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Gifford Pinchot

Gifford Pinchot
Artist
Pirie MacDonald, 27 Jan 1867 - 22 Apr 1942
Sitter
Gifford Pinchot, 11 Aug 1865 - 04 Oct 1946
Date
1909
Type
Photograph
Medium
Platinum print
Dimensions
Image/Sheet: 22.5 x 15.1cm (8 7/8 x 5 15/16")
Mount: 38.6 x 28cm (15 3/16 x 11")
Mat: 55.9 x 40.6cm (22 x 16")
Topic
Gifford Pinchot: Male
Gifford Pinchot: Society and Social Change\Reformer\Environmentalist
Gifford Pinchot: Politics and Government\Governor\Pennsylvania
Gifford Pinchot: Natural Resource Occupations\Forester
Portrait
Credit Line
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Drake Morey and the Morey Family
Restrictions & Rights
CC0
Object number
S/NPG.2002.378
Exhibition Label
Gifford Pinchot was the first professional forester in the United States and a key voice for environmental conservation at the turn of the twentieth century. As the head of the Division of Forestry (1898–1905) and later the newly created U.S. Forest Service (1905– 10), he charted a path between preservationists, who wanted wilderness lands to be set aside, and business leaders, who wanted unlimited access to extract resources. Pinchot viewed the environment as a resource that must be sustainably managed by the government for “the greatest good to the greatest number for the longest time.”
Distressed by the large-scale destruction of trees under industrialization, he wielded the power of the press to persuade the public to support conservation. A key political ally of President Theodore Roosevelt, Pinchot helped designate nearly 150 million acres of national forests and established the authority of the Forest Service to regulate them.
Gifford Pinchot fue el primer silvicultor profesional de EE.UU. y una voz clave de la conservación am biental en los umbrales del siglo XX. Como director de la División de Silvicultura (1898–1905) y luego del recién creado Servicio Forestal de EE.UU. (1905–10), trazó un nuevo camino entre los conservacionistas, quienes querían que se reservaran las áreas salvajes, y los líderes empresariales, quienes querían acceso ilimitado para extraer recursos. Pinchot veía el ambiente como un recurso que el gobierno debía manejar de manera sostenible para “el mayor bene ficio del mayor número de personas por el mayor tiempo posible”.
Preocupado por la destrucción masiva de árboles a causa de la industrialización, Pinchot aprovechó el poder de la prensa para persuadir al público de que apoyara la conservación. Como gran aliado político del presidente Theodore Roosevelt, promovió la designación de casi 150 millones de acres de bosques nacionales y estableció la autoridad del Servicio Forestal para regularlos.
Data Source
National Portrait Gallery
Exhibition
Forces of Nature: Voices that Shaped Environmentalism
On View
NPG, North Gallery 220