October 24, 1919

Les Pomeroy and fellow University of Wisconsin classmate Eugene P. Connor sailed on the Monteagle from Vancouver, British Columbia, bound for Japan. With five letters of introduction, they managed to find work doing dry kiln consulting. They worked as seamen from the Philippines to Japan, China, Egypt, India, Siberia, and Italy, then across the European continent to do forestry research in France and England. Although Sierra Club founder John Muir championed forest conservation by setting aside large acreages, it was Pomeroy who devised a conservation plan for growing and harvesting timber that both conserved it and turned it into a renewable resource. His science-based management plans regenerated timberlands across the South, and he carried out his groundbreaking work in Arkansas.