystem health, customer service, and participative management being the foundational underpinnings (USDA, FS 1995: III 14-15, IV 1-2, 6).

As "working circles" were the planning units when the Six Rivers was created, the 1990s developed "management areas." Divided into 17 management areas, the Six Rivers developed unique prescriptions to be applied to reach a desired future condition. The list of management areas reflects the fundamental changes from the timber-oriented working circles concept: wilderness, wild river, experimental forest, Humboldt Nursery, Research Natural Area, Native American Contemporary Use Area, Smith River National Recreation Area, special habitat area, and general forest—to name just 9. Thus, the areas are defined by the primary use and, therefore, the management practices they have in common rather than by the assumption that the primary emphasis is on timber production with other uses being expressed as constraints or opportunities within the framework of timber production.

Historical moments, such as fiftieth anniversaries or an imminent millennium tend to provoke thinking about our past, its meaning, and its ramifications for our future. By the time of the Six Rivers' hundredth anniversary, historical perspective will have allowed not only for a better account of the first 25 years, but also for a sharpened focus on the transition into the third era of the Six Rivers' past and a clearer perception of the shape which that transition ultimately takes. Fundamental organizational questions being asked today of both the agency and of the Six Rivers National Forest will have receded or been resolved and new issues defined—questions such as: Will the Forest Service still exist as an entity, or will it become part of a mega, resource management agency? Will the Six Rivers persist as an entity, or will its work be contracted to various, specialized, private firms? Will the national forest system persist, or will it be broken-up and managed by private business? All of these possibilities have been seriously considered by Congress over the past two years, and more propositions are sure to form in the future.

A 1977 field trip to the Siskiyou Mountains with Senator Hayakawa and various environmental groups. The Forest Service, by the 1960s, managed the land in a social and political climate that was vastly different from the postwar climate into which it was born. US Forest Service photo