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April 10, 2021, 2:37 p.m. ET
JOHN DAY, Ore. One of the most venomous battles in our polarized nation is the one that has unfolded between loggers and environmentalists in timber towns like this one in the snow-capped Blue Mountains of Eastern Oregon.
Yet, astonishingly, peace has broken out here. Loggers and tree-huggers who once loathed and feared each other have learned to hold their noses and cooperate and this may have saved the town. It may also offer lessons for a divided country.
The timber industry, by far the biggest employer in John Day, survives here only because environmentalists led by Susan Jane Brown, a Portland lawyer, fought to save these workers’ jobs by keeping chain saws active. John Shelk, who owns the town’s sawmill, and might be expected to eat environmental lawyers for breakfast, says simply, “Susan Jane is my hero.”