In 1920 the Forestry Commission began the transformation of a great expanse of steep hillside and moorland, around Betws-y-Coed in North Wales, into modern productive forest. The few old oakwoods that remained, and the remarkable scenery of riverside, lake and crag were treated with the consideration they merited when spruce, larch, pine and Douglas fir were brought in. In 1937, to encourage wider public access to the woods and hills, the Forestry Commission embodied this young Gwydyr Forest into its Snowdonia Forest Park, which became encircled some ten years later by the larger Snowdonia National Park of the Countryside Commission. This Booklet aims to give a fuller understanding of all that forestry means to the uplands of North Wales and to their people.