TSW Honors Jim Furnish

This is the first time, as far as I know, that we’ve lost one of our own here at The Smokey Wire. Jim Furnish was always a thoughtful contributor, and his passion for our National Forests was always front and center of what he told us. I’m glad he took his time in retirement to share his views and stories with us.  He was a great supporter and friend of The Smokey Wire, where heterodox thinkers of all persuasions are welcome.

Jim spent his early career in Region 2, and here, we have an annual ceremony to honor those who have passed on each year. We have a riderless horse ceremony, plant a tree, and it used to be that the Fiddlin’ Foresters played and sang. I may be able to recreate elements of this, but not in a timely way. So I ask you to imagine it, and Dave Mertz standing in front of us, saying:

A friend of mine, Jim Furnish, a former Deputy Chief of the Forest Service and Forest Supervisor of the Siuslaw National Forest, passed away on January 11 at his home in Gila, New Mexico. He occasionally commented and wrote opinion pieces on The Smokey Wire.

I got to know Jim in 2021 when he came to the Black Hills National Forest in South Dakota to help us with some timber management issues. Blaine Cook, the BIack Hills NF Forest Silviculturist knew him from their days together on the Bighorn NF invited him and he readily accepted. I must admit, prior to meeting him back then, I didn’t really know that much about him. I knew that he had written a book Toward a Natural Forest: The Forest Service in Transition, and he had worked on the Black Hills NF at one time.

I liked Jim from the start. He was affable, knowledgeable, and more than willing to help us out. He traveled from his home at the time in Iowa just to be of assistance. He certainly had a lot of stories, and I enjoyed hearing his perspective and inside knowledge. He jumped right in here and met with the press and helped us with a public meeting. It helped to have a former Deputy Chief on our side!

Over the few days that we spent together, I came to understand where he was coming from and how he developed his beliefs on how the Forest Service was being managed. Later, I read his book and enjoyed it very much. I came to believe that I agreed with him on a number of issues, not everything, but quite a few things. I recommend his book to anyone interested in the management of National Forests. You may not agree with him, but you might be exposed to some thinking that you haven’t heard before.

After his trip to the Black Hills, he was quoted in an article of E&E News saying “I’m kind of the turd in the punchbowl.” And so he was. Within the Forest Service circles, he was probably not viewed by many as a favored son. I think he was perfectly fine with that. He brought some uncomfortable truths, and some Agency people struggled with that.

I know this, Jim was passionate about the management of National Forests and he wasn’t afraid to bring it up. To challenge the establishment. It is extremely rare for a retired, Senior FS employee to speak out about things they think the FS is doing wrong, but he was willing to do that. Agree with him or not, at least he was out there trying to improve things. After he was here in 2021, he kept in touch and helped us with several efforts. I feel fortunate to have met Jim and gotten to know him. Rest in peace, Jim.

More information about him is in his obituary here.

A memorial service is being planned for the Spring in Iowa City, Iowa. For more information or to send remembrances, contact the family at [email protected]. Memorial contributions can be made to the “James Furnish Scholarship in Forestry (fund 2705130)” at the Iowa State University Foundation. Online giving can be made via www.foundation.iastate.edu/giveonline

To send flowers to the family or plant a tree in memory of James “Jim” Richards Furnish, please visit our floral store.

You can also leave a memory on the Tribute wall.

As for me, when you get to be a certain age, it’s clear that we are on a downhill trail from the high country to the Home Ranch.  It can be steeper or more gradual, and the trail can be longer or shorter, but the destination is not in doubt. I’ll see you there, Jim!

Please feel free to share your own memories in the comments.

17 thoughts on “TSW Honors Jim Furnish”

  1. I never met him, but as my career progressed I realized how much of how I understand forest management came from him. We are all poorer for his passing.

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  2. Jim became an icon and an unsung hero for me after I read his revealing memoir, “Toward a Natural Forest: The Forest Service in Transition,” co-authored with another hero of mine, Char Miller.

    In his memoir, Jim acknowledged the fundamental human drive to gain sustenance from the earth, but he also believed that we need not destroy the earth in the process. Drawing on [his] personal experience and broad professional knowledge, Jim embodied the highest potential of the USFS to provide strong leadership in a wider, global conservation effort. “Those who are interested in our public lands — environmentalists, natural resource professionals, academics, and historians — will find Jim Furnish’s story deeply informed, thought-provoking, and ultimately inspiring.”

    I’m thankful that Jim expressed his wisdom on many issues discussed on TSW, and I welcomed his perspective and support of some of my own comments. I only wish that I could have met him in person; he seemed like a personable and authentic fellow who cared a lot about the important things in life (i.e. family, faith, and sustainable ecological stewardship through restraint of industrial/commercial exploitation). RIP, Mr. Furnish. In these times, we need more voices like yours.

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  3. I only met Jim Furnish personally once that I recall, at a small party in Corvallis, Oregon. That was a little over 20 years ago, but we have butted heads from time to time since he was Supervisor on the Siuslaw NF in the 1990s. And most recently, here on The Smokey Wire, just weeks ago.

    Jim and I were usually at polar opposites on our viewpoints regarding forest management and wildlife policies, and sometimes our words got a little salty, but there has always been a willingness to engage and discuss our differences, and to respect each other’s viewpoints. That was the same when we met, and he was on assignment from DC. Friendly, cordial, mixed with pleasant banter and unflinching opposite perspectives.

    I had no idea he was so ill, and it is further testament to his life that he remained active and involved until the end. And actually, there were things we did agree on from time to time, most recently here on The Smokey Wire. He will definitely be missed.

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  4. Sad news; a respected conservationist. I didn’t know him personally but enjoyed discussing opinions on TSW. Rest in Peace, Jim, down from the High Country, indeed….

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  5. A shock to the eyes. That’s the only way to put it. I’ve just returned from a trip to my treasured Black Hills of South Dakota and found them stripped to the bone, the lovely ponderosa pines sent down the road to make boards, and lots of them. In my 35-year career with the U.S. Forest Service, including three years as deputy chief, I’ve been to almost all our 125 national forests and have rarely seen anything so unnecessary and damaging. And so heartbreaking. The Black Hills is a prime example of an ugly, out-of-control debacle in forestry gone wrong. [Furnish, Forest Service putting national forests in peril]

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  6. Toward a Natural Forest – The Forest Service in Transition: This memoir by Jim Furnish speaks elegantly of how much the Forest Service has changed during our lives. It is a concise memoir echoing the dramatic changes we experienced in our own careers by a leader who recognized the challenges the agency was facing as his own career advanced from that of a forestry technician to Deputy Chief. He was willing to take risks and stepped into a leadership role in helping the agency renew its soul during a time of dramatic change.

    Although I had heard of him, I never personally met him, but in reading his memoir, I found he praised many men and women with whom we both had worked with over the years. Most of all his book offers faith that the agency can continue to evolve by developing the leadership to continue to redefine itself. Only then can it continue to play a critical role in helping conserve our public lands as climate change challenges many of our basic assumptions in the century ahead.

    I hope other active and retired Forest Service personnel take the time to seek out a copy ( I found mine hidden among new nonfiction books at the Deschutes county library). You will find it a refreshingly worth while read!

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  7. I first met Jim circa mid 1990s when he was Siuslaw forest supervisor. Immediately, I knew this guy was different. The Siuslaw had recently suffered a major winter storm event that triggered a bunch of landslides, many related to its logging-legacy roads. Some forest supervisors might have swept the landslide damage under the carpet. Not Jim. He saw the event as an opportunity to champion his vision, encapsulated in a documentary he features in — “Torrents of Change” — for pivoting the Siuslaw away from clearcutting and towards watershed and salmon restoration. The esprit de corps he created among the Siuslaw’s staff for this new mission was inspiring to witness. Jim expanded on his land ethic in “Seeing the Forest,” a documentary released in 2015, in which he returns to the Siuslaw to discuss lessons learned with his successor.

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  8. I didn’t want to post again but Sharon, if this is original it is one of the best tributes I have ever read! Just wow!!!

    “As for me, when you get to be a certain age, it’s clear that we are on a downhill trail from the high country to the Home Ranch. It can be steeper or more gradual, and the trail can be longer or shorter, but the destination is not in doubt. I’ll see you there, Jim!”

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    • Yup, that was me. Thanks.. I’m around people much better than I am at writing this kind of stuff, to the extent that I’m kind of fearful of dipping my toe in that water. The angels were whispering to me, no doubt.

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  9. I was shocked to learn of Jim’s passing while I was traveling to the funeral of my younger sister, who died suddenly Jan. 7. The road in the rearview mirror is indeed longer than the one ahead.

    I will miss Jim’s insightful comments on this site. With some of the more heated topics on FS management, I’d wonder “what will Furnish have to say about that one?” It was always interesting, full of historic detail.

    I met Jim in 2001, when I was plucked from a ranger district on the Kaibab National Forest to head up the Recreation Fee (Demo at the time) program in DC and he was Deputy Chief. My Forest Supervisor was the late, great Conny Frisch, who had been a district ranger for him on the Siuslaw and she thought well of him. Jim was controversial because he had leapfrogged into the Deputy Chief position during the Clinton Administration. People were suspicious of him and his ideas. I was a political junkie but wide-eyed to the ways of Washington.

    Jim took me under his wing as a supporter of the Rec Fee program (and, I believe, for the Conny connection). My first trip within weeks of arriving in DC was to southern California alone with him. I couldn’t imagine why a Deputy Chief wanted to travel with just me and honestly, was suspicious of his intentions. But he was truly interested in coaching me into the job and helping the program. That was a tough assignment because SoCal implemented the program in a way that was hurting our ability to get permanent authorization nationally. No other leaders in DC really liked the idea of Rec Fees and left we out to hang when tough decisions had to be made. Jim didn’t last long into the new Bush administration, but he kept in touch. Once when we won an important court case he urged me to declare victory. “We don’t celebrate our wins enough” he said. Somewhere there is a news quote of me declaring victory in that case. I never forgot it. We made a lot of changes across the agency, eventually winning the permanent program and today I’m delighted that many people have no memory of those controversial days.

    After I retired from the National Forests in Florida, Jim published his book “Toward a Natural Forest” and came to Tallahassee to promote it. He remembered me and was as kind and thoughtful as ever. I was thrilled for him that he found new love and adventures in Gila, NM. For some reason, it seemed he would always be there. I was surprised that he was 79 years old, as he seemed much younger. An interesting, impactful life. Thank you, Jim.

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