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The Pioneer Woodsman as He Is Related to Lumbering in the Northwest
The Pioneer Woodsman as He Is Related to Lumbering in the Northwest
I DEDICATE
THIS BOOK TO THE MEMORY OF
WILLIAM S. PATRICK,
GUIDING FRIEND AND HELPFUL COUNSELOR
OF MY EARLIER MANHOOD YEARS.
Foreword
The aim will be to take the reader along on the journey of the pioneer woodsman, from comfortable hearthstone, from family, friends, books, magazines, and daily papers, and to disappear with him from all evidences of civilization and from all human companionship save, ordinarily, that of one helper who not infrequently is an Indian, and to live for weeks at a time in the unbroken forest, seldom sleeping more than a single night in one place.
The woodsman and his one companion must carry cooking utensils, axes, raw provisions of flour, meat, beans, coffee, sugar, rice, pepper, and salt; maps, plats, books for field notes; the simplest and lightest possible equipment of surveying implements; and, lastly, tent and blankets for shelter and covering at night to protect them from storm and cold.
Incidents of the daily life of these two voluntary reclusionists, as they occurred to the author, and some of the results obtained, will be told to the reader in the pages which are to follow.
CHAPTER I.
Sowing the Germ That I Knew Not
"This superficial tale is but a preface of her worthy praise."
Early environment sometimes paints colors on the canvas of one's later life.
Fifty years ago in western New York, there were thousands of acres of valuable timber. The country was well watered, and, on some of the streams, mills and factories had sprung into existence. On one of these were three sawmills of one upright saw each, and all did custom sawing.
My father was a manufacturer, especially of carriages, wagons, and sleighs. There were no factories then engaged in making spokes, felloes, whiffletrees, bent carriage poles, thills or shafts, and bent runners for cutters and sleighs. These all had to be made at the shop where the cutter, wagon, or carriage was being built. Consequently the manufacturer was obliged to provide himself with seasoned planks and boards of the various kinds of wood that entered into the construction of each vehicle. Trips were made to the woods to examine trees of birch, maple, oak, ash, beech, hickory, rock elm, butternut, basswood, whitewood, and sometimes hemlock and pine. The timber desired having been selected, the trees were converted into logs which in turn were taken to the custom mill and sawed into such dimensions required, as far as was possible at that period to have done at these rather primitive sawmills. Beyond this the resawing was done at the shop.
Thus, almost unconsciously, at an early age, by reason of the assistance rendered to my father in selecting and securing this manufactured lumber from the tree in the forest to the sawed product of the mill, I became familiar with the names and the textures of many kinds of woods, the knowledge of which stood me in good turn in later years.
CHAPTER II.
Preparations for the Wilds of Wisconsin
In the city of Detroit, early in June, 1871, was gathered a group of four veteran woodsmen of the lumbermen's craft, and two raw recruits, one, a student fresh from his father's law office in Bay City, and the other, myself, whose frontier experiences were yet to be gained.
A contract, by William S. Patrick of Bay City, the principal of this group, had been made with Henry W. Sage, of Brooklyn, New York, to select and to secure by purchase from the United States and from the state of Wisconsin, valuable pine lands believed to be located in the wilds of northern Wisconsin. Tents, blankets, axes, extra clothing, cooking utensils, compasses, and other surveying implements were ordered, and soon the party was ready for the start.
At that time no passable roads penetrated the northern woods of Wisconsin from the south. The country to be examined for available pine lands at the commencement of our work was tributary to the head waters of the Flambeau River. To reach this point in the forest it was thought best to enter the woods from the south shore of Lake Superior. Also, the United States land office controlling a part of this territory, was located at Bayfield, Wisconsin, and at that office must be selected such township plats as would be needed in the examining of lands in that portion of the Bayfield Land District.
The quickest line of transit at that date was by railroad to Chicago, and thence to St. Paul over the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway, crossing the Mississippi River at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, to McGregor, Iowa, and thence north to St. Paul. There was no other railroad then completed from Chicago to St. Paul. The only railroad from St. Paul to Lake Superior was the St. Paul and Duluth. From Duluth, passage was taken by steamer to Bayfield. Township plats were here obtained from the government land office. Provisions of pork, flour, beans, coffee, rice, sugar, baking powder, dried apples, pepper and salt, tobacco, etc., for one month's living in the woods for nine men, were bought and put into cloth sacks. Our original number of six men was here augmented by three half-breed Indians of the Bad River Indian Reservation, who were hired as packers and guides over a trail to be followed to the Flambeau Indian Reservation. A Lake Superior fisherman was then engaged to take the party and its outfit in his sailing boat from Bayfield to the mouth of Montreal River, which is the boundary between Wisconsin and Michigan. The distance was about thirty-five miles.
CHAPTER III.
Entering the Wilds of Wisconsin
The party disembarked at a sand beach, but the sailboat drew too much water to permit a close landing. Here it was that the two tenderfeet got their first experience with Lake Superior's cold water, since all were obliged to climb or jump overboard into three feet of the almost icy water, and to carry on heads and shoulders portions of the luggage to the dry land. Here was to begin the first night of my camp life. Dry wood was sought, and camp fires were kindled to be used, first, to dry the wet clothing, and second, to cook the food for the first out-of-door supper.
To avoid mosquitoes, orders were given to prepare beds for the night on the sand beach away from the friendly tall trees that stood near by. One mattress served for the whole party and consisted of as level a strip of the sandy shore as could be selected. Promise of fair weather rendered unnecessary the raising of tents which were made to serve as so much thickness to keep the body from contact with the sand.
That night the stars shone brightly above the sleepers' faces, the waters of Superior broke gently along the beach, and the tall pines lent their first lullaby to willingly listening ears.
"The waves have a story to tell me,
As I lie on the lonely beach;
Chanting aloft in the pine-tops,
The wind has a lesson to teach;
But the stars sing an anthem of glory
I cannot put into speech.
They sing of the Mighty Master,
Of the loom His fingers span,
Where a star or a soul is a part of the whole,
And weft in the wondrous plan."
The next morning broke bright and clear, and the sun sent a sheen upon the dimpled waters of old Superior that gave us a touch of regret at the parting of the ways; for the members, one by one, after a well relished breakfast, shouldered their packs and fell into single file behind the Indian guide who led the way to the trail through the woods, forty miles long, to the Flambeau Reservation.
Two days and the morning of the third brought the party, footsore in new boots and eaten by mosquitoes, to the end of the trail. Now, lakes must be crossed, and the Flambeau River navigated for many days. In the Indian village were many wigwams, occupied by the usually large families of two or three generations of bucks, squaws, children, from the eldest down to the liquid-nosed papoose, and their numerous dogs that never fail to announce the approach of "kitchimokoman," the white man.
Some of the old men were building birch canoes, and many birch crafts of different ages and of previous service were to be seen in the camp. From among them, enough were bought to carry all of the men of the party and their outfits. The last canoe bought was a three-man canoe, which leaked and must be "pitched" before it could be used.
At this point let it be explained that every woodsman, trapper, pioneer, settler, or camper who depends upon a birch canoe for navigation should, and generally does, provide himself with a quantity of commercial resin and a fireproof dish in which to melt it. The resin is then tempered by adding just enough grease to prevent the mixture, when applied to the dry surface of a leaky spot on the canoe, and cooled in the water of the lake or river at the time of using, from cracking by reason of too great hardness. The surface must be dry or the "pitch" will not adhere firmly to the leaky seam or knot in the bark of the canoe. The drying is quickly done by holding a live ember or firebrand close to the surface of the wet bark.
Mr. Patrick had bought the canoes from different owners and had paid for them all except the leaky three-man canoe. It was the property of a fat squaw of uncertain age. The price agreed upon for this canoe was twenty dollars. Mr. Patrick and the squaw were standing on opposite sides of the canoe as Mr. Patrick took from his pocket a twenty dollar bill to hand her in payment. Just then he discovered that the pan of pitch (resin), which had been previously placed over the live coals, was on fire. He placed the twenty dollar bill on the canoe in front of the squaw, and quickly ran to extinguish the fire in the burning pitch. When he returned to the canoe, the bill had disappeared, and the wise old squaw claimed to know nothing of its whereabouts. A second twenty dollar bill was produced and handed to the squaw, when Mr. Patrick became the owner of a forty dollar birch canoe.
CHAPTER IV.
Surveying and Selecting Government Timber Lands
Our party of land surveyors, or "land lookers" as they were often called, being thus supplied with water transports, proceeded in their canoes a short distance down the Flambeau River, where the work of selecting government or state lands timbered with pine trees was to begin.
The questions have been so often asked, "How do you know where you are when in the dense forest away from all roads and trails, and many miles from any human habitation?", "How can you tell one tract of land from another tract?", and "How can you tell what land belongs to the United States and what to the State?", that it seems desirable to try to make these points clear to the reader.
The Continental Congress, through its committee appointed expressly for the work, inaugurated the present system of survey of the public lands in 1784. For the purposes of this explanation it will be sufficient to recite that the system consists of parallel lines six miles apart running north and south, designated as "range lines"; also of other parallel lines, six miles apart running east and west, designated as "township lines". Any six miles square bounded by four of these lines constitutes a "township". The territory within these two range lines and two township lines is subdivided into "sections", each one mile square, by running five parallel lines north and south across the township, each one mile from its nearest parallel line, and, in like manner, by running five other parallel lines east and west across the township from the east range line to the west range line, each line one mile from its nearest parallel line. In this manner, the township is subdivided into thirty-six sections each one mile square. The four township corners are marked by posts, squared at the upper end, and marked on the four sides by the proper letters and figures cut into the four flat faces by "marking irons", each flat surface facing the township for which it is marked.
In addition, one tree in each of the four township corners is blazed (a smooth surface exposed by chopping through the bark into the wood) on the side of the tree facing the stake, and the same letters and figures as are on the nearest face of the stake are marked thereon. These letters and figures give the number of the township, range and section touching that corner. On another blaze below the first, and near the ground, are marked the letters "B T", meaning "bearing tree".
The surveyor writes in his field book the kind and diameter of tree, the distance and direction of each bearing tree from the corner post, and these notes of the surveyor are recorded in the United States land office at Washington.
Even if the stake and three of the bearing trees should be destroyed, so that but one tree be left, with a copy of the notes, one could relocate the township corner.
The section corners within the township are marked in a similar manner.
Midway between adjacent section corners is located a "quarter corner", on the line between the two adjacent sections. This is marked by a post blazed flat on opposite sides and marked "¼ S". There are also two "witness trees" or bearing trees marked "¼ S".
By running straight lines through a section, east and west and north and south, connecting the quarter corners, the section of six hundred and forty acres may be divided into four quarter sections of one hundred and sixty acres each. These may in turn be divided into four similar shaped quarters of forty acres each called "forties", which constitute the smallest regular government subdivisions, except fractional acreages caused by lakes and rivers which may cut out part of what might otherwise have been a forty. In such cases the government surveyor "meanders" or measures the winding courses, and the fractional forties thus measured are marked with the number of acres each contains. Each is called a "lot" and is given a number. These lots are noted and numbered on the surveyor's map or plat which is later recorded.
The subdivision of the mile square section is the work of the land looker, as the government ceases its work when the exterior lines are run.