Friends & Neighbors: Meet Howard Burnett

Published 11:56 pm Tuesday, February 24, 2009

You could say Howard Burnett has been green his entire life.

A retired forester, Burnett knew what he wanted to do at age 12. As a child growing up on the outskirts of New York City, he spent hours outside — hunting, fishing and going on adventures as a Boy Scout.

Not all of his outdoor time was for fun, however.

“During the Depression it was necessary, hunting and fishing for food,” he said.

Burnett received a bachelor’s of science degree in forestry from the College of Forestry at Syracuse University, then went to work for the U.S. Forest Service. His first assignment was in Holly Springs, Miss., 45 miles from Memphis. For a New Yorker’s first time in the South, the change was initially quite a jolt.

“It took a while to get used to the accent,” said Burnett. “They didn’t understand me and I didn’t understand them.”

But it wasn’t long before Burnett fell in love … with the historical town.

“I loved Holly Springs,” he said. “It’s a beautiful antebellum town with a lot of Civil War history. And if you’re doing what you want then you like where you do it.”

Burnett stayed a year and then went to Lake City, Fla., where he spent four months marking wood that had been damaged in a wildfire. After that, the North Georgia mountains beckoned him to Dahlonega. Four years later he transferred to Chatsworth to serve as the first district ranger of the Chattahoochee National Forest.

Here he really found love when he met and married his wife, Martha Sue.

Martha Sue was a young widow with a daughter, Charlene. Her husband was killed when she was seven months pregnant. To make ends meet, she worked as a waitress in a local restaurant where the new district ranger liked to eat. The two hit it off immediately.

“Our first date was on Labor Day,” Burnett recalled. “We went to Atlanta to see ‘South Pacific’ because she wanted to.”

The couple married the following summer and will celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary this year. In addition to Charlene, they have two sons together, Alex and David. They also have seven grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.

Burnett oversaw the Cohutta Wilderness and 11,000 acres in north Whitfield County for four years, then transferred to Franklin, N.C., for another four years. Following his stint there, he worked for two years as a safety officer at the Forest Service regional office in Atlanta, then moved to the Forest Service’s state and private forestry branch. He spent the remainder of his career there, working in Atlanta, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., before retiring in 1986.

He and Martha Sue purchased a retirement home in Annapolis, Md., where they lived for 18 years. Eventually, when they weren’t able to take care of their yard, the couple bought a condo in Dalton three years ago so they could be closer to Martha Sue’s family.

Burnett kept busy during retirement working as a volunteer for American Forests and the National Association of State Foresters as Smokey Bear’s banker.

“I kept track of the bank account that they paid for pencils and other things that had Smokey Bear on them with,” he said.

At American Forests, Burnett made his mark as the “Tree Doctor,” answering questions that were sent in to the organization’s publication of the same name. The company averaged 150 to 200 letters per year, and Burnett tried his best to answer all of them.

“It started because letters would come in and American Forests didn’t have a system of answering them,” he said. “I thought people deserved an answer in a polite, timely manner so they gave me the job.”

Perhaps the strangest question came from someone who found a large seed in Montana and was looking for help in identifying it. The person thought it may have come from a pine tree but it was too large.

“Finally I decided it must have been an avocado seed,” Burnett said. “I told him to plant the seed and let me know what happened.”

Locally, Burnett helped with Dalton’s acquisition of Georgia’s Liberty Tree, which was planted on the grounds of City Hall in 2006. The tree is one of 14 grown from saplings of America’s last remaining Liberty Tree in Annapolis. One sapling was planted in each of the original 13 colonies and Washington, D.C.

Burnett says Dalton should be proud.

“We have something no one else (in the state) has,” he said.

Dalton’s first Liberty Tree festival was held last year. Burnett says city councilman Charlie Bethel is trying to get the state Legislature to name the tree Georgia’s official Liberty Tree. He predicts the tree will grow to 100 feet and dominate the landscape.

“Dalton has a very good tree program and gets a lot of benefit from trees,” said Burnett.

Burnett retired as the Tree Doctor on Jan. 1. He now spends his time leading a memory writing class at the Dalton-Whitfield Senior Center, doing crossword puzzles, watching “Jeopardy!,” reading and e-mailing. He still believes trees hold a lot of power.

“Planting trees is a way of fighting global warming,” he said. “If it’s proved to be false, the worst we can be accused of is doing the right thing for the wrong reason.”