Pennsylvania State Forest Academy
Mont Alto, Franklin County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
The Commonwealth's first forestry school was established here at Mont Alto in 1903; named the State Forest Academy in 1905. In 1929, it merged with Pennsylvania State College; later Pennsylvania State University. Joseph T. Rothrock, the Commonwealth's first Forestry Commissioner, and Mira Lloyd Dock, noted activist and conservationist, were among its founders.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
When conservation was still a new idea in America, Pennsylvania opened its first forestry school here at Mont Alto in 1903, formally named the State Forest Academy two years later. Its founders included Joseph Rothrock, the state's first Forestry Commissioner, and the activist Mira Lloyd Dock, both leaders in the movement to reclaim lands stripped bare by logging. In 1929 the academy merged into what became Pennsylvania State University.
Why it matters
The school trained the foresters who restored Pennsylvania's ravaged woodlands, part of the Progressive-era conservation movement that reshaped how Americans steward their natural resources.
Plan your visit
NearbyMake a day of it — museums, food, and places to stay near this marker.
Museums & culture
- Monterey Pass Battlefield Museum7.9 mi away
- Frederick County Fire Museum14.9 mi away · 300 South Seton Avenue, Emmitsburg, MD
Attractions
- Sachs Covered Bridge14.5 mi away · Waterworks Road, Gettysburg, PA
- Sachs Covered Bridge14.5 mi away
- John Eisenhower Bridge14.9 mi away · Waterworks Road
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Related people
- · Joseph T. Rothrock
- · Mira Lloyd Dock
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Ralph Elwood Brock (1883-1959)
Mont Alto, PA · est. 2003
A member of the State Forest Academy's original class of 1906, Ralph Elwood Brock became the school's first African American graduate and a protégé of the pioneering forester J.T. Rothrock. He ran the Mont Alto State Forest Nursery until 1911, then built a career as a consulting forester shaping gardens and landscapes in New York City and Philadelphia. His work opened a professional field that few Black Americans had yet entered.
George H. Wirt (1880 - 1961)
Mont Alto, PA · est. 2005
George H. Wirt became Pennsylvania's first professionally trained forester and, in 1903, co-founded and led the State Forest Academy that opened at Mont Alto. A protege of conservation pioneer Dr. Joseph T. Rothrock, Wirt taught forestry by joining theory to hands-on practice and set trends that shaped the young profession. He drafted the forest-protection laws enacted in 1915 and, as Chief Forest Fire Warden from 1915 to 1946, built a wildfire-protection plan that safeguarded the state's woodlands.
Caledonia Furnace
Greene Township, PA · est. 1947
Thaddeus Stevens and James D. Paxton built the Caledonia iron furnace here in 1837, part of the charcoal-iron industry that fed early American growth. Stevens went on to become one of Congress's most uncompromising foes of slavery, and in June 1863 — as Robert E. Lee's army moved toward Gettysburg — Confederate Gen. Jubal Early singled out the works and destroyed them, in part as payback for the ironmaster's antislavery politics. Early burned the furnace on June 26 on his march toward York.
Old Log Building
Waynesboro, PA · est. 1955
Built by John Bourns sometime between 1770 and 1780, this modest one-and-a-half story log structure served the young community as both schoolhouse and church — the twin pillars of frontier civic life. In an age when a single sturdy building often had to do double duty, learning and worship shared the same walls. It later became a private dwelling and endures as one of the oldest buildings in Waynesboro.