Trails of the Past: Historical Overview of the Flathead National Forest, Montana, 1800-1960

adit - A horizontal drift or passage from the ground surface into a mine.

administrative site - Term used by Forest Service to denote an area reserved for administrative use of the agency, such as the site of a guard station, pasture for government stock, lookout, or camping area.

alidade (firefinder) - A sighting apparatus used by lookouts to determine the horizontal bearing and sometimes the vertical angle of a fire from a lookout.

alienated land - Land within the boundaries of a national forest that is not managed by the Forest Service. It might be owned by an individual or by a large lumber company, for example.

allotment - The area covered under a grazing permit.

allowable cut - Amount of timber that a district, forest, or region is allowed to cut in one year, generally calculated by volume.

arrastra - A drag-stone mill for pulverizing ores containing valuable minerals.

aspect - The direction a slope is facing (its exposure in relation to the sun).

backcountry - Area that does not have road access and thus is relatively remote.

bed - A horizontal seam or deposit of mineral.

big wheels - Special wagon used for hauling logs in the summers, with two very large wheels (one end of the log would be supported on the wagon, the other would drag behind it).

blaze - Mark made on a tree trunk with an axe to identify a trail.

blowdown - Timber blown over in a windstorm.

blowup - Sudden increase in fire intensity or rate of spread sufficient to prevent direct control or to upset existing control plans.

board foot - The unit in which the volume of a log is measured. A board-foot is a volume equivalent to a piece of wood one foot square and one inch thick.

brigade - During the early 1800s, a large group of men who would be sent into an area to trap all the fur-bearing animals in the region.

bucking - The process of sawing a downed tree into sections of the length desired for transportation. Bucking converts a tree into a log.

chute - A log track or trough or ditch used to transport logs from one location to another by sliding them with the help of gravity or of draft animals.

Continental Unit - Experimental aerial forest fire control area created in 1945 on 2 million acres of roadless wilderness, including part of the Flathead National Forest. The network relied on fire detection by airplane and on fire suppression by smokejumpers (primarily).

contributed time - Hours of work that a Forest Service employee does for the agency at no charge. The free work often occurs in the early morning or in the evening.

crosscut saw - A two-man saw for cutting trees in the woods.

crow's nest - A platform built high up in a tree (or trees) to provide greater visibility to lookouts.

cruise timber - To estimate the amount and species of standing timber in a given area.

cutover land - Land on which the timber has been harvested (also known as "stumpland").

deck of logs - A temporary pile of logs awaiting transfer to another location via log chutes, hauling roads, river drive, logging railroad, etc.

Decker packsaddle - Replaced the sawbuck and diamond hitch used on pack animals in the Forest Service in the 1920s.

diamond bitch - Method of tying a load on a pack animal that was replaced in the 1920s by the Decker packsaddle.

dispatcher - Person employed to receive reports of discovery and status of fires, confirm fire location, take action promptly to provide fire fighters and equipment likely to be needed to control a fire in initial attack, send them to the proper location, and support them as needed.

downfall - Trees that have fallen down (generally used referring to obstacles on a trail).

drift fence - Fence built to prevent the wandering of unpermitted cattle and sheep onto national forest grazing allotments.

emergency phone - Temporary phone wire and phone set up for a fire camp or other temporary situation.

enrollees - Term used for men enrolled in the Civilian Conservation Corps, 1933-1942.

entryman - Person applying for or proving up on a national forest homestead claim.

extensive land classification - Broad classification of possible land uses on Forest Service land.

fallers - The men who cut down trees.

fire danger - A general term used to express an assessment of fixed and variable factors such as fire risk, fuels, weather, and topography, which influence whether fires will start, spread, and do damage and the expected difficulty controlling the fire.

firefinder - see "alidade."

firefinder map - A map, generally mounted on a wood or metal base, that is provided with an azimuth circle, at the center of which is pivoted a firefinder.

fireline - The part of a fire control line that is scraped or dug to mineral soil.

flume - A long trough filled with running water used to transport logs from one place to another.

Forest highway - Sections of state, county, and other important public roads in and adjacent to the national forests that provide primary access to the Forest.

Forest road - Roads needed primarily for the protection, development, and administration of national forest lands.

free hunter - Independent fur trapper who sold furs to the fur companies but was not an employee.

grazing allotments - Specific area assigned to stock under a grazing permit.

guard station - Complex of buildings located at a Forest Service administrative site. Typically includes a cabin, outhouse, barn, and other outbuildings.

gyppo - Contract worker instead of employee, as in gyppo logger or gyppo trail crew.

heliograph - Device used in 1910s by Forest Service workers to send messages from lookouts to ranger stations. Used mirrors to reflect the sun's rays in code.

intensive land classification - Forest Service program of the 1910s to determine which land in the national forests could be listed for homesteading.

KV funds - The Knutson-Vandenberg Act of 1930 allowed the Forest Service to require purchasers of national forest timber sales to make cash deposits to cover the cost of planting, seeding, or thinning the sale area to improve the future timber stand.

local experienced men (LEM) - Locally hired men who worked as foremen and supervisors of CCC enrollees.

lode - Aggregations of mineral matter containing ores in fissures.

long-butted - A tree that is cut with a high (often over 4') stump.

lookout - Site of a fire detection site, the fire tower or building used to detect fires, or or the person looking for fires.

main-line packer - Packer who provided supplies along the main trail through a ranger district.

mantying up - Preparing a load to be carried by pack animals by wrapping it in canvas and tying it with rope.

map board - Board mounted on a stand on a lookout point that was used as a support for a map when surveying the area for fire.

MBF - Thousand board feet.

millpond - The pond in which the logs for the mill are contained, whether it be an artificial pond or a boom within an existing body of water, such as Flathead Lake.

miner's phone - A heavy iron telephone used by the Forest Service on its backcountry phone lines.

MMBF - Million board feet.

mopping up - Final stage of fire suppression (checking for smoke, turning over logs, etc.).

outfitter - Person who takes recreationists into the backcountry for a fee.

pack animals - Animals used to haul supplies, generally horses and mules in the United States.

pack string - At least two pack animals trailed or roped together and led by a packer riding a saddle horse.

packer - Person in charge of packing and delivering supplies to backcountry workers.

peavey - A lever used in logging that is similar to a cant hook but has a strong sharp spike on the end.

placer - A placer where gold is found. Includes all forms of mineral deposits except veins in place (hard-rock lodes).

prescribed burning - The burning of forest or range fuels on a specific area under predetermined conditions so that the fire is confined to that area to fulfill forestry, range, wildlife management, sanitary, or hazard reduction objectives.

presuppression - Work done to aid in fire suppression before a fire started, such as trail construction or phone line maintenance.

pulaski - Combination chopping and trenching tool widely used in fireline construction which combines a single-bitted axe blade with a narrow trenching blade (resembling an adze hoe) fitted to a straight handle.

rag camp - Camp where the worker(s) stayed in a canvas tent.

railroad ties - Crossties on a railroad track.

Regional Office (RO) - Administrative headquarters of each Forest Service region. The Regional Office for Region One is in Missoula.

Remount Depot - Forest Service ranch located near Missoula that provided pack animals to the various Forests as needed and wintered the stock.

river drive - Method of transporting logs by which the logs were floated down a river or stream to the millpond.

river pig - A man who works on a river drive, preventing log jams and keeping the logs moving.

rocker - A long cradle that uses a rocking motion to separate placer gold from sand and gravels.

scaling timber - Determining the amount of board feet in a log.

school section - Sections 16 and 36 of every township, granted to the states to raise money for schools.

seen area - Literally, the area visible from a lookout point.

shaft - A well-like excavation in the earth.

skidding - The process of pulling logs over skid trails, using draft animals harnessed to single logs or strings of logs, or to sledges carrying logs, or using tractors.

slash - The debris left after trees have been felled and trimmed for logs.

sluice - Long connected troughs through which gold-bearing earth is washed; the cleated bottom catches the gold particles.

smokechaser - Forest Service worker assigned to go to a fire as soon as it was detected and begin fire suppression work.

smokejumper - Person who parachutes out of a plane to a remote fire and then works on fire suppression.

snag - A standing dead tree or part of a dead tree from which at least the leaves and smaller branches have fallen.

special-use permit - Permits issued by the Forest Service for such uses of Forest Service land as summer home sites, commercial outfitting, and dam sites.

spike camps - Small, temporary camp located in a remote area to accommodate workers.

splash dam - A dam built on a stream normally too small to accommodate a log drive. The dam was used to create a flood that enabled logs to be driven further downstream. The flood was released by dynamiting the splash dam, or by opening a sluice through which water and logs could be allowed to pass.

springboard - Pieces of wood that sawyer stood on while long-butting a tree.

stamp mill - Machinery for crushing ores.

steam donkey - A winch used to pull logs in from the loads, for loading. etc. Originally steam powered with a vertical boiler mounted on a sled made of logs.

Supervisor's Office (SO) - The main administrative office of a national forest. On the Flathead National Forest, this is now located in Kalispell (the south half was originally administered out of Ovando).

suppress a fire - Extinguish a fire or confine the area it burns within fixed boundaries.

sustained yield - A yield of forest products that can be sustained in perpetuity, with an approximately even annual yield. The purpose is to achieve an approximate balance between net growth and harvest.

10% funds - The percentage of Forest Service receipts that is given to the counties for use on schools and roads.

tie hacks - Men who hewed railroad crossties in the woods.

timber cruiser - Person who estimates the volume and value of marketable timber on a tract of land and maps it out for logging.

timber trespass - Stealing timber from the public domain.

timber famine - Term used in the 1800s and early 1900s to describe the anticipated shortage of timber in the United States.

truck trails - Forest Service road built to a minimum standard, often to allow truck access during a fire.

voyageur - Man employed by a fur company to transport goods and men to and from remote areas, principally by boat.

wannigan - Floating cook shack used on a river drive.

way trail - Trail built to a minimum standard.

windfall - Trees uprooted or snapped off by high winds.

withdrawal - Forest Service term for reserving land within a national forest for a specific purpose, such as an administrative site.

working circle - Management unit of a national forest that included non-Forest Service land for planning purposes (primarily for timber sales).

yard - The location of a group of log decks.