695 Logging the Pacific Slopes

695 LOGGING THE PACIFIC SLOPES NEWELL L. WRIGHT Lumbering started on the west coast practically all reverted to the counties about 1850. in the days of the Gold for nonpayment of taxes. Rush. Sawmill machinery was brought As the demand for lumber increased around Gape Horn from the East in and transportation facilities (such as sailing vessels. The first mills were for adequate ports for seagoing vessels and medium and small-sized timbers. Logs transcontinental railroads for land were furnished by farmers and land shipments) became available, domestic clearers from the timbered areas that and foreign markets expanded. More adjoined navigable waters wherever it production was needed. In logging this was cheaper to put them in a stream meant greater increases in speed and than to pile them for burning. Much of power. In the early eighties there was this was done with the ax, saw, and log much timber near the mills, but some jack, toil and sweat, grunt and groan. of it was on ground unsuitable for ox- The start was small but, step by step, or horse-team logging. Of the various production increased, and machinery steam-powered machines that came was built to saw the larger logs. This into use, the most successful was the called for more powder in the woods. donkey engine, which had a horizontal Timber was abundant—much too drum and a vertical-type boiler. much for the early settler, whose first Because it had been a slow and la- thought was food and whose first prob- borious job to haul the felled and lem was to find unforcsted areas or bucked timber to the skid roads, the clear fields for farming. Fire was the first donkey engines supplanted the great land clearer, and in the early horses and oxen in this work. They 1850's great forests went up in smoke. were strong enough to pull logs out of Soon the timber line receded, and the canyons with little application of ox team and skid road came into being. blocks, which often were necessary The big timber started moving to the when horses and oxen were used. For crack of the bull whip and the roar of some time the animals were still used the puncher. for skid-road work and for hauling the Horses followed the ox team; as pro- logs to the water. The donkey engine duction increased, speed as well as yarded the big logs to the road and power was needed. The proper appli- made up the turn for its trip to the cation of gravity was the influencing water. It was soon found that a ma- factor in logging with the ox and horse chine could do it faster, however, so team. Grades favorable with the load roading donkeys were built. These were necessary, but logging shows were machines were bolted to huge log sleds, plentiful, and no great engineering which made good foundations and skill was needed. made the unit easily movable in the A good woodsman—usually the fore- woods. The unit was moved by hang- man—did the locating. Rough ground ing a block some distance ahead and and poor timber stands were bypassed. running the main drum, line out Only the high-quality timber was cut, through the block, then back to the and only the best logs wêre removed. sled; it was made fast on the sled The margin between costs and recovery runner. By applying steam to roll the value was low, and low-grade material drum, the unit would be moved toward could be handled only at a loss. Fire the block. It simply pulled itself by ravaged much of the lands that were its own power. so handled ; some remained in fair con- The roading donkey was built with ditioUj and new growth was started; huge drums, which had a great line 696 Yearbook^ of Agriculture 1949 capacity. When the roading distance vances in the construction of the don- got greater than the Une capacity of key engine. one machine^ often one and sometimes two more machines were added to relay D0NKF.Y ENGINES were generally the logs to the water. The building of listed by diameter of cylinder and donkey sleds and skid and pole roads length of stroke in inches. One of the became a craft of importance. The first prize machines was a 7 by 9 inch, skid-road builder sometimes assisted with a single drum. A line horse was the foreman in making the location. used to pull the cable line and the Straight roads on easy grades were choker—a length of cable with a flat most desirable. hook on one end and an eye in the Such logging was successful in other to be passed around the log and limited areas of timber, but soon the fastened to the main haul line—back length of haul compelled a dififerent to the woods. line of action. On rough ground the haul-back job The demand for lumber was good. became too hard for a horse, so an in- In 1899, Douglas-fir lumber was aver- genious mechanical engineer designed aging almost $9 a thousand at the mill. the haul-back drum. A line smaller Eastern lumbermen wêre becoming in- than the main line was found sufficient terested in the big timber of the West. for this work, but it had to be more Large consolidations were under way. than twice as long, because it went By 1905, timberland homesteads were out to a corner haul-back block at being picked up for $5 or so an acre. about the main-line length from the At the turn of the century railroad donkey engine, over to a lead haul- logging was starting. The need for log- back block. From there it was strung ging engineers was recognized. Until to and hooked on the main line at the colleges supplied the training, some of fair leads, on the end of the donkey the best logging engineers in the early sled. The haul-back line had first to days were trained woodsmen, self- be pulled out through the blocks by educated in civil engineering. Logging hand and hooked to the end of the railroads became the principal medium main line. From then on, steam did of transporting logs to the mills; it the wôrk until the line needed chang- still is considered the cheapest for hauls ing to reach more logs. Laying out of more than 50 miles when transpor- the haul-back line was an arduous task tation by water is not possible. and all hands wêrc called to help. To Always original and ever a pioneer, speed up the job, an additional drum the logger did not follow the road wâs added to the machine. This held specifications of the regular railroad what is called a straw line, about systems. Because his capital was more three-eighths inch in diameter, which limited, he kept construction costs at a was easier strung out by hand and was minimum, even at the sacrifice of oper- used to string out the haul-back line. ation. Seven-percent favorable grades On simple yarding donkeys this is the and 20° curves were common; so there drum arrangement in use today. was need for the geared engine, which The yarding donkey, sitting at a sounded, when traveling 15 miles an point near where the logs were to go hour, like a passenger train going 60. in the water, on a skid road, or on It probably has delivered more logs to cars, dragged the logs in a straight waterways at lower cost than any other line from a distant point. Immovable piece of transportation equipment. objects, such as stumps and trees in In the western woods this was the the line of travel, had to be avoided, age of steam. Three notable western or the log rolled or kicked around machinery builders expanded into the them with the main line. The logger's heavy logging-equipment field, and the term for these obstacles was "hang- competition brought about great ad- ups." A poorly chosen skid road caused Logging the Pacific Slopes 697 the rigging slingcr to remark that he the addition of a haul-back drum less- had been fighting hang-ups all day. The ened the work of getting the hooks more hang-ups, the fewer logs hauled back over the log as well as regulating out. The selection of good donkey set- its placement on the car. A third drum tings and skid roads greatly influenced was added for use in spotting the cars the log production and marked the for loading when the train crew was worth of the crew boss, or hook tender. away. A somewhat similar loading method wâs used in the ponderosa pine ASSEMBLING LOGS to facilitate load- region—another Pacific slope region— ing on cars was important to a smooth- although not so extensively. working operation. It was necessary to It was soon found that logging by the accumulate enough logs at one point ground-lead method resulted in less so that a well-balanced carload could hang-up delay when the logs were be formed. This was done by building pulled uphill by the donkey. The log inclined log-crib landings with jump- tended to follow up the side of a stump up approaches so the logs would be and shear away from it. More powder hauled first to the higher part of the and speed were needed, which the ma- landing and then rolled toward the chinery builders supplied when they front.

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