“Reverse Extractionism” and Overcoming Sexism: Dr. Eloise Gerry and Saving the Turpentine Industry

• In Event: Extracting Forest Knowledge: Race, Class, and Gender in Early American Forestry

Abstract

Dr. Eloise Gerry was the first female research scientist employed by the USDA Forest Service. Hired in 1910 as a microscopist and working in Madison, Wisconsin, Gerry made huge strides in wood properties research even though she was restricted to only working in the lab. She persistently argued she needed to be in the field in order to have a firmer understanding of knowledge of place, but her male supervisor and colleagues were apprehensive. Her argument won out and in 1916 she began conducting field research in the Mississippi woods on turpentine production. The traditional method for making turpentine required making a series of deep cuts into a live tree, a process that quickly killed the tree. By combining local knowledge and place-based research, Gerry discovered that by modifying their cutting methods, industry workers could both increase turpentine production and extend the life of the trees.

Gerry was then sent to New Orleans to convince industry leaders of her findings. She went door to door explaining the new method to local communities whose thinking about turpentining was entrenched—a process I call “reverse extractionism.” Despite her sex, many listened to her findings. Her recommendation is credited with saving the struggling industry.

Gerry’s story is one example of women in the Forest Service dealing with entrenched knowledge of place. Women had to work harder than men to prove their research was accurate and beneficial because lumber or forest products industry men often did not believe them. Women’s work as research scientists straddled the line of female-appropriate positions and those entering more of the masculine domain of forestry positions with brief periods of field work on the forests. It was often women’s local knowledge of place and entry into local communities that made their work not only palatable but transformational.

Author

• Rachel D Kline, Public historian, USDA Forest Service