Yesterday I got over to the World Forestry Center/Discovery Museum. Overall it is a nice museum but if you have been watching the battle with the big forest industries for last 50 years you see the propaganda everywhere. Now I have a love-hate relationship with the timber industry. I have worked house construction so I love my 2x4s but I also love our large natural forested areas and sustainability. I hate when the forest industry works to “get the cut out” and make as much profit as it can and leaves hills baron eco disaster areas and never replant (this happened a lot 50 years ago). The museum portrays the timber industry as the great friends of the environment. When they harvest timber it is only done in an eco friendly way with sustainability in mind. If you have been around for more than a half century you know they only portray this role because they are force to by hard won laws that make them do it. The museum portrays a picture of forest and logging today and is better then 50 years ago. But we also know if you turn your back on the timber industry for on second and they will be back to their scorched earth policies.
So I am trying to stay objective on adding the forest museum to the website. The museum has good information that is presented in a modern, attractive way and with good interactivity of kids. For folks who haven’t been through the eco battles they may think everything they see is all facts and the only way things can be done. I hope folks visit the museum but I also hope they question what they hear and see and ask why are there almost no 350 year old trees any more and is this the only way. There are getting be other ways of doing things that are not business as usual. In my “when timber was king” tour I am trying give a complete story. This museum will be part of it but just one part.
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