Early Days in the Forest Service Volume 4

EARLY-DAY RANGER IN THE PRIEST LAKE COUNTRY
By Henry A. Peterson

INTRODUCTION

My career with the U.S. Forest Service started in June 1925 as a lookout on Cuban Hill on the Falls Ranger District of the Kaniksu National Forest. All of my Forest Service employment, with the exception of details, was on the Kaniksu. I retired April 1, 1956, at the age of 62 from the Forest Supervisor's Timber Management Staff at Sandpoint, Idaho, after 30 years with the Forest Service.

When I was 9 years old, my parents came from Minnesota in March 1903 and homesteaded near Camden, Washington. I attended the local schools and grew up in that community. Recently I was requested by the Pend Oreille County Historical Society to write an article of my recollections of our early pioneering and homesteading experiences. After completing the article it occurred to me that I might have personal knowledge of facts, incidents and experiences during my tenure of duty in the Priest Lake Country not known to others that may be of interest and have some historical value. Especially, since it appears that very little has been recorded about the so-called "Good Old Days" of the Priest Lake Country.

THE BEGINNING

I decided to apply for employment with the Forest Service for the season of 1925.

A girl friend whom I had known since childhood was operating a beauty shop in Newport at this time. Occasionally we would go to shows and dances together. At that time the Kaniksu Forest Supervisor's Office was in Newport. Emory M. Kapp, now retired, was the Administrative Assistant in the Supervisor's Office and was also dating this girl friend. Often, we both wanted dates at the same time. Kapp and I had never met but we knew of each other via our girl friend. So we became rivals; but this was a challenge I accepted. However, soon afterwards I met Kapp downtown in Newport more or less by accident. We became acquainted and from then on we were very good friends. When I filled out the application for employment Kapp introduced me to the office force, obtained and assisted in filling out the application, which was referred to District Ranger John Murray at the Falls Ranger Station. I was hired and assigned as lookout on Cuban Hill during the summer of 1925.

This incident with Kapp and the girl friend started my career with the Forest Service. Incidentally, Kapp and I both lost out. Our girl friend married someone else.

The fall of 1925 was dry and I finally came down from the lookout about the middle of September and was assigned to recondition fire tools. During October, as before mentioned, I took the assembled written Civil Service Examination for the position of Forest Ranger. Later I was notified that I passed with a grade of 84 plus with 5 points added for veterans status during World War I, which gave me a grade of 89 plus.

The frame cabin on Cuban Hill was of gable roof construction. Part of my job in addition to being lookout was to remove the gable roof and replace it with a cupola type roof. Lumber and material were packed in. I was furnished with a set of plans, cut the lumber to fit and tore off the old roof. About the middle of July a fellow by the name of Tom Terrell was hired as an emergency smokechaser and assigned to Cuban Hill to assist me in getting the new roof on as soon as possible. Terrell later was employed by James Evenden and made a career in the Service. Believe he was in charge after Evenden retired.

There were millions of yellow jackets that summer; and while the roof was off, it was difficult to eat, sit, or stand without getting stung. There were also many small flying ants and at times they were constantly falling down our necks and the yellow jackets were attempting to make a meal of them. After attempts at slapping them and getting stung, it was decided it was best to let them have their at meal and fly away in peace. It takes a lot of willpower to allow yellow jackets to roam around on the back of your neck but after getting stung with each slap one soon tries to make friends with the pesky insects.

Terrell was a very likable fellow and I was sorry when the roof was completed and he returned to the Ranger Station. I rather enjoyed life on the lookout despite the loneliness. I made friends with a flock of young blue grouse and they became quite tame. Mother grouse would sit on a large rock watching while the little fellows scampered around catching grasshoppers until one day a large hawk spotted them and attempted to have a grouse dinner. The hawk missed but after that I never saw them again. I dug a small hole on the north slope and installed a wooden box for a cooler; soon I had a large pet toad, fed him all sorts of insects until one day a large garter snake spotted him. When I kneeled down to get some butter I almost placed my knee on the snake, which had the toad by the front foot. I killed the snake but Mr. Toad decided it was time to find a safer place and, I lost another friend.

During the summer I had cut and ricked about 5 ricks of buckskin larch firewood, all with a double bitted axe, as I had no saw. Believe this was probably a record supply of firewood on any lookout on the forest. Had to carry the wood about one-eighth mile. It was an early morning and late evening project.

During 1925 while I was on Cuban Hill, the upper part of the Upper Westbranch drainage was burned over by a series of fires set by a dry lightning storm. On the day prior to this storm, District Ranger Murray and Assistant Forest Supervisor Francis Carroll were locating trail in the vicinity of South Baldy lookout and decided to spend the night at the lookout. A forestry student by the name of Blickensderfer was the lookout and Bill Blake, a native in the Bear Paw country, was the smokechaser. Since Murray and Carroll had hiked all day, Blickensderfer and Blake insisted that they sleep on the regular bunks. Blickensderfer and Blake slept on the floor with Blickensderfer next to and in front of the stove. Lookout buildings had no lightning protection those days. During the night a bolt of lightning came down the stovepipe, jumped to the floor under where Blickensderfer was sleeping, killing him instantly. Murray and Carroll gave artificial respiration instantly and worked over him until it was evident that nothing could revive him. Blake was not hurt and immediately grabbed his pack and controlled three fires before returning to the lookout. A bronze plaque was later cemented to a rock near the lookout building and the present Blickensderfer Creek was named in his honor. This storm was also the cause of the fires, which burned over the upper part of the Upper Westbranch drainage. Also caused the death of two other men.

One afternoon on a steep south slope, south of the present Gleason Mountain, the fire picked up in fury. The overhead, fearing a crown fire, decided to remove the crew to safety and ordered all the men to follow.

Two men, Jackson and Gleason, decided there was a safer way out and refused to follow. Their bodies were later found where they had been trapped by the crown fire while trying to gain the ridge top.

The present Gleason Mountain and Jackson Mountain were named in honor of these men. As I recall, both were transient firefighters. I believe both were laid to rest in the Priest River Cemetery.

Prior to the beginning of the 1926 fire season, Ranger Murray offered me the position of office man and dispatcher at the Falls Station. The summer of 1926 was considered a severe fire season on the Kaniksu as well as on many other Forests in Region One. This office experience was invaluable to me during the coming years. My fiend, Emory Kapp, was very patient and helpful, and made several special trips to the Falls Station to explain policies and procedures. Paper work and office procedures were quite simple in those days as compared with those of 1956 when I retired and 1956 was simple compared to 1968. Those were the "Good Old Days."

THE NAME BISMARK

For years the present Priest Lake Ranger District was known as the "Bismark." While serving as District Ranger, I often wondered why. A nearby mountain was also named Bismark as well as the large meadows on Reeder Creek south of the station. I received the answer from John Nordman, John E. Hanson, and Andy Coolin. These old timers were living in the area during my tour of duty at the Bismark.

John Nordman homesteaded adjoining the Ranger Station on the west, now owned by Mrs. Rose Hurst. Nordman received his H.E. Patent April 30, 1913. The town of Nordman was named after Mr. Nordman. Nordman was related to the three Hagers: Ole, Swan, and John who also homesteaded around the Bismark meadows.

John E. (Jack) Hanson, homesteaded in Section 23, T60N., R5W., about one-half mile north of the Luby road. He received his H.E. Patent April 14, 1906. So far as I know Hanson was a bachelor. I recall Hanson telling that when he first came to that country, Bismark Mountain was covered with brush.

Andy Coolin was an early-day resident of the Priest Lake country. The town of Coolin where he lived was named after him. Do not know whether or not he ever homesteaded. I heard that Coolin had done considerable prospecting around Priest Lake. He had a son named Stewart.

According to these men, during the early days two trappers by the names of Bush and Bismark lived in a cabin near the site of the Bismark Station while trapping on the Bismark meadows, Reeder Creek, and surrounding area.

Bush was killed by a passenger train in Priest River. Had too many drinks and fell asleep on the railroad track, and the evening passenger train ended his career.

Bismark continued to trap alone. Very few knew him but for some time no one had seen or heard of him, so Nordman investigated and found him dead, frozen to death in his cabin. This was during the month of March; do not know the year. Nordman sent word to Hanson and Coolin to help bury the deceased. On an agreed date Hanson hiked from his ranch about 8-miles and Coolin came by boat from Coolin to Reeder Bay and hiked to the cabin. Being in March most of the country was snow covered. They selected a bare spot for the grave somewhere between the late Ralph Lambert's new residence and Reeder Creek and between the old and new highway. The site was covered with wild meadow grass with a few scattered wolf type lodge pole pine trees. I was shown the grave in its natural state by A. S. (Del) McQuilkin. Nordman and Hanson related that they had difficulty digging on account of fairly large round rocks. That required all hands to lift out. They estimated the grave was 4 feet deep. They then went to the cabin and attempted to make a rough box from split cedar but lacked nails to fasten it together. So they carried the body over in blankets, since he passed away in bed. When they arrived at the gravesite, about a foot of water had seeped in and they wondered what to do. They had no bucket to dip out the water and it was getting late so they lowered the body, placed the troublesome rocks on the body and filled the hole. There was a distinct mound as I recall with a headboard of split cedar. Nordman said that the cabin where Bismark lived was the worst smelling place he had ever experienced. He said they skinned the fur animals inside the cabin, threw the carcasses out the door, which added to the smell, and that the smell inside the cabin was almost unbearable. He also stated that Bismark's body was covered with open raw sores. No one knew the cause of death.

Later, after Ralph Lambert bought the Ole Hager place and built the new residence, I attempted to locate the grave for Mr. Lambert in 1957 but was not successful because they had messed up the area with a bulldozer for a cattle pasture. Nordman also stated that some time after the burial they burned the cabin to dispose of the smell and any possible contagious disease.

I have looked in vain for some evidence of the cabin location but never found any clues. It is believed this happened prior to the creation of the National Forests in 1908.

Thereafter, locally the site of trappers cabin was referred to as "Bismark." Later, due to the available horse pasture, a Guard and pack station was established and in 1927 after the creation of the Bismark District it was known as the Bismark Ranger Station. The District name has since been appropriately changed to Priest Lake District. However, a mountain and a large meadow were also named in Bismark's honor and probably will remain for all time.

Recently I was talking to Leland L. (Lee) White who succeeded me as District Ranger in March 1940. Lee also was shown the grave by Del McQuilkin. Lee promised to attempt to locate the grave. Later he told me he was not able to find it due to clearing activities. We both thought that if the site could be definitely located, it should be preserved as an historical site if permissible by the owners.

THE DALKENA LUMBER COMPANY - August 20, 1912 Timber Sale

Prior to my retirement I was assigned the job of sorting the very old closed timber sale folders for the purpose of retaining those of historical value and disposing of the others.

That was about 1954. Among the hundreds of sale folders reviewed of which many were retained, one sale stands out in my memory, which had a note stapled to the folder, which read "The largest sale in the Region." This was the Dalkena Lumber Company 8-20-12 Timber Sale.

Thinking that some of the statistics, volumes, and stumpage prices, personnel involved, etc., may be of interest to some of the present day personnel, most of which probably never heard of this sale, I recently reviewed this sale folder for some of the highlights.

The sale agreement was signed May 3, 1913, by E. W. Harris, General Manager for the Dalkena Lumber Co.; witnesses were E. B. Tanner and Meyer H. Wolff. The agreement was approved at Washington D.C. September 9, 1913, by Henry S. Graves, Forester, and witnessed by R. Y. Stewart. (Stewart was later Chief Forester in 1931.)

James W. Girard's signature appears on many of the cost reports; his title was scaler. I never met Girard but heard of him many times during my early employment. Mallory N. Stickney was the Forest Supervisor during 1912. Howard R. Flint signed several papers as Forest Supervisor in 1920.

About 1925 the National Geographic Society and the U.S. Geological Survey conducted an expedition down the Salmon River during the month of October. The article "Down Idaho's River of No Return" was published in the July 1926 issue of the National Geographic magazine.

Howard R. Flint, at that time Regional Forest Inspector, was assigned to the expedition by the Forest Service to study the plants and animals.

During the trip Flint came down with a cold. A few days later he became very sick and weak. The party rushed him to Mackay Bar 25 miles down river, 2 days away. In the meantime they radioed for a plane to meet them. Dick Johnson of the Johnson Flying Service met them at Mackay Bar; Flint was rushed to Missoula, but all was in vain; his cold developed into pneumonia and he passed away while the expedition was in progress.

Fred Morrel was District Forester (no Regional Forest) in 1941.

Fred Forsythe is mentioned in an undated memorandum; he was in charge of a cruising party on the sale area. The sale was advertised in the Spokesman-Review on January 19, 1931, with the following volumes and stumpage prices.

Total volume 263,000 M feet B.M. on 18,240 acres, located as follows:

No. 1	Lower Westbranch Chance 5,000 acres 66,000 M. feet B.M. 57% white pine and 66,000 cedar poles
No. 2	Moore Creek - Upper Westbranch Chance 11,000 acres 140,800 M. feet B.M. 55% white pine and 110,000 cedar poles
No. 3	Main Priest River Chance 2,240 acres 32,100 M. feet B. M. 51% white pine and 15,500 cedar poles

The following stumpage prices were advertised and bid. Apparently there was no competition in the bidding.

No. 1	White pine	5.00
	Yellow pine	2.00
	Spruce and dead W.P.	1.00
	All other species	.50
No. 2	Same except white pine	3.00
No. 3	Same

(See following page for prices paid for cedar poles.)

This sale was reappraised periodically and continued until the summer of 1930 when the company sawmill located at Lakena, Washington, burned to the ground and the company ceased operation.

During the spring of 1930 after returning from Half Moon Fire damage cruise in Glacier Park, I helped cruise the remainder of the sale which was up for reappraisal. Lester Eddy, Neil Fullerton, and I were in the cruising party.

As I recall, we had to walk to Camp No. 1, near the old Pelke Station because the road was impassable to motor vehicles of any kind. We walked on the railroad tracks. It usually was July 1 before the road was passable.

According to the contract the company was responsible for brush disposal under the supervision of the Forest Officer in charge. Some years later this was changed and the company deposited cooperative brush disposal funds.

I wonder if this is still the largest timber sale in Region One?

CEDAR POLES UPPER WESTBRANCH CHANCE

Split post 10 cents per hundred

THE YEAR 1926

I was snuggly settled and enjoying my new job when all thunder broke loose. On the night of July 12, several hundred lightning fires were started by a dry storm. It was reported that the lookout on Monumental Lookout counted 240 individual fires visible from his station. The weather continued hot, dry, and windy for many days. Within hours all Districts were out of smokechasers and men. There were very few roads or trails. The road from Priest River ended at Nordman and Coolin. There were no side roads. The only trails were up the major drainages and as a result many small fires burned together within a few days, which resulted in fewer but bigger fires (but not necessarily better). The Kaniksu, this was prior to combining with the Pend Oreille, after a week or so had about 1500 men on fires from all walks of life. Many camps were pack camps with long hikes, in many cases trails had to be reconstructed to reach the fire. All camps were crying for more men but few came. The atmosphere was so thick with smoke that lookouts were useless. Fire scouts made trips but when they returned they did not know where they had been since visibility was almost zero.

During 1925 and 1926, J. C. Whittum was Forest Supervisor, Francis Carroll was Assistant Supervisor. Emory M. Kapp was Administrative Assistant. Floyd Cossett was Staffman of Lands & Recreation. John Breen was Staffman in Timber, Management. There were two women clerks. Robert Dow, Gordon McGillivray, Rolf Fremming, Bill Ferwerda, and Charles H. Tracy were on timber sale work.

Prior to 1925, I was only vaguely aware that there was such an organization as the United States Forest Service. My only experience with the Service was 2 weeks as a firefighter the summer of 1921 on the Sullivan Lake District and several weeks as a brush piler. I recall that Gordon McGillivray was office man for Art Pauley. Now after one season's experience as a lookout, I find myself holding down the position of office man-dispatcher. Little did I know what was in store for me that summer. There was considerable turnover among transient firefighters who were paid at the Supervisor's Office at Newport. Apparently there were many errors made by the timekeepers at the fire camps, instructions were issued that I audit and OK all time slips prior to being forwarded to Newport, this took considerable time since in those days there were no adding machines or other office equipment other than an old Oliver typewriter. In fact, during my 30 years in the Forest Service, 16 of which were as District Ranger, I never had an adding machine.

The country from the Gleason Mountain ridge to High Rock Mountain, on the Priest Lake District, was on fire. Firefighters going into the Granite Creek drainage had to hike from Nordman to a base camp located at Stagger Inn, a distance of about 15 miles. After the 15-mile hike, some of the men more or less staggered in and someone appropriately named the camp "Stagger Inn." A sign from a ration box was nailed to a tree bearing this name and remained there for several years. It finally became officially known as "Stagger Inn." A year or two later a log smokechaser cabin was constructed on the site.

During 1926 fires also burned much of the Fedar Creek area and the upper part of the Lamb Creek drainage. Also, a good sized fire in Section 22 and 23, T59N, R5W, in the lower Upper Westbranch drainage. The Quartz Mountain fire occurred in 1926. It covered several sections.

Another fire burned the area west of Kalispell Bay, now a plantation. Most of the fire-killed white pine timber was salvaged during the fall of 1926 and summer of 1927.

There were five Ranger Districts in 1926 on the old Kaniksu.

There were three of us batching at the Falls Ranger Station and we lived on canned goods from fire camps that had lost their labels. We never were sure what the menu would be until we opened the cans. At first we would shake the can and decide if it sounded like peaches. Upon opening the can we usually discovered that it wasn't peaches, but sauerkraut. Gradually we coded the cans by recording numbers, letters, etc., stamped on the can. This enabled us to distinguish sauerkraut from peaches.

In 1928, when I was the District Ranger, I met a car about half a mile above Stagger Inn. A man and woman from Spokane had come over Pass Creek Pass from Sullivan Lake and were trying to locate Stagger Inn. I told them that it was about half a mile down the road, the woman replied that was wonderful because she was starved. I informed them there was no eating-place there. She became very indignant and told me they saw a road sign indicating the mileage to Stagger Inn, and they had decided to have dinner there. The Forest Service received quite a tongue lashing for such a misleading sign. Between her outbursts, I tried to explain how the Inn had gotten its name. Apparently this did not satisfy her hunger. I directed them to Elkins Resort.

By the middle of August, most of the fires in the lower county had been controlled, but there were many miles of open fire line in the high backcountry. Finally on the night of August 16 it started to rain and continued for 3 days and nights. It even snowed in some of the fire camps in the high country.

I was a very inexperienced dispatcher. Ranger Murray had little time to train me and things began with a loud bang the morning of July 13 when all the fires started. Emory Kapp was very helpful. He made several trips to the Falls office to assist and train me in the policy and procedure. Mrs. Murray was also a big help. The office was located in the Ranger's dwellings with a door between the office and the kitchen. I believe Mrs. Murray knew as much about office procedure as Mr. Murray did.

George Duncan from Missoula was reconstructing the Priest River-to-Nordman Road. Duncan had a warehouse in Priest River stocked with the usual food supplies carried by the Central Purchase Warehouse in Spokane. Mrs. Duncan was in charge of the warehouse. Ranger Districts tributary to Priest River ordered their supplies from Duncan's warehouse. During the fires all fire camp supplies were ordered through Duncan's warehouse and delivered by their trucks. Usually it was midnight before I was able to phone in all the orders from the many camps. The basic fire tools in those days consisted of 2-man crosscut saws, grub hoes, mattocks, double bitted axes and #2 shovels. I had never seen or heard of the Pulaski tool at that time.

During March 1927, I was unemployed. Forest Supervisor J. C. Whittum offered me the opportunity to attend a 30-day Ranger school at the Priest River Experiment Station if I would do so without pay. Since it was planned to offer me an appointment during the coming fall, I attended this school. Instructors were: W. W. White from the Regional Office; J. N. Templar, Forest Supervisor, Deer Lodge National Forest; and Otto York, a District Ranger (I do not recall the Forest). Jack Yost was the District Ranger at the Benton Station at the time. Since we burned most of his wood supply, one weekend we had a "wood cutting bee." The crosscut saws we used were in poor cutting condition, so I volunteered to sharpen several. Mr. White was so impressed that he decided to have a saw filing class with myself as instructor. Everything went fairly well until it came time to swedge the rakers. Most of the new appointees were awkward with the swedging hammer, and the rakers on about six good saws were broken and the saws ruined. Mr. White said it was worthwhile. I doubted this since Rangers and appointed personnel seldom file the Forest Service saws.

After the disastrous fires of 1926 it was decided to create two more Ranger Districts. In 1927 the Bismark and Cusick Districts were created.

Clarence B. Sutliff, now retired and living in Walla Walla, Washington, (and a brother to Kenneth Sutliff employed at the S.O.) was the first District Ranger on the Bismark. Don McGregor was the Ranger on the Cusick District with headquarters at Cusick, Washington.

A. E. (Al) Spaulding, a student at the time, worked for Sutliff the summer of 1928. I was the office man and dispatcher during the summer of 1927. It was an easy fire season and most of the activity was directed on a large trail building program. George Duncan of Missoula was now constructing a road from Nordman to Stagger Inn. The work completed in 1927 made it possible to drive to the Forks of Granite. Within a couple of years it was possible to drive through to Sullivan Lake.

During 1927 the Dalkena Lumber Company logged the fire-killed timber in Fedar and Lamb Creek drainages. The timber from Fedar Creek area was dumped in Granite Creek just below where the Fedar Creek Road crosses Granite Creek. It was floated down Granite into Priest Lake during the spring flood.

The timber in Lamb Creek was decked for truck haul during winter by a fleet of solid rubber tired Republic trucks, owned by a Mr. Nelson of Spokane. Logs were dumped into Priest Lake at Kalispell Bay and towed to the outlet for the spring drive down Priest River. [1]

[1] See photos of scaling decked logs in 4 feet of snow.

For many years logs were transported to mills by a spring log drive on Priest River. Sawmills were located as follows: Beardsmore Mill at Priest River, Humbird Lumber Company Mill at Newport (now Diamond National), Dalkena Lumber Company Mill at Kalkena (burned 1931), Diamond Match Company Mill at Cusick and the Panhandle Lumber Company Mill at Ione.

The Humbird Lumber Company for years drove logs down the Lower Westbranch by a series of flood dams. In 1928 they constructed a log flume down the lower Westbranch from the dam site near the Falls Ranger Station, to the confluence with the Lower Westbranch and the main Priest River. However, this proved to be a bad investment since the grade was so flat that logs jammed in the flume due to slack water and usually the slides of the flume collapsed as fast as they were repaired. Part of the trouble was that much of the construction was done during the winter months and timbers were set on frozen ground and when the ground thawed the flume settled. I believe it was only used one summer and a few logs were delivered via the flume.

On October 27, 1927, while I was the foreman of a planting crew in the Zero Creek drainage, I received notice of my appointment. Clarence Knutson from Missoula who had made planting surveys on the Forest during the summer was in charge of the camp. Floyd Cossitt from the Supervisor's Staff was in charge overall. Karl Krueger, recently retired as Forest Supervisor of the Coeur d'Alene Forest, was my flagman.

There were three planting crews; it was the policy for the foreman to trade planters until gradually they were all the same speed. Roy Kinyon had the faster planters, known as the "Speed Balls;" the "In Betweens" were my crew and Billy Boar had the "Slow Pokes."

For recreation we had a set of horseshoes. One evening Clarence Knutson had won several games of horseshoes in a row. He challenged anyone in camp at $1.00 per game. No one volunteered, so finally after much coaxing I accepted the challenge. The whole gang was cheering for me and I won three games and $3.00.

This was a mistake on my part since I was from then on in the doghouse and Knutson criticized everything I did. I probably would have been discharged except for the fact that I had received my appointment. Knutson was later transferred to the Superior Forest in Minnesota. He passed away about 15 years ago. Floyd Cossitt transferred to a southern forest; I believe it was located in Georgia.

Several years after it was created, the Cusick Ranger District was abolished. Don McGregor was transferred to the Shiloh District during 1935 and was again transferred to the West Yellowstone District of the Gallatin Forest. A few years later he developed pneumonia while snow bound at the Ranger Station. He passed away before help could reach him.

During the summer of 1927, the first residence at the Bismark Ranger Station was constructed on a $1500 limitation. Most of the labor was contributed. Most of the funds were spent for materials. When the building allotment was exhausted the residence lacked a bathtub, toilet, linoleum, etc. The inside woodwork was unpainted and the walls were plastered but not painted and had no built-ins in the kitchen. Sutliff was single at that time. He married a year or so later and had a choice of either a bathtub or a toilet. He chose the toilet.

Rolf Fremming, now retired, was in charge of the construction. Rolf was a mechanical engineer and on the Forest Supervisor's timber staff. Fremming's parents lived on upper Goose Creek near the Idaho-Washington state line at the time.

Prior to 1927, the Bismark was a guard and pack station. Improvements consisted of log cookhouse, log barn (still standing) a frame warehouse, the front of which was partitioned off for a small office which served the purpose until 1935 when the combination office, warehouse and kitchen was constructed under the C.C.C. program. The log cookhouse was then raised. The old frame warehouse stood where the present shop and garage stand now. It was moved to a temporary location, where it remains today. I believe it is now the sign shop.

The water system consisted of a cistern pump between the present gasoline pump and the meadow. After Sutliff was married and had moved into the residence, he dug a well in a draw about 100 yards north of the present bunkhouse, which barely supplied our needs. He installed a 1,000-gallon pressure tank in the basement and pumped with a gasoline engine. When the pressure reached 75 pounds a lever was supposed to flip at the tank and cause a short circuit on the engine magneto, but it never worked. When I took over as Ranger in June 1932, it was discovered that this well was on private land we later abandoned it and dug another near the cookhouse-warehouse and constructed a 10,000-gallon reservoir on the hill east of the warehouse. When pumping into the pressure tank, usually a flood sprayed the basement. I would plan to stop it in 20 minutes, but always I seemed to get involved with other chores. A safety valve would pop off at 80 pounds pressure and the wife would phone or call for me to shut it off. I can hear her words now "the basement is all flooded again."

During my tenure at the Bismark, we were short of water during the dry part of every summer. It was nip and tuck for domestic purposes. Stock was watered at the cistern pump which had a good supply of water, but we were afraid it was contaminated due to old garbage and pit toilets close by to the north.

After the planting job on Zero Creek, I was assigned to Timber Management work marking timber during the fall and scaling logs after deep snow. All large sales were handled through the Supervisor's Office. There were not too many at one time and each large sale had a project man in charge.

There was a gentleman named Bill Ferwerda who was the scaler and project man in charge of the Dalkena Timber-Company sale on Fedar Creek. Ferwerda was terribly fussy about his scaler's cabin, such as coming in with wet shoes, etc. Robert Dow and Louis Fuess while working in the area stayed at the camp and slept in Ferwerda's cabin. Ferwerda was very critical of almost everything they did. On their last day after Ferwerda had left for work, they decided to give him a farewell that he would never forget. They stuffed burlap sacks into the stovepipes on the roof, as well as inside the heating stove. They nailed the extra scale rule to the wall and clinched the nails. They wired the eyelets of his rubber boots, twisted the wires tight and clipped them close.

3. See photos of Tom Baker and myself scaling decked logs in Lamb Creek, 12/1927. There was 4 feet of snow on the ground with zero temperature.

Ferwerda had a new pair of Malone wool pants that he had not worn yet. All blankets used by timber management were stenciled USFS-COOP with 3-inch letters and yellow paint for identification. They found the stencil and yellow paint and labeled the seat of the malone pants USFS-COOP.

When Ferwerda came in that evening he had quite a time getting a fire started. Finally he discovered the sacks in the pipe, after smoking up the cabin. When Ferwerda discovered the bright yellow USFS-COOP on the seat of his new wool pants, he phoned John Breen and made a formal complaint. Breen gave orders that they purchase a new pair of Malone trousers. A Mr. Fann operated a clothing store in Priest River and they had Fann order the largest size trousers made by the Malone Company and sent them to Mr. Ferwerda. I never heard whether or not Ferwerda was able to trade them in for a smaller size.

Not long after this incident, Bob Dow was assigned as project man on one of the large sales. He considered this a demotion and resigned. Within a short time Dow established the Dow Insurance Company in Priest River. He was elected and served several years as State Senator from Bonner County and for many years was Democratic County Chairman. Foremen hired for employment in the C.C.C. camps had to be cleared through Bob Dow; however, Dow so far as I know, cleared all requests regardless of political party affiliation. Bob passed away some years ago.

THE LAMB CREEK FLASH FLOOD

The upper part of the Lamb Creek drainage was burned over in 1926. Later, the Dalkena Lumber Company logged it. It was snagged about 1935 by a Blister Rust WPA crew. They had a winter camp just below the burn in the green timber, frame cookhouse, bunkhouse, etc. That fall the late Frank Walters, myself, and a few men burned the area. It happened on a Sunday early in June, with only a few men in camp.

A rather small black cloud developed over the upper drainage, a few claps of thunder and a cloudburst happened. Since the area was denuded, the rain rushed down the hills gathering cull logs, tops, and debris of all kinds. Those that saw it estimate there was a 20-foot head of water, partially dammed by logs and debris; finally the log jam stopped and held about 1 mile downstream in the green timber. The water broke through, washed out all bridges, culverts, and much of the road. It required a week with a bulldozer to repair the road so that a truck could get through. Later we attempted to burn the logjam but, as I recall, were not very successful. No one at the CCC camp F-142 or at the Ranger Station knew about the flood until someone hiked out and reported the disaster. The upper part of Lamb Creek was a small, narrow stream with moss covered banks and rocks. After the flood it was gouged and scoured about 20 to 40 feet wide with large boulders exposed. The water at the camp was so high that a log floated into the open door of the bunkhouse. It is fortunate that no one happened to be traveling the Lamb Creek Road below the spike camp during the flood since there was a great possibility of loss of life.

THE DIAMOND MATCH COMPANY
10-26-26 Timber Sale - Kalispell Creek

On the night of July 12, 1926, a series of dry lightning storms set several hundred fires on the Kaniksu Forest. The following days were hot, dry, and windy. There were several crew-sized fires the next day located in the upper half of the Kalispell Creek drainage on the Priest Lake District and no men available for a week or more. Much of the drainage burned.

A few weeks prior to the fires the Diamond Match Company had purchased all of the Northern Pacific land and timber within the drainage. At the end of the fire season a large portion of their timber had been fire killed. The Forest Service also had considerable fire-killed timber in the drainage.

The Diamond Match Company considered writing off the loss since it was in the remote upper portions of the drainage. A salvage sale was negotiated. After 38 years I do not recall the volumes involved, which was mostly white pine. Larch was optional, none except right-of-way was cut. However, for silvicultural reasons an estimated 5 million board feet of hemlock was included in the sale contract. Stumpage as follows: dead white pine $2.00 per M, no brush; green white pine $4.00 per M, plus $2.00 brush; hemlock $1.00 per M, other species $1.00 per M, plus $1.00 brush. Hemlock and mixed species appraised at a loss, which was offset by reducing the white pine stumpage.

In those days sales were for white pine. Hemlock was usually included for silvicultural reasons and usually appraised with a minus value, which was carried by the white pine values.

During the fall of 1926 the company started construction of an in-between gauge (i.e., between a narrow and standard gauge) railroad extending from Kalispell Bay on Priest Lake, up Kalispell Creek to Deer Horn Creek in the extreme upper part of the drainage, a distance of approximately 17 miles. Clarence Griggs was the engineer who located the railroad grades. Griggs later had charge of the construction of the Bonners Ferry municipal power dam on the Moyie River.

The railroad grades were constructed by hand labor on a station-to-station gypo basis. Most of the crews were Swedish and White Russians. As logging was completed in the upper drainage, camps were moved to lower country. Rails and ties picked up and branch lines extended up the following tributaries: Chute, Hungry, Rapids, Virgin, Nuisance, and Bath Creeks.

They had two logging trains consisting of a locomotive and nine log cars each. The locomotives were 20-ton, gasoline powered Plymouth with extra ballast. The engineer shifted gears more or less like a truck. (See photos.) Roger Morris of Sandpoint, retired and a long time employee of Lou's Auto Parts, was one of the locomotive engineers. Logs were dumped into a boomed area of Kalispell Bay. (See photos.)

During the annual spring log drive on Priest River the logs were towed to the outlet of Priest Lake and headed for the Cusick Mill. Humbird Lumber Company owned the Diamond Match Company's Newport mill at that time.

During 1926 and part of 1927 J. C. Whittum was Forest Supervisor, John Breen was staff man in charge of timber management. Francis Caroll assistant Supervisor - fire control. A year or two later James E. Ryan took over as Forest Supervisor; Karl Klehm, staff man in timber management; I. V. Anderson was assistant supervisor in fire control. About 1928 Anderson transferred to Missoula and Albert N. Cochrell replaced him.

John Gray was general manager for Diamond Match Company; Jack Barron was chief cruiser and timber procurement. Charles E. Olson, a well-known lumberman and sawmill operator, was logging superintendent. Tom Tedford and Ted Dick were camp foremen. There were several other camp foremen that I cannot recall. There were three logging camps operating simultaneously most of the time. Camps closed down for the winter usually late in December or early January depending on depth of snow and opened in the spring late in April or early May.

During 1927 and most of 1928 John Murray was project man in charge of the sale for the Forest Service, during this period most of the logging was in fire-killed timber.

John Murray was District Ranger at the Falls Ranger Station in 1925. I started my Forest Service career working for Murray.

Late in August of 1928 project man John Murray became ill and requested extended sick leave and I was assigned on September 1, 1928. They were still logging fire-killed white pine but much of it was checking, and boring insect larvae were prevalent. Soon all logging of fire-killed timber ceased. From then on all green timber had to be designated for cutting by marking. About 5 million of green hemlock was included in the sale for silvicultural reasons. The hemlock appraised at a loss but the white pine stumpage was lowered to absorb the loss. The trouble was the hemlock was very defective. The contract marking instructions defined a merchantable hemlock tree as any tree 50 percent sound.

During the winter of 1927 a marking crew snowshoed to one of the upper camps, batched, and marked the timber in Sec. 22, T36N, R45E. Part of the area was a large hemlock flat with scattered white pine. The crew marked about 50 percent of the hemlock. When I arrived they were logging in this area. Skidding with a 10-ton Holt Caterpillar from this landing logs were trailed over one-half mile of chute to the railroad below.

When I arrived there was a controversy as to whether or not the marked hemlock was merchantable. Some Forest Service personnel insisted that they had to cut it since it had been marked. The company had felled many hemlock trees but not one was merchantable. Most of the trees had visible conks. After looking over the area and cutting, I defied anyone to find one merchantable hemlock on the area. The sale area had many other areas with very defective hemlock that was included in the sale contract.

Karl Klehm was a proponent of clear-cut and burn of such climax types. Soon afterwards the sale contract was modified, marking instructions changed, etc. The sale was divided into three classifications, as follows: "Class A," selective cut, pile and burn; "Class B," selective cut, pile and burn with stand improvement; "Class C," clear cut all merchantable, control burn and plant. I believe this was some of the first clear-cut and controlled burn on the forest financed with brush disposal funds. Most of the felling was done by contract on a per acre basis, based on a cruise of the residual stand. We already had cost per acre based on hourly rates.

Incidentally, the plantation in Fedar Creek was clear cut, burned, and planted.

Most of my time was spent reclassifying the sale area into A, B, and C areas, marking boundaries, traversing the B areas for acreage, preparing bids, supervising cutting, marking timber, etc. I believe I marked 99 percent of the green timber cut on the sale.

I also had a 10- to 20-man brush crew with foreman. Crew boarded at the camps. Piling and burning kept pace with logging since camps were moved when cutting was completed. I had two and sometimes three scalers, depending on volume being cut on National Forest lands.

With the exception of a few long, flat skidding areas by tractor, all skidding was by horses. Very few old time lumberjacks on the job, mostly natives from around Priest River and surrounding area. Due to poor transportation they stayed in camp and went home over the weekends.

Logging was on a gypo basis. Strips at right angles to the railroad or chute were laid out and a price negotiated to saw and skid with horses rented from the company; the company furnished tools.

The logging camps were quite modern as compared to the old time camps prior to World War I when they worked the 10 hours per day and everybody carried his own bedroll, slept on double deck wooden bunks with a little hay for a mattress. Everybody hung their wet socks and clothes around the central barrel stove in the bunkhouse. No bath facilities. Those days are sometimes referred to as "the good ole days" but what a smell.

Prior to World War I, I worked at several of these old time logging camps. Generally they all served very good food but living conditions were terrible.

A book could be written about the old time logging camps, lumberjacks, and camp foremen, many of which were characters in their own right and known throughout the Inland Empire. Wood-em-up George Yarno and Moonlight Joe Piatt were two of the camp foremen with reputations. But I had better return to the 10-26-26 sale.

As logging was completed in the upper part of the drainage, camps were moved to lower country, rails and ties picked up and railroads were extended up side drainages. There were many miles of hewn log chutes up some of the steep side tributary creeks, none of which can now be identified on account of the Gleason Mountain fire of 1939.

It is doubtful that any of the clear-cut and burn areas treated on the sale area could be identified today on the ground except by a map showing the areas. However, there is one area easily identified located in the xxxxx-1/4 of Sec. 34, T16N, R5W, about 1 mile north of the new Priest Lake Ranger Station. This area was felled during the spring of 1931, burned the fall of 1932, and planted the spring of 1933. The present highway passes through the east end of the area.

Washington State law required that private companies dispose of logging debris. Generally, the Diamond Match Company disposed of logging brush by setting fire to concentrated brush piles left by the gypos along skidding trails. Usually this resulted in a broadcast burn killing all residual timber and had the appearance of a forest fire.

Some years later the Government acquired all the Diamond Match Company lands in the drainage by tripartite land exchange.

Later about 1935 a CCC camp, No. 102, was established just inside the Washington State line. For a winter project the CCC crews snagged all of the 1926 burn plus the areas broadcast burned by the Diamond Match Company. It was planned to control burn the whole area the fall of 1939. However, Mother Nature decided differently; a dry lightning strike about 2 p.m. on August 25, 1939, started a fire in a draw near the top of the north slope of Gleason Ridge that contained a heavy concentration of fuels in the NW-1/4 Sec. 35, T36N, R45E. A sudden strong wind started soon afterwards, which within an hour or two spread the fire in a northeast direction. Before this fire was controlled it covered 9,300 acres. But that is another story covered by a separate chapter.

It is believed that the Kalispell Creek drainage, as a whole, especially in the State of Washington, experienced the most complete and drastic face lifting of any comparable drainage within any Forest in Region One. Personally, I saw the drainage prior to a tree being cut. When I visited the area during the late years, it was difficult to realize or visualize the changes that had transformed the old to the present appearances.

I was just looking at a list of Region One retirees and noticed the name of Joseph S. Boismier. Joe was a crosscut saw filer for the Diamond Match Company during the life of this sale. Later he was employed as a saw filer at the Spokane Warehouse. He had a Civil Service rating. He retired in 1955 and now lives in Spokane. I visited several times with Joe when I had occasion to visit the warehouse prior to my retirement.

It was early spring and camps were operating and our brush crew was burning piled brush. On May 8, 1930, Mary Podlas and I were married. I had only 3 days leave. We got as far as Wallace, Idaho, on our honeymoon which probably wasn't the most romantic trip ever taken by newlyweds. Afterwards, we lived on Priest Lake in a two-room government houseboat, which I had previously stocked with furniture and supplies. The houseboat was on float logs and anchored to piling on the south shore of Kalispell Bay near a permittee summer home. Waves rocked us to sleep on many occasions.

The men in the different camps took up a collection of $130 to buy a wedding present. They couldn't decide what to buy, not knowing what we had or needed most, so they decided to give us the cash to purchase what we needed or wanted. One day while I was working, the landing camp cook came over and handed Mary a cigar box full of money and a box of chocolates with an apology for the amount collected because many of the fellows were short of funds, not having worked long enough to have received their first check. We were very surprised since we hadn't expected any present from that source. We bought a nice console radio.

Late that summer Mary's younger sister, Frieda, visited us for several weeks. One day while I was on the job the houseboat broke loose and took off toward Kalispell Island and the Upper Lake country. They were accused by everybody of attempting to explore Priest Lake on their own without a paddle. It was a windy day and only a few strands of telephone wire secured the houseboat to the piling and the wire appeared to have worn apart. The landing crew finally discovered they were afloat and leaving the country and rescued them via outboard boat and motor. All was forgiven and I really secured the houseboat for keeps.

The houseboat was later floated to the Beaver Creek Ranger Station, beached and used as a bunkhouse.

At the start of the sale the Forest Service had a used, small, three wheeled, gasoline powered "Buda" speeder for use by the project man. It was located at the landing camp locked in a small speeder house. When I took over, I made inquiry about it and was told garage mechanics could not make the motor operate and that it jumped the rails and was dangerous so I forgot about it.

However, after getting married, living at Kalispell Bay, the job 4 miles by car and 5 or 6 miles by railroad tracks (hiking) transportation was a problem. One weekend prior to marriage I experimented with the speeder. I succeeded in getting the motor to run but no power and the pesky thing did jump the track. Partially dismantled the motor and found that a badly worn part prevented the exhaust valve from opening. I made a new part by hand from the shank of a cant hook at the blacksmith shop, case hardened the part, and away we went, with plenty of power and speed. However, it still jumped the rails. Then I remembered the old saying "after everything else fails, read the instructions." There was an instruction book. After lining up the wheels according to instructions, it never again jumped the rails. It was used daily to and from the camps, to home and from camp to camp during working days. Estimated I traveled several thousand miles by speeder. I could haul two passengers beside myself and usually met Ryan or Klehm or both when they visited the sale.

Incidentally, a new part was ordered from the company prior to making one by hand. It finally came after about 40-days but never was installed; the handmade part continued to work perfectly. After the sale the speeder was transferred to the Panhandle Lumber Company logging railroad in LeClerc Creek to haul planting stock to a backcountry plantation. I heard they never were able to successfully operate it and finally substituted pack mules.

Several years later while I was District Ranger I observed what I considered to be one of nature's phenomena in regard to restoring some kind of cover growth to barren burned area. This happened on part of the sale area so I should like to mention it at this time. Believe the year was about 1936. During the fall of 1936 we had control-burned a large area in Sections 10, 14, and 16, T36N, R45 E, with a CCC crew. The area concerned was fire-killed during 1926, and had been snagged by the CCC crews. The specific area was in the SE-l/4 of Section 10 and the NE-1/4 of Section 15, along the present road, mostly on the upper side on a south slope for a distance of about 1 mile before the road reaches Sema Pass. The soil was sandy with some rock here and there. The area burned very hard and clean to bare soil. The next spring the area turned a green with a thick stand of small Ceanothus veluntinus commonly called "buck-brush." There was a very uniform stand as though someone had seeded it with a mechanical seeder. No ceanothus was observed on the area after the 1926 fire and prior to the control burn. My question is, where did Mother Nature obtain the seed? It is difficult for me to visualize that the seed was stored in the soil from the years past or to have been blown there by wind since the seeds are rather heavy.

The seed must have been stored in the soil, but how did they remain viable after two fires? Why didn't they germinate after the 1926 fire? I have asked many people but no one had any answer.

The area was planted to ponderosa pine during the spring of 1936; the survival was fair to good. Within a few years there was severe competition between the small pine and the ceanothus brush. Some years later, in the late forties or early fifties, the area was sprayed with an herbicide from a helicopter to kill the brush. I would suggest that anyone reading this should examine the area if their travels take them by there. The last time I visited the area was 8 years ago in 1960. Would like to visit the area and drainage next summer. I have often heard the saying, "nature abhors a scar." To me, what I have related demonstrates the amazing and persistent laws of nature to heal a scar in a seemingly impossible situation.

At that time it was a policy that the project man prepare a cutover area report at the completion of the large timber sales. I prepared such a report during the winter of 1931. As far as I know it was the only one submitted up to that time; primarily due to changing project men many times during the life of the sale and as a result nobody had the complete history of what happened. The changing of project men was due to the belief that after 30 days at one location they would have to pay board on their own. However, after Klehm came it was discovered that no one had to pay board regardless of length of duty on one sale. Therefore, I remained until the sale was completed.

The last time I checked the closed files on the Diamond Match Company 10-26-26 sale about 1954 the cutover area report was missing and so far as I know it never was located. However, there should be a copy in the Regional Office.

During the summer of 1930 John Gray of Spokane, Inland Empire General Manager for the Diamond Match Company, and Charles E. Olson, the company logging superintendent, visited the sale. I transported them via speeder, camp to camp and up side spurs, etc., to different operations. I mentioned that it was a mystery to me that there was a profit in matches which retailed at 5 cents per box, when one considered all the different activities and operations necessary to produce that box of matches, such as cruising, felling, skidding, loading, hauling, river-drive, pond storage, saw milling, air drying, shipping to Spokane block factory, cutting into match blocks, shipping to Chico, California, making into matches, packing in boxes, shipping to wholesalers, shipping to retail outlets and selling for 5 cents per box. Mr. Gray requested that I guess the average value to the company for 1,000 ft. b.m. of #1 match stock after being manufactured into matches. My guess wasn't even close. According to Mr. Gray the value was approximately $2,100 i.e., the value they received from the wholesale trade. Then the question was, what was the production cost? Again my guesses weren't close. The production cost was about $1,300. From those figures it was apparent there was a profit of $800; I believe that is about a 61.4 percent profit. Not a bad investment. However, not all white pine lumber is suitable for match stock; only a small percent grades #1 match stock.

During the fall of 1926 and 1927 I helped mark considerable timber on quite a number of large timber sales. The marking policy in mature white pine stands was to leave three to five 24", full crowned "Koch. Specials" per acre, wherever possible and mark the balance for cutting. The Koch specials were named after Ellers Koch, for year's assistant Regional Forester, in charge of timber management.

PERSONALITIES AND LIFE IN THE OLD LOGGING CAMPS

I believe I would be remiss if I failed to jot down a few lines regarding some of the well known, old-time logging camp foremen and a few remarks about the old-time lumberjacks and logging camps.

John Specht was a logging camp foreman from the old school. He came west with the Lake states lumberjacks after Paul Bunyon more or less completed logging in that territory. He was an iced road sleigh-haul proponent. He settled in Priest River and for years was camp foreman for the Dalkena Lumber Company. John was a big, raw-boned man and a rough and tumble lumberjack style fighter. According to the tales they told, many tried but few could defeat him.

Specht had a dislike for low rubber shoes, the kind used without leather tops. Also, he disliked anyone who smoked cigarettes, roll-your-own or tailor-made; usually let them work 1 day and promptly discharged them. He also had a habit to kick the bunkhouse door open in the morning and yell "All out" and for no apparent reason would pick out at random two or three men, tell them to get their time slips at the office then on second thought tell the last man to wait, "I'll get you a partner." For a big man he had a high-pitched, squeaky voice, but when he spoke they usually listened. They tell of an incident in the early days. Specht was foreman of a logging camp located on Priest Lake near Granite Creek. One day for no apparent reason, other than to show who was boss, he discharged a husky young lumberjack who had considerable experience with professional boxing. After he arrived in Priest River and had a few drinks he decided to return to camp and give Mr. Specht a lesson to remember. He told his plans to Buck Brozick, the company office manager at Priest River. From the looks of the man Brozich thought possibly the fellow was capable of winning the fight and figured he should phone the camp and warn Specht. However, he was busy and forgot to phone until towards evening the next day. Specht answered the phone, after Brozick warned him that so and so was planning to return to camp and give him a licking, Specht replied, "He has already been here."

Personally I never met Specht until about 1936 when he was hired as a foreman at the World War I F-159 CCC camp. I had developed a dislike for the man from the many stories told of his many escapades. The environs around the Bismark Ranger Station consisted mostly of a dense stand of seedling, and small pole reproduction, old windfalls, etc. It was a bad fire hazard. John Specht was the foreman of a crew of CCC's that spent several months fireproofing and cleaning up the area so I got to know him quite well. He must have changed; possibly he mellowed in later years. At any rate, I found him to be a very nice person; we all liked and respected him. He was a good CCC foreman.

George (Wood-em-up) Yarno. Wood-em-up George, as he was known, was for many years a logging camp foreman for the Diamond Match Company. He was of the old school, sort of cantankerous at times in that he liked to discharge men indiscriminately; however, he would rehire them a few days later. Wood-em-up George was a great lover of horses and all of his logging was by horse skidding. When the skidding jammers and heel booms took over the skidding, George quit the woods and moved to California and started raising racehorses. He was killed in a car wreck a few years later.

During my time as District Ranger on the Bismark (now Priest Lake) District, Yarno logged the upper Branch Creek drainage; had a tent camp in Section 24, T34N, R45E. It was in this camp where he shot a bear, which had been raiding the meat and cookhouse. (This episode is covered by a separate story, "Bear in the Logging Camp.")

Next he logged the Upper West Branch country, the camp was located a short distance upstream from the upper bridge on the Squaw Valley Road. From there they moved to Goose Creek and logged that drainage.

Hauling was by company trucks. During the summer the Squaw Valley road would get badly wash boarded with all the truck travel. We had a road grader operated by a CCC enrollee, Ishmael (Red) Evans. I believe Red is now grader operator for the Newport District. Since this was a Class I road with a lot of travel we attempted to grade it as often as possible but sometimes it became very rough between visits. About this time the residence phone would ring during the evening; it was often Wood-em-up George. First he would invite me to camp for supper the next day, saying they were having fried chicken and ice cream, etc. Then he would talk shop and other miscellaneous subjects, and then, finally, would inquire as to the whereabouts of the road grader. Later when I heard his voice on the phone I would inform him as to the grader before he could mention fried chicken and ice cream. Every time I happened to stop at camp during the evening he always took me on a tour of the horse barn; they had beautiful horses. George would give me a verbal biography of each horse. The company sent him to the Palouse country each spring to purchase new horses so he had a complete history of each horse; how much it cost, weighed, age, etc.

From Goose Creek Yarno and the outfit moved to Little Lightning Creek. The company constructed a standard gauge railroad from Kootenai to the upper part of the drainage. The Plymouth gasoline locomotives used on the Kalispell Creek sale were modified to standard gauge and used on this job. Log cars were transferred to the Spokane International Railroad near Kootenai; then transported to a spur on the south side of Pend Oreille River just below the S.I. bridge below Dover where the logs were dumped into log booms in the river and periodically towed to Albeni Falls. This logging operation was about half completed in 1940 when I transferred to the Shiloh (now Sandpoint) District.

Dick Ferrel, a lumberjack preacher from a mission in Spokane was known throughout the logging camps of eastern Washington and Idaho. Dick, as he was known, traveled from camp to camp, made the rounds about once a month. He was always welcome and usually stayed one night. During the evening, services were held, usually in the cookhouse; afterwards a hat was passed and a collection taken. Dick was never charged for board or lodging. He confessed that in his younger days he was a drunkard, a gambler, and led an aimless, useless life.

I attended about four or five of Dick's services. In my opinion he gave a very common sense sermon, void of shouting and violent pleading, based on the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments.

I believe that most of the fellows in camp attended the services. Many of the lumberjacks have quite a vocabulary of profane words. However, it was noticed that they refrained from using cuss words in Ferrell's presence. Should someone forget, others promptly cautioned them.

Ferrel made regular visits to the logging camps on the Diamond Match Company 10-26-26 sale and always came over to my cabin for a visit.

The Blind Peddler

For years when logging camps were operating throughout the Inland Empire it was a common sight in the camps and surrounding towns to see an elderly, blind peddler led by an Airedale dog on a chain. I never knew the man's name although I have seen him many times. This fellow was a logging camp salesman; he usually had quite an assortment of shaving supplies, shoe laces, pencils, toothpaste, brushes, combs, and many other articles used by the personnel of logging camps. I have purchased many articles from him myself. I still have a razor (straight edge and strop) that was purchased from him. He usually stopped a couple of days at each camp. The seeing-eye Airedale dog seemed to be devoted and apparently a very intelligent, well trained dog; he seemed to know where his master wanted him to take him. I have watched him many times in Priest River leading his charge all over town; always waited until the street was clear of traffic before proceeding.

The Old-time Lumberjack and Camps

The old time lumberjack is a vanishing breed of man; very few are alive, today. They are the men who worked as lumberjacks in the Lake states during their younger days and migrated to the west as the timber diminished in the east. They were of many nationalities with Scandinavians and French-Canadians well represented. Prior to World War I they carried their own bedroll and each had a packsack with all of his personal belongings, and quite often his entire fortune.

I worked in some of the camps for short periods during this time. I was a sawyer. The bunkhouses usually were large and constructed of logs. A row of double decked wooden bunks was along each side. A double drum style heating stove made from oil barrels was located in the center of the building between the rows of bunks. There was a 2 x 12 plank (deacon) seat attached to the lower bunk and extending the full length of the building except in one corner which was occupied by a wooden trough on an incline that was used for wash-up. There were no drying rooms or facilities for taking a bath or doing laundry. However, they did have one luxury—hot water with which to wash. A hot water tank was an open metal barrel near the heating stove. The water was heated with pipe coils in the heater.

Most of the lumberjacks wore woolen two-piece underwear winter and summer. Usually they came in sweaty and often wet and hung their wet, sweaty clothes and socks around the heating stove to dry. The smell was indescribable. Talk about air pollution and smog!! This was something, with tobacco smoke, and 50 men drying their clothes and socks, and all the other odors of hard working men who seldom took a bath or changed their clothes for weeks and sometimes months at a time for the simple reason that there were no facilities for bathing or laundering.

There was one redeeming feature of the old time logging camp; they had good cooks and served very good food and plenty of it. The old salt pork and bean days of the past were long gone in this area. These camps were home to many of those fellows. They were single and foot loose. Many stayed over winter and some were short staked and moved from camp to camp. It was a policy that if they came to the camp looking for a job they received two or three free meals and lodging if there were empty bunks, otherwise they slept on the benches. They had a code of ethics. They would never ask for a job from the foreman; it was up to the foreman to offer them a job. Most of them were specialists i.e., teamster, sawyer, swamper, canthook men, etc., and if there wasn't an opening for his line of work, he took off for the next camp. There were many camps in the woods those days. The cookhouse also had a code of ethics. No talking at the table except to request passing of food. Should a green horn or someone start visiting, the cook or second cook, armed with a large butcher knife would tap you on the shoulder and remind you to eat and get out.

Prior to World War I they worked 10 hours per day, 6 days per week. In the morning when the foreman kicked the bunkhouse door open, the new arrivals would be sitting on the benches. The foreman usually knew the men and the kind of work they were looking for. If there were jobs available they were hired; otherwise, they took off for another camp. Usually the foreman visited the bunkhouse the night before and sized up the new arrivals; sometimes he would discharge a few men the next morning to make room for some of the new faces, especially if he knew them. It didn't mean anything in those days to be discharged by a camp foreman; if you came back a few days later you probably would be hired again.

During the earlier days wages were so much per month with board. Later it was on an hourly basis with board deducted. Prior to and during World War I there was some effort to organize the woods workers into labor unions. First there was the Four L's: Loyal Legion of Loggers and Lumbermen. This so-called union was organized and dominated by the lumber companies. Very few of the lumberjacks were members; members were mostly sawmill workers. I personally know of one instance where the mill workers picked a spokesman to request a 25¢ per day pay raise. The manager promptly discharged the spokesman and the rest went back to work with no raise.

Later the I.W.W., Industrial Workers of the World, was organized. It is believed that most of the lumberjacks joined the I.W.W. for the simple reason that it advocated that the companies furnish bedding, mattresses, and steel cots; smaller and more sanitary bunkhouses, separate drying rooms and bath and laundry facilities. Many were arrested for membership, which was alleged to be violation of a law known as Criminal Syndicalism. I believe this law was to prevent sabotage during World War I. Many thought it was a vicious law when applied to the I.W.W. lumberjack membership; however, many were given prison terms for no reason other than membership. Some were radicals but most were only trying to better their working conditions. Generally they were given credit for forcing the companies to improve camp facilities. About this time a Federal law was passed making the 8-hour day mandatory.

After I was discharged from military service in 1919 I recall reading about a trial in Spokane. Several lumberjacks were arrested for having I.W.W. membership cards in their possession. A prominent lady resident of Spokane was on the jury. She requested knowledge as to why it was a crime to carry an I.W.W. membership card. The prosecuting attorney explained that the members of the I.W.W. wanted 8-hour working days, be furnished bed and bedding, bath and laundry facilities, etc., in the logging camps. The lady made quite a name for herself when she got through telling all within hearing that if it was a crime to want a place to take a bath, laundry, bedding, etc., there was something wrong with the law under which they were arrested. They were acquitted.

Many of these fellows stayed in camp all winter, saved in every way possible in order to make a "big stake," then headed for town—quite often Spokane—and bought needed new clothes, calked boots, etc., paid their room rent in advance and proceeded to paint the town red. After their money, which they spent freely, was gone they headed for a logging camp to make another stake.