Old Town demonstration forest marks 10th year

OLD TOWN – It used to bug former James River Timber Corp. Vice President Brenton S. Halsey Jr. that people didn’t understand the business of forestry, according to his widow.

So he decided to help create the James River Outdoor Classroom and Demonstration Forest in Old Town.

Several months after the project opened a decade ago, a disgruntled employee entered Halsey’s office in Southampton, Pa., and fatally shot the executive.

Afterward, the demonstration forest was dedicated in Halsey’s memory. This year marks its 10th anniversary, which was celebrated Tuesday with a ceremony at the forest.

The forest is an extension of Halsey himself, said his widow, Corell Halsey-Moore.

“He loved this project,” she said in a letter that was read at the ceremony. “He would be thrilled to know [Stillwater Montessori teacher] Joann Alex and other teachers are teaching in his forest.”

The Brenton S. Halsey Jr. Memorial Outdoor Classroom and Demonstration Forest is located on a 10-acre site just off U.S. Route 2 in Old Town and is now overseen by the Georgia-Pacific Corp. The facility incorporates several outdoor classrooms and various interconnecting trails into an educational setting designed to teach people about forest-management practices.

For example, a portion of the forest was thinned a decade ago and now the results can be examined, University of Maine College of Forestry professor Alan Kimball said.

“The object is to show kids how fast a forest grows,” he said. “And how easy it is to direct growth. Pine is like a good dog – it responds well. In the back corner the [unthinned] trees are about one-third of the size.”

Wood-chip trails lead past sites that demonstrate various tree-harvesting techniques, such as clear-cutting and crown-cutting.

Clear-cutting in the 1980s “put a dark shadow on everything that was done in the forest,” said Bruce Brockway, Halsey’s former co-worker and friend. He said the demonstration forest also showed industry leaders various options.

“Brent was not a forester,” said Brockway. “He believed strongly in conservation and forest management. He was looking for a way to demonstrate forest management.”

The demonstration forest also was established to bolster Project Learning Tree, said Barry Burgason, wildlife biologist for Huber Resource Corp., who works with PLT, a nationwide environmental education program.

“We teach the kids how to think, not what to think,” he said. “We lay the facts out and the kids get to develop which way to go.”

The Stillwater Montessori School has been a partner with the demonstration forest since the beginning, said Alex. Around 16 Montessori pupils helped to refurbish the wildlife garden portion of the demonstration forest with the help of a $500 National Geographic Society grant.

“A wildlife garden is an area dedicated to making a good habitat for animals,” 10-year-old volunteer Norah Bird said.

The pupils cut brush, planted plants, cleared trails and made maps of the garden.

The 10-year anniversary of the forest is a great time to remember Halsey’s ideas.

“He was a young man with tremendous vision,” said Brockway. “It was the first actual outdoor demonstration forest classroom in the nation. This is really a tribute to him.”

Brockway is also a board member for the Orono Land Trust, which oversees the property, and is treasurer of the memorial fund set up in Halsey’s name to maintain the demonstration forest.