the last stand
In his book, The Last Stand, David Harris vividly documents the events leading up to, and directly following, the hostile takeover of Pacific Lumber. Harris presents the heartrending story of a logging company whose noble ideals were corrupted by the sudden influx of greed. Prior to Charles Hurwitz's company Maxxam gaining control, Pacific Lumber viewed the principles of "selective cut" and "sustainable yield" as practically sacred. Afterwards the company reversed these policies that had become almost synonymous with its name, solely for the purpose of maximizing profit. While some might argue that the reversal of these policies, and the transition to "modern forestry" was inevitable, this viewpoint is extremely fallible. The basic principles of selective cut and sustainable yield are in utter opposition to everything that the logging industry has come to represent over the course of the last century. PL was a different kind of logging company. Selective cutting, a policy first set forth by Albert Stanwood Murphy, meant "PL cut a maximum of 70 percent of the mature trees in a stan
------------------------------------------------------------------------ d" (Harris, page 16). PL's practice was such a drastic change from the industry standard of leaving hillsides completely barren that, "it was often difficult for the untrained observer to realize... that the company's selectively cut acreage had even been touched" (pages, 16-17). Sustainable yield, another Albert Murphy implementation, also represented a striking difference between how PL and the rest of the industry did business. While many companies would routinely cut all of their timber and promptly go out of business, PL's "annual cut would always be limited and never exceed its timberlands' new growth" (page ! uld possibly transform Scotia into a ghost town in a mere matter of decades. The argument that PL would have eventually reverted to the policy of clear cutting without intervention is hardly defendable. At one point near the beginning of the book, during a meeting of PL's board of directors, Bob Stephenson PL's forest manager, presented a proposal that included some limited plans for clear cutt
Some common words found in the essay are:
Pacific Lumber, Albert Murphy, PL Hurwitz, Stanwood Murphy, Warren Murphy, PL Indians, Stephenson PL's, Lumber Harris, William Cronon, David Harris, sustainable yield, pacific lumber, selective cut sustainable, cut sustainable, selective cut, principles selective, principles selective cut, logging company, cut sustainable yield, selective cutting,
Approximate Word count = 738
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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