Dave and I decided to give one gift this year, rather than several smaller ones, and maximize the impact. We felt that a gift to child care would be one that provided an immediate impact in an area of critical importance.

Nancy Borghesi (’69 BA L&S), married to David (’70 BBA)

Monahan Forest- Not Your Typical Classroom

Edmund H. Drager, '56, LLB '60, was born and raised in Eagle River, Wisconsin. He spent his childhood fishing for bass and blue gills on a small lake created by glaciers and hiking through his family's forest-360 acres of rolling hills and valleys. It was an ideal place to grow up and he expected to return there after college to join his father in the family law practice.

Instead, Drager accepted a job with a prestigious LaSalle Street law firm in Chicago, Illinois. "It was a good job and I had a wonderful time living in Chicago."

Drager, who fell in love with the Rocky Mountains while on a ski trip, moved to Colorado and continued to practice law. Now retired, he lives in Vail, Colorado, but still returns each summer to Vilas County, where he welcomes UW-Madison faculty and students in wildlife ecology and forestry to the land his family calls Monahan Forest.

Drager's father, Ed, LLB '27, bought the property in 1932 for hunting and the opportunity to manage a forest of his own. For the past 57 years, the Dragers have managed the forest, keeping detailed records of harvests and other activities.

Drager's hospitality gives the students an opportunity to study all aspects of a mixed-age, multiple-use forest. "Students need a place like this," commented Drager. The forest is home to many plant and wildlife species native to northern Wisconsin. A fire tower perches on a hill that Drager estimates is over 1900 feet above sea level, one of the highest points in the state.
Drager's commitment to sustainable forestry led him to donate two condominiums to the University of Wisconsin Foundation to establish a charitable remainder unitrust. The proceeds from the unitrust will perpetuate sustainable forestry research and teaching activities necessary to maintain the multi-age, multi-species, sustained-yield forest conditions that currently exist at the Monahan Forest.

"I've spent a lot of time growing up in the forest," said Drager. "I'm also ensuring that Monahan Forest will forever be a part of Wisconsin."

Raymond P. Guries, professor in the Department of Forest Ecology and Management in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences and the Institute for Environmental Studies, sees the benefits of Drager's gift every summer.

"Students attending the forestry summer camps benefit from Ed Drager's generosity as well as his commitment to sustainable forestry. The Monahan Forest is the scene of several 'hands on' student field exercises that enrich their learning experience," says Guries, the recipient of one of the UW's Distinguished Teaching Awards in 2001.

"Perhaps more important, the Monahan Forest provides students with concrete evidence that timber production, wildlife habitat and esthetics can all be achieved on a single, well-managed forest," explains Guries, whose own research interests include genetic resource management and sustainable forestry practices.