"Bud's Place" Has Good Showing

SWAN VALLEY - Nearly 80 people attended the showing of the movie "Bud's Place" May 5 at the Swan Valley Community Hall. The 60-minute film, sponsored by Alpine Artisans, Swan Valley Connections and the Upper Swan Valley Historical Society, told the story of the late Swan Valley resident William "Bud" Moore, a renowned forester, conservationist, teacher and the author of "The Lochsa Story: Land Ethics in the Bitterroot Mountains."

Moore's son Bill introduced the film and spoke about his father whom he called Pop. He said Moore got the name "Pop" from much younger soldiers when he joined the Marines during World War II at the age of 22 or 23. Bill added that he appreciates what "Pop" had taught him as a child, he respected his influence with the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) management practices and how he taught and encouraged young people interested in forest management who attended the local educational organization called Northwest Connection.

The film, by Moore's friend filmmaker George Sibley, told mostly in Moore's own recorded words, wove together recreations of Moore's life events, historic films and photographs and interviews the USFS had with Moore for two and one half days on the occasion of their centennial in 2005.

Moore attended Woodside Elementary School on Lolo Creek in the Bitterroot Valley of Montana. In six years he graduated from the eighth grade where his formal schooling ended. In his later years he visited Woodside School telling students that he walked five miles each way to attend the school. The students there began a tradition of honoring him by following in Moore's footsteps as he traveled to school.

In the film, Moore said that life experiences broadened his world vision from his days of supporting himself by trapping in the Bitterroot Mountains. In World War II he acquired administrative skills and he led by teamwork while finding the good in people. Moore worked for the USFS on fire towers, backcountry ranger patrol and then advancing to district ranger in the Bitterroot Mountains. He called the forest management practices in the 1950s "an illusion of knowledge." He said he began to see the wisdom of "holistic" management practices, keeping the whole ecosystem in mind when dealing with fire and commercial logging. The USFS listened to him and promoted him to Chief of Fire Control and Air Operations from which he retired in 1974. He received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Montana (UM) the same year.

Moore returned to his "Coyote Forest" home in the Swan Valley to run a saw mill. He said if done properly the forests can have recreational and commercial uses at the same time. Bud called it "keeping all the parts. You could do a lot of things as long as you kept the parts intact."

Until the end of his life in 2010, at 93 years of age, he had an endless stream of visitors to Coyote Forest who enjoyed his story telling told with his sense of humor.

Moore seemingly had a contradictory outlook on forest practices. He was a hunter and a trapper, a wildlife conservationist, he maintained a sustainable population inside his trap lines and he was a forester who logged and ran a sawmill.

Swan Valley resident Claudia Kux said that Moore was able to unify people. "It was evident from the wide variety of outlooks and occupations of those who attended the film. They came together to honor Bud Moore."

Moore kept meticulous notes and was known as a "wizard at paperwork". He kept a notebook with him at all times in which he wrote observations. His family placed his archival collection containing correspondence, journals, field notes and photographs at the University of Montana's (UM) Mansfield Library. A guide to the Bud Moore collection at UM is found at: http://bit.ly/bud-more-archives.

Moore's "Photo Archive" is available online as the Bud Moore Photograph and Sound Recordings which is part of the Montana Memory Project. It includes more than 4,500 photographs, 1, 400 of which contain Moore describing the scene or sharing the memory of the photo. Visit: http://bit.ly/bud-moore-photos