Some great early film of a few of the West Coast’s major timber company’s, enjoy !
All of the West Coast logging railroads were standard gauge. None of that wimpy narrow gauge stuff for us. The logs were too big.
Thanks Rick, for the find, and Ken, for making it easy to view.
Thanks Rick and Ken, great shots!
Cass here in WVA was/is standard gauge.
Steve Featherkile said:
All of the West Coast logging railroads were standard gauge. None of that wimpy narrow gauge stuff for us. The logs were too big.
Thanks Rick, for the find, and Ken, for making it easy to view.
Wellll, that is not quite the case, there were dozens and dozens of small operations in narrow gauge (36 inch and 42 inch) that came and went especially in the early days.
Some of the more substantial and longer lasting companies using 36 inch narrow gauge that come to mind are; West Side Lumber, Pickering Lumber, Swayne Lumber, Diamond & Caldor, North Pacific Coast, Sumpter Valley, Michigan-California and Lamoine Lumber and Trading Co.
So Happily there were a few(https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-laughing.gif)
I really liked those two videos. My brother Bill and I grew up starting the mid-1950s in the Humboldt County CA region of Redwood trees logging, although my dad was on the opposite side, State Park Ranger. Unfortunately, the steamers were gone from the logging industry by that time…replaced by the infamous logging trucks. My brother now lives in Sonora CA and he’s the one that modeled the 8 foot Westside Lumber Co Shay I posted about. The Westside RR was close to Sonora and last year Bill got permission from the local Indian Tribe, which now owns most of the property of the old Westside, to walk the former track right-a-way. He sent me photos of some of the existing dilapidated buildings thay can be seen standing 30 years ago. I sent the links to those two videos since I saw a Heisler from Westside operating in one scene. Bill’s now modeling a 1/6 inch Heisler based on the one displayed in the Westside town square. By the way, OSHA would shut down those old logging operations today and rightly so…some real scary safety issues for the workers in those videos!
Hey Tom, which park did your Dad ranger at? I was born and raised around Arcata, Blue Lake, and Dows Prairie.
Back in those days there was only 4 ways to make a living in Humboldt County for most folks; the woods, the mills, fishing or dairy farming.
Now days there is only one way to make a living there, Pot Farming(https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-surprised.gif)(https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-foot-in-mouth.gif).
These look excellent! I will have to look for these! (http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)
Rick Marty said:
Hey Tom, which park did your Dad ranger at? I was born and raised around Arcata, Blue Lake, and Dows Prairie.
Back in those days there was only 4 ways to make a living in Humboldt County for most folks; the woods, the mills, fishing or dairy farming.
Now days there is only one way to make a living there, Pot Farming(https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-surprised.gif)(https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-foot-in-mouth.gif).
Rick - When we moved from LA area to Humboldt County in 1955 we lived at: Patrick’s Point State Park; Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park; Humboldt Redwoods State Park. My dad then transferred to the Park District Headquarters at Fort Humbodlt State Historic Park, Eureka, where I attended high school. So we made the rounds! I hadn’t been back to Eureka area since I went into the U.S. Navy after college in 1969. But in 2008 I attended my one and only high school reunion (45th)…things have really changed there. My brother came up from Sonora to visit while I was there and we toured all the state parks we lived in as kids. Also, we found some old logging RR wood tressles still standing around Blue Lake area…there’s an Indian Casino in Blue Lake now. While in Eureka I also joined the Timber Heritage Association which has a collection of logging locomotives and is restoring one at the Strasburg RR Shops in PA: http://timberheritage.org/
Yes, some of the most beautiful parks especially Patrick’s Point. Fort Humboldt and it’s history back to the 1850’s, that is where the Falk and the Bear Harbor are stored and operated, as you probably know. They also have a couple of operational steam donkeys there. I have been fortunate to have engineered and fired on both locomotives as well as one of the Donkeys, what fun!!!
If you arrived in '55 you had a chance to see some operating steam as Hammond ran their log train from Crannel to Samoa up to late '56 or early '57, I remember them as they ran right behind the house and I was 10 at that time. As you pointed out there is a whole ton of logging artifacts and abandoned infrastructure if you know where to look, that areas logging history goes back to the 1850’s.
I have been a member of Timber Heritage for many years and get down there as often as I can for the many events and to help out when I can. My Dad still lives in the area, one of the greatest times I ever had there was to take Dad to one of the locomotive training sessions at Fort Humboldt several years ago and watch as he got to engineer on the Bear Harbor, what fun to watch his eyes get big and round and a huge grin on his face. I imagine the way mine must have looked when he bought my first toy train many years before.
Rick - I was about six years old when we moved in 1955 to Humboldt County, Patrict’s Point State Park, so unfortunately, I don’t remember ever seeing any live steamers operating. Some day I hope to revisit my roots up there, especially when THA gets their steam loco excursion operation online. In 2009, when my brother was visiting me here in the DC area, we took a three day tour of railroads in PA…as a THA member, they gave us a special tour of the Strasburg RR Repair Shops including THA’s Pacific Lumber Company No. 37 (1925 Alco 2-6-2T). At that time the loco was just sitting outside unfinished awaiting additional THA funding. As a kid I do remember going into the general store at Crannel, and there also my mother, Bettina White, taught ballet dance to elementary school girls there and also at the Trinidad Town Hall. By the way, my brother’s wife, Linda White, lived in Somoa lumber company housing where her dad worked in lumber mill there…she graduated from Arcata High I recall was in 1966. When I was back there in 2008 for my high school reunion, my brother and I toured the Somoa Roundhouse and also visited the Somoa Cookhouse where most of the workers used to eat.
Wow, what childhood memories and history we’re boring others with!
Tom
When I was a teenager (in the 70’s) I got a summer job with a Boy Scout camp, just because they used the site and buildings of an abandoned Pickering L.C. camp. Pay wasn’t much, but it was fun exploring. Dining hall was the PLC mess hall, and all the cabins were old skidded lumbermen bunk houses.
I forget the PLC camp’s name now, and I couldn’t see the BSA camp there anymore on the Google map. But it was near Beardsley Lake, up near Strawberry CA.
Those were the days…
My family moved to that area when I was nine, in 1964. We first lived in a remote old farmhouse near Freshwater. We were there when they had the “Thousand Year” flood. We walked a few miles to school, along a two-lane highway with log trucks roaring by. (Our dog was hit and killed by one of them.) The elementary school was a four-room building, with two classrooms. Three grades were taught in each class. The original one-room schoolhouse was out front. When my dad was ordained he held church services there, and it was always a thrill getting to ring the bell.
Then we moved to Arcata, and lived there until the summer of '66 when we moved to San Diego. While in Arcata, my dad would take my brothers and me to the bay before dawn to collect small cut-off pieces of logs that had drifted away from the mills and washed ashore. He sold these for firewood.
Before we moved to San Diego, we toured the pulp mill and a lumber mill. The lumber mill was especially impressive. I especially recall the bark stripper. It had a remotely-operated sprayer that blasted the bark off with a powerful jet of water, and remotely-operated arms to turn the logs as needed. We were able to watch it through a large observation window.
Hi guys, been away for a few days.
Tom, THA like most preservation groups is always short on funding. Unfortunately #37 will probably be sitting in Strasburg for several more years. They however, have been doing great things with the old Hammond Lumber facilities at Samoa as you probably know if your getting the news letters. I lived in some of that company housing myself for a short period of time. My other Granddad was a night boiler watchman for the mill in his later years.
Cliff, It is beautiful country in the Sierra’s. Like you it has been a lot of years since I was around Beardsley or Strawberry. It is too bad that almost all the traces of the old logging lines in the mountains are gone.
Ray, Thanks for adding your memories of Humboldt to this trip down memory lane. You and I have shared this in the past and it is always fun to do again.
Thanks all.
Cliff Jennings said:
When I was a teenager (in the 70’s) I got a summer job with a Boy Scout camp, just because they used the site and buildings of an abandoned Pickering L.C. camp. Pay wasn’t much, but it was fun exploring. Dining hall was the PLC mess hall, and all the cabins were old skidded lumbermen bunk houses.
I forget the PLC camp’s name now, and I couldn’t see the BSA camp there anymore on the Google map. But it was near Beardsley Lake, up near Strawberry CA.
Those were the days…
Our family used to camp at Strawberry Lake, near Strawberry, CA. Beautiful area, very rocky and rugged mountains. Early to mid, late fifties.
When working at that BSA camp near Beardsley, during my wanderings I found a PLC water tank spout in the woods, with the collapsed tank nearby. So I asked about it. It was on the BSA property, deemed junk, and I was permitted to take it.
About 4 years later, preparing for my move to the east coast, I sold it with the rest of my mining / farming / rr / iron junk collection.
I still think about that dang spout…