Department of Forest Products records

Forestry was first listed as a College of Agriculture collegiate-level course in the 1889-1890 University Bulletin. At its May 13, 1910, meeting, the Board of Regents voted to establish “a new special department, to be known as the Department of Forestry…”

The first course in Forest Products was offered by the Department of Forestry in 1913. The course work at that time included “an introductory survey of all the wood products of forests” and a “special study of forest products other than timber…cellulose for paper, sugar, tanning materials, turpentine, tar, oil, resin, waxes, gum, creosote, wood alcohol, acetic acid, acetone, etc.”

In the 1924-1926 Announcement of Courses for the College of Agriculture, Forestry, and Home Economics, a notice was included announcing that the course of study in forestry included the option of majoring in Forest Products. The curriculum for Forest Products expanded over the decades, and by the 1960s, students majoring in Forest Products were offered specializations in forest-products merchandising (preparation for work in building-products merchandising, light construction, and production of forest products) and forest-products engineering (preparation for technical work in the fields of pulp and paper, wood preservation, plywood manufacture, wood seasoning, and other wood-processing industries).

At the December 4, 1970, Board of Regents meeting, upon recommendation of the Vice President for Academic Administration and the President, the Board voted to “approve the establishment of three collegiate units within the administrative structure of the Institute of Agriculture: College of Agriculture, College of Forestry, and College of Home Economics…”

Core curriculum areas for the new College of Forestry included forest resource development, forest science, recreation resource management, and forest products.

John Haygreen was named the first head of the Department of Forest Products, which offered specialization in manufactured housing, marketing, pulp and paper, and wood science and technology.

At the August 12, 1988, Board of Regents Educational Planning and Policy Committee meeting, committee members reviewed a proposal to change the name of the College of Forestry to the College of Natural Resources. Under the administrative structure of the new College of Natural Resources, the Department of Forest Products experienced two name changes: first to the Department of Wood and Paper Science in 1996, and then to the Department of Bio-Based Products in 2004.

As part of a system-wide reorganization (“Strategic Positioning” and later “Transforming the U”), announced in September 2004 by President Robert Bruininks, the number of colleges on the Twin Cities campus was reduced by three. The President’s academic recommendations included integrating the College of Natural Resources with the academic units of the College of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Sciences “to create a new, expanded college focused broadly on food systems, environmental science, policy, and renewable resources.”

In 2006, the Department of Bio-based Products merged with the Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering to form the new Department of Bioproducts and Biosystems Engineering with its administrative home in the newly formed College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences.

Heads of Forest Products/Wood and Paper Science/Bio-based Products