G. M. Brandborg Papers, 1909-1977

Guy M. "Brandy" Brandborg was born in Henning, Minnesota on March 3, 1893. In the summer of 1913, Brandborg came to Montana to work in Glacier National Park. That fall, he attended Forest Ranger School in Missoula, Montana and worked for the Forest Service during his summers. His first summer with the Forest Service was spent at the Earl Mountain Ranger Station near Choteau, Montana. After graduation in 1915, Brandborg worked on the Flathead National Forest.

After returning from Army duties during World War I, Brandborg moved to Idaho in 1924 to begin his professional career as a ranger in the Forest Service. He worked on the Nez Perce National Forest for ten years and was promoted from Ranger to Assistant Supervisor. Brandborg returned to Montana in 1935 and served as Forest Supervisor of the Bitterroot National Forest until his retirement in 1955.

Brandborg was active in education in his community throughout and following his tenure as Forest Supervisor. In addition to serving on the State Board of Education for eleven years, Brandborg assisted in developing a program for teaching conservation at Montana State University (now The University of Montana) in Missoula, and Montana State College (now Montana State University) in Bozeman. The program was run through the Montana Fish and Game Commission and the Montana University Extension Service. In 1958, he helped to organize the Montana Conservation Council, which provided a public forum for discussion of Montana’s natural resources and their sustainable use as well as conservation education in schools.

After his retirement, Brandborg witnessed excessive clearcutting and other land abuses on public forests and grazing land. He campaigned for a sustainable harvest of timber through letters to Montana congressmen, testifying before the United States House and Senate, letter campaigns and contributing to the formation of conservation organizations. In 1958, he helped organize the Montana Wilderness Association which was instrumental in the 1964 passage of the Federal Wilderness Act. In 1963, Brandborg and Doris Milner formed the Save the Selway Committee which, through legislation sponsored by Senators Frank Church and Lee Metcalf, helped establish two of the largest wilderness areas in the United States. Throughout the rest of his life, Brandborg and his wife Ruth worked tirelessly towards protecting wilderness and a policy of the sustainable harvesting of timber on public lands. Brandborg died in Missoula in 1977 at the age of 84.