On a Roll
State’s Lumber Industry Overcomes Mistakes of Past to Grow into Billion-Dollar Business
Jeff Fetzer
Penn Lines Contributor
For a few fleeting weeks each fall, the forests of Pennsylvania ignite in a fiery display of crimson, orange, gold, and bronze before the elements — wind, rain and time — extinguish the blazing autumnal display.
It’s part of a cycle of renewal, a seasonal pause before the woods come alive again in the spring.
But about a century ago, the Pennsylvania hillsides, valleys and ridges weren’t just bare for a season; they were devastated for decades.
During Pennsylvania’s lumber boom in the mid-1800s to early 1900s, the state’s vast stands of towering old-growth forests were felled at a dizzying pace. This left behind a desolate landscape, environmental degradation and communities scrambling to adjust to the loss of population and jobs after the timber companies moved on.
Yet, just as trees sprout new growth each spring, Pennsylvania’s forests overcame the indiscriminate logging activities of the past and have gone on to flourish. Today, the Keystone State houses the most abundant hardwood forests in the nation and has been the top producer of hardwood lumber and exports in the United States for many years.
But it’s taken a lot of work to get there — and keep it that way. While on this journey, those tasked with managing the forests — everyone from state agencies to private landowners — have had to overcome misconceptions deeply rooted in the past as they work to preserve the state’s forests for the future.
“No other state has the sheer volume of hardwoods that we have and the diversity of the species we have,” says Jonathan Geyer, executive director of the Pennsylvania Hardwoods Development Council. “Pennsylvania also has some of the highest quality hardwoods, not just in the U.S., but in the world.”
State Forester Seth Cassell agrees: “Our forests are really the fabric of Pennsylvania. They are the fabric of our history, but also a big part of our future. Our forests provide so much to Pennsylvania: clean air, clean water, wildlife habitat, scenic beauty, places to recreate. And they’re not just nice to have; they’re really important to our economy, too.”
A NEW GENERATION OF LOGGERS: Dan Wettlaufer bucks tulip poplar logs harvested on private property in Lycoming County. Second-generation loggers, Dan and his brother, Brian, members of Sullivan County Rural Electric Cooperative, co-own Dennis Wettlaufer Logging of Muncy Valley, which has provided contract logging services for Dwight Lewis Lumber for decades. (Photo by Jeff Fetzer)
'Wood is good'
Pennsylvania is home to more than 16.6 million acres of forestland — nearly 60% of the state’s land area — and more than 90% of the trees within those forests are hardwood species, including an abundance of black cherry, maple and oak.
According to a 2018 economic impact study, the forest products industry employs about 65,000 Pennsylvanians, which is close to 10% of the state’s manufacturing workforce, and has a $21 billion direct impact on the state’s economy annually.
“We are an industry that has employees in every single county in Pennsylvania,” Geyer says. In his role with the Hardwoods Development Council, a bureau within the state Department of Agriculture, Geyer’s focus is on developing, expanding and promoting the hardwoods industry.
“The future of our forest is dependent on the forest market,” Geyer says. “If people understand that using wood improves forest health, and we increase our use of wood, our forests will be in fantastic shape for the future.”
He explains that modern sustainable forestry practices provide a continuous timber resource, while also creating habitat for wildlife, cleansing the air, protecting waterways, and providing recreational opportunities enjoyed by leaf-peepers, hikers, bikers, birders, and hunters.
“We want people to understand that wood is good,” he says. “It’s renewable. It’s sustainable. It stores carbon. We are not an industry that is just cutting down trees and leaving the forest in disarray.”
HARVESTING AND HELPING: Marc Lewis, a member of Sullivan County Rural Electric Cooperative, inspects hardwood lumber milled at Dwight Lewis Lumber in Hillsgrove. Marc and his brother, Mel, are third-generation co-owners of the business, which produces about 6 million board feet of lumber annually. (Photo by Jeff Fetzer)
Timber’s deep roots
That wasn’t the case, however, during Pennsylvania’s storied lumber boom, when its virgin white pine and hemlock forests were systematically decimated by logging, leaving much of the state devoid of mature timber stands by the 1920s.
The literal meaning of Pennsylvania is “Penn’s Wood” — “sylvan” is Latin for “of the woods” — so it’s no surprise the Commonwealth played a key role in supplying timber to help build our fledgling nation.
During the Industrial Revolution, the bulk of the industry was concentrated in Maine, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. However, as the forests of New England were depleted, the industry moved south into New York and Pennsylvania, and by the 1870s, the Commonwealth had become the top lumber-producing state in the nation. That lasted until the turn of the 20th century when the lumber boom busted, leaving behind a barren, treeless landscape and an array of environmental problems that would take the state decades to overcome.
“There were problems that we always talk about with deforestation — erosion and water quality,” says Joshua Roth, site administrator for the Pennsylvania Lumber Museum in Potter County, a region served by Tri-County Rural Electric Cooperative. “But one thing that is often overlooked is the economic problems that were created.”
He says the population of many counties in the “Big Woods” region of north-central Pennsylvania never rebounded from the collapse of the lumber industry more than a century ago.
“If you look at population data, there are not a whole lot of people who live in this area in the Northern Tier of Pennsylvania,” Roth says. “That was clearly not the case during the height of the lumber industry.”
Potter County’s population peaked in 1900, when census data shows more than 30,000 residents living there, he says. But by the 2020 Census, the county’s population dipped to 16,000.
“So twice as many people lived here in 1900, and most of those folks were employed at the local mill, or they worked in the woods, drove a locomotive, worked in a paper factory, or peeled hemlock bark,” Roth says. “And when the resource was played out, all those people had to find something else to do. They had to go where the work was, which was no longer the north-central part of Pennsylvania.”
Frequent wildfires were another vestige of the lumber boom era.
“A lot of what the western states are experiencing today with wildfires was commonplace in Pennsylvania at the turn of the 20th century,” Roth says. “And when state government finally got involved, its No. 1 mandate in terms of managing the forest was to manage it for fire control and prevention.”
FORESTRY FORESIGHT: State Forester Seth Cassell, director of the Bureau of Forestry for the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, says the founders of forestry conservation in Pennsylvania had incredible foresight. Their decisions more than a century ago built the state forest system, which today flourishes on 2.2 million acres. (Photo courtesy of the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources)
The state steps in
In 1895, Pennsylvania created the Division of Forestry within the Department of Agriculture. In addition to establishing a forest fire protection system, the new agency purchased cut-over land for reforestation and watershed protection.
“After taking all the timber off, a lot of the timber companies defaulted on their taxes,” says Cassell,w ho also is director of the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Bureau of Forestry. “The Commonwealth was able to buy those lands very cheaply, and it bought those lands to restore them.”
The land acquisitions would result in the formation of the Pennsylvania State Forest system, which today encompasses more than 2.2 million acres in 20 state forest districts.
“What amazing vision and foresight the founders of forestry conservation in Pennsylvania must have had,” Cassell says. “They traveled around the state and looked at thousands of acres that were completely harvested — hardly any trees left, silt flowing into the streams, uncontrolled fires — and they looked at that and said, ‘Hey, we should conserve this.’ ”
Cassell, who co-owns a Lycoming County hunting cabin served by Tri-County REC, says the Division of Forestry, now the Bureau of Forestry, was one of the nation’s first conservation organizations, and its efforts to manage the state’s public forest resources have been a resounding success.
The state’s scarred landscape eventually healed, regenerating into the highest-growing stock of hardwood timber in the nation. Also, the lessons learned from the indiscriminate logging practices of the past would give way to a science-based, forest-stewardship approach that today ensures the long-term health, viability, and productivity of the state’s forests.
“A big part of our work is helping landowners with their journey of managing the land … and helping them do that in a way that uses the most recent science and sustainable practices,” Cassell says, noting the vast majority of forestland in Penn’s Woods is owned by private landowners. “Our forests aren’t going to be healthy by accident: It takes people who are trained professionals, it takes loggers and people in the woods products industry, and it takes landowners who are interested in sustainable practices.”
TAKING A TOLL: Once lush with towering forests of hemlock and white pine, this barren landscape was a common sight across Pennsylvania in the aftermath of the lumber boom from the mid-1800s to early 1900s. The state’s vast forests were decimated by aggressive logging, leaving behind a stark reminder of the industry’s environmental toll before conservation and sustainable forestry practices took root. (Photo courtesy of the Pennsylvania Lumber Museum)
‘We’re the tree huggers’
Dwight Lewis Lumber in Hillsgrove has been practicing sustainable forestry on its 16,000 acres in north-central Pennsylvania for decades.
Served by Sullivan County REC in Forksville, the lumber operation began in 1941 when Gleason Lewis built a sawmill to mill lumber harvested on the family farm. Before long, the farmer-turned-businessman was purchasing timber from neighbors and selling the lumber locally. He also began acquiring tracts of forestland in Sullivan and neighboring counties. Gleason Lewis’ son, Dwight, eventually took over the operation, and his sons, Marc and Mel, now co-own the company.
Marc, a former member of the co-op’s board of directors, says he’s been involved with the family business since he was old enough to pile lumber.
When he began working at the mill full-time after graduating from Penn State in 1978, he says there were six to eight sawmills operating in the county. Dwight Lewis Lumber, which employs about 30 people, is the last one remaining. A sister company, Lewis Lumber Products, employs an additional 30-plus workers at its retail hardwood lumber and custom-moulding and mill-work facility in Lycoming County.
Marc attributes the company’s longevity to a variety of factors, including the addition of the retail lumber and custom milling business and working with conscientious logging contractors who share its commitment to professional forestry practices.
“Another thing that sets us apart is that all of our timberlands, just like all of Pennsylvania’s state forestlands, are Forest Stewardship Council-certified,” Marc says. “So annually, a third-party comes in and looks over our documentation and makes sure that we’re doing the right thing in the forest for the future.
“We pride ourselves in that we’re not destroying the land,” he adds. “Everybody thinks when you’re cutting trees you’re destroying the land, but we’re harvesting in order to have a new crop.”
And that harvesting, when done sustainably, results in a forest with a diversity of species and age classes that provide long-term benefits for wildlife and the environment, while also ensuring a continuous supply of timber.
“I think the biggest thing for people to understand is that, you know, we’re the tree huggers,” Marc says. “We’re not out there trying to cut down every tree. We care about trees and the future of our forests by managing them properly. And we’ve got a great product to sell.”
He says there are constant headwinds facing the lumber industry. For instance, Marc says, solid wood cabinetry has fallen out of favor, with homeowners favoring painted fiberboard instead.
“It’s been a pretty tough market for a while now,” he says. “Cherry has lost its flavor. It used to be cherry was king of the hardwoods. Now we get more requests for maples and oaks than we do for cherry.”
The one bright spot has been white oak, which has surged in price in recent years due to the nation’s burgeoning bourbon industry, Marc says. Bourbon is aged exclusively in charred new white oak barrels.
Still chugging along
While market trends impacting the wood-products industry tend to fluctuate, Matt Sampson, president of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association board, says the industry is facing bigger threats, including invasive species and climate change.
And it’s the job of groups like the forestry association — recognized as the nation’s oldest grassroots state organization devoted to forest conservation — and the Bureau of Forestry to monitor forest conditions and find ways to keep the land healthy and vital.
“As foresters, we’ve been trained to look at the forest, see how it’s interacting and see if there’s a treatment to help that forest grow better — sort of like doctors of the woods,” says Sampson, who has a degree in industrial forestry. “I like to say, ‘Healthy forests, healthy us.’ ”
Sampson says Pennsylvania’s forests have proven to be remarkably resilient, and he expects that will continue as long as people find a reason to care for and value them.
“For everything that they have been battered with — invasives, climate change, the deer herd — the forests are still chugging along, and we still have a viable industry,” he says. “I feel good about the state of Pennsylvania’s forests, and I feel good about the direction Pennsylvania, and everybody involved in forestry — the industry, state, federal, private landowners — are going.”
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