White-tailed deer provided Indians and white settlers with meat and pelts until the mid-1800s. After 1850, white settler populations grew, and by the early 1890s, deer were virtually extinct not only in Tennessee but in most of the eastern United Sates. Restocking was tried off-and-on until the Tennessee Game and Fish Commission, known today as the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, began a project in earnest in 1943. Before that, in 1937, 178 deer were trapped in Pisgah National Forest and released in the southern CNF, including the Ocoee Ranger District. The restocking programs were successful, and today hunters are depended on to keep growing deer populations in check.