The Long Run · Episode 1 of 7 · 23 min
The Greatest Good? How the Forest Service Promised to Manage Public Land
A century ago the U.S. Forest Service promised to manage public land for "the greatest good of the greatest number in the long run." This opening episode sets the test: Gifford Pinchot and the agency's 1905 birth, the "Land of Many Uses" motto, the two agencies that hand out grazing permits across 240 million acres, and the hardest clause in the promise, in the long run.
Who's who
- Gifford Pinchot+12 more episodesFirst Chief of the Forest Service and author of the founding creed
- Theodore Roosevelt+14 more episodesPresident who signed the 1905 Transfer Act and backed conservation
- James Wilson+2 more episodesSecretary of Agriculture who signed the 1905 Wilson Letter
- W J McGeeConservation theorist Pinchot credited as the movement's intellectual architect
- Doug Burgum+3 more episodesInterior Secretary who signed the 2026 grazing memorandum
- Brooke Rollins+4 more episodesAgriculture Secretary who signed the 2026 grazing memorandum
Timeline
- February 1905Roosevelt signs the Transfer Act moving the forest reserves to Agriculture; the Wilson Letter sets out the creed
- March 1905Bureau of Forestry renamed the U.S. Forest Service with Pinchot as first Chief
- 1934Taylor Grazing Act closes the open range and creates grazing districts and permits
- 1946Bureau of Land Management created by merging the Grazing Service and General Land Office
- 1960Multiple-Use Sustained-Yield Act lists grazing among coequal uses
- March 2026Interior and Agriculture sign a memorandum affirming no net loss of grazing Animal Unit Months
Still debated
Historians attribute the 1905 Wilson Letter largely to Pinchot, but that is a scholarly consensus rather than a signed confession. The origin of the phrase "in the long run" comes substantially through Pinchot's own later account, and the first use of the "Land of Many Uses" motto is not cleanly dated.
Connected episodes in other series
The Big Burn of 1910 and the War on All WildfireThe Fire This Time · Episode 5Also features Gifford Pinchot, Theodore Roosevelt
Selling Off the West: The 2025-26 Fight Over America's Public LandsThe Uncosted West · Episode 15Also features Brooke Rollins, Doug Burgum
The Greatest Good, for the Longest TimeFishing for a Solution · Episode 12Also features Gifford Pinchot, James Wilson
The Suppression BargainFire Returns to My Backyard · Episode 4Also features Theodore Roosevelt