Steinway’s Last U.S. Wood Supplier Nears Closure

Recently, The Wall Street Journal published an article by Sara Lehnert describing how the famed piano manufacturer Steinway’s wood supplier may be forced to shut down due to U.S. Forest Service policies that have left it without usable timber.

Steinway pianos possess a unique sound. “When you play a Steinway, the warmth and nobility in its voice are unlike any other instrument,” said Ukrainian-born classical pianist Emanuel Ax.

The secret behind this sound lies not only in Steinway’s master craftsmen—who have used the same methods since 1853—but also in the special wood chosen for the soundboard. This timber, harvested from Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, gives Steinway pianos their exceptional tone quality, pitch, clarity, and consistency. Sadly, the federal government’s broken promises may soon silence the music.

In 1994, Ms. Lehnert’s father, uncles, their close friend, and grandfather took a risk by purchasing a bankrupt sawmill on Prince of Wales Island, Alaska.

Thirty-one years ago, her father moved the family to a remote rural community they had never seen before. Together with a small team—including Ms. Lehnert’s 16-year-old brother—they rebuilt the sawmill over six months and realized their American dream.

Today, their wood is used in Martin and Gibson guitars, and in pianos by Kawai, Boston, Essex, Yamaha, and Steinway. Their company, Viking Lumber, is the only sawmill in the United States still capable of supplying Steinway with the wood it requires.

Even if you don’t play an instrument, you still depend on their timber. Their Sitka spruce is used in NASA wind tunnels, in shipbuilding and aircraft construction, in helicopter rotor blades that fight fires and carry supplies to troops, and even in the nose cones of U.S. military missiles.

Now Viking Lumber faces a government-created obstacle threatening every airplane, helicopter, ship, guitar, and Steinway piano that relies on its wood.

In their region of Alaska, the federal government owns about 94% of the land and controls access to timber. In 2016, the U.S. Department of Agriculture adopted a management plan pledging to provide old-growth Tongass timber on a set annual schedule. But the government has failed to honor that commitment. The Forest Service has never met the sales targets in the plan; in the past four years, it has offered less than 10% of the timber the industry requires annually.

The entire Alaskan timber sector—and global industries dependent on its output—rely on these sales. Neither a presidential executive order, nor a memorandum from Acting Deputy Chief Chris French of the Forest Service, nor even a lawsuit filed earlier this year against the USDA has been able to stop the agency from strangling the industry.

Timber companies are not seeking to strip the forest bare. Tongass covers over 16 million acres, 95% of which is off-limits to logging. To grasp how little is allowed to be harvested, imagine a football field 360 feet long by 160 feet wide. Under the current plan, the industry is permitted to cut an area equal to just a square slightly over seven feet on each side—about 0.09% of Tongass.

Industry veterans like Ms. Lehnert’s father have built businesses on principles of sustainability, ensuring that future generations can continue small-scale logging while the forest remains a resource for recreation, subsistence lifestyles, tourism, and cultural traditions.

The people matter, too. Viking’s workforce includes Alaska Natives, parents, and those pursuing their own American dream.

Their sawmill manager immigrated from Mexico nearly 20 years ago, became a U.S. citizen, married a local special education teacher, raised children, and built a home in the community he loves. Another worker, a single father of three, once nearly went to prison for drug addiction until the mill manager pleaded with a judge to give him a second chance. He is now sober, a valued employee, and a dedicated father.

The island has around 4,000 residents, with hundreds of families depending on the timber trade. When Viking Lumber—the last remaining sawmill in Alaska—completes its current contract this September, it will have exhausted all the wood made available by the Forest Service. After 31 years, the operation will be forced to shut down. Families who depend on it will have to leave. The sawmill—supplier to the world’s leading music manufacturers—will vanish.

And then, one must ask: How will the music go on?