VIDEO REVIEW
A Day in the Woods Golden Rail Video, 254 Trumpeter Way, Friday Harbor, WA 98250; mail orders: P.O. Box 10474, Glendale, CA 91209; www.goldenrailvideo .com. 97 minutes, DVD only, $29.95 plus $6.00 shipping; WA residents add sales tax.
Timberrrrrr! This documentary is pro- fessionally re- searched and pro- duced, and is also fun to watch as it pro- vides a tour de force look at the history of the timber and log- ging industry in the United States. The program combines an
abundance of archival film and still photos, authentic sounds of old machinery at work, and excellent narration along with contem- porary video of preserved logging railroads moving authentically staged consists. In 12 logically laid out chapters, the excellent ed- iting and storytelling explain how the indus- try evolved, from the woods of Maine on the East Coast to the Pacific Northwest indus- trial operations of today. Timber men, prag- matic and economically driven, innovated and improved on the basic tasks — felling trees, moving them out of the woods to the mills, and turning them into lumber. We see how the industry moved from the early use of axes, men, and beasts and evolved to us- ing crosscut saws and steam power in its many forms, not only to move trains but the often bizarre contraptions that moved logs in the woods at the mills. Streams, rivers, lakes, and flumes were used for water trans- port of raw wood; gravity was your a friend and an enemy. OSHA would go wild at the methods and machinery depicted here and shut it all down, but things got done, the country was built, and fortunes were made, while not a few folks were hurt or killed in the process.
Rail operations evolved from initial at- tempts to use small rod engines in the woods to the now-familiar Shay, Heisler, and Cli- max geared locomotives, which could put up with temporary, flimsy, twisting track while pulling well and not running away down hillsides as logs and trains were marshaled to loading points small and great. In con- trast, today, the logging industry has trucks, chain saws,
helicopters, and renewable
forests, plus the green and environmental movements.
The show starts with runbys of modern
day preserved steam-powered logging trains on different railroads in the Northwest be- fore delving into the Colonial period, when the country’s best timber went to England for use in shipbuilding. We see how tools and techniques improved over the decades; streams and rivers were temporarily dammed and then released to create enough turbulence to get piles of logs moving to mar- ket. Log jams were broken up by daredevil men using pikes or dynamite, and then floated in booms and pulled by tugs to sawmills. In winter, sleds and draft animals were used to move logs in the woods. The wheel was employed first in the 1870s and various hoists, spars, booms and cables were employed to get most of each log up off the ground so it could be moved more easily, since a smaller point of contact created less
friction. Illustrating this complex and de- tailed story throughout are myriad b&w still photos, b&w and color archival movies from more than 30 sources, with vintage sounds and narration being well coordinated with the imagery. Going west, the size of the trees in- creased, so logging techniques changed again with the addition of springboards for the ax men, slide roads, steam donkeys for yarding timber, and wire rope all came into use. Reforestation concepts dictated that some logging railroads were built more per- manently than others, since more trees would grow. The program shows the laying of track, building of bridges, the evolution of log buggies, and more. Logging camps are covered — both temporary and permanent logging camps are shown, and we see fur- ther innovation in moving woodland timber to railheads as well as improving techniques to handle logs with aerial cableways. A tour of the complete workings of an old sawmill plainly shows how dangerous the industry was back then and remains today. Compare loading boxcars by hand, board by board, to the speed of using forklifts and the purpose- built railcars of today.
The birthplace of the crawler tractor seems to have been the logging industry, where a couple of guys tried various contrap- tions which led to the Caterpillar tractor — better than a team of oxen, and more portable than a railroad. The addition of a scraper blade to the front created the bull- dozer, shown here as the classic Caterpillar Model 6. However, logistics improvements, the diesel engine, and trucks doomed steam and after World War II no new logging rail- road lines were built and many were aban- doned, their rights of way converted to roads. Throughout, the program reverts back to video showing today’s logging rail lines for a wide variety of runbys. The locomotives shown include a Mason Logging Co. 2-6-2T, Hammond Logging Co. 2-8-2T No.17, Picker- ing Lumber Shay No.11, Hillcrest Lumber Climax No.10, Curtiss Lumber Heisler No.2, W.H. Eccles Lumber Heisler No.3, Pacific Coast Shay No.11, Rayonier Shay No.2, and all manner of rolling stock moving in au- thentic locations and over bridges with meets, helper situations, doubleheaders and close-ups of the equipment at work. The program’s sound and visual quality is excellent and the restoration and transfer of the vintage film materials and editing are first rate (with the understanding that some old films just cannot be resurrected to per- fection). The sources of vintage imagery in- clude an impressive “Who’s Who” of the in- dustry and its suppliers and archivists. The program also offers a feature to turn the narration on or off and a few minutes of run- by outtakes.
This program’s educational content is ex- ceptionally high, as it provides an excellent overview of the entire lumber industry, not just the railroad aspects. It is recommended for children and adults of all ages, school his- tory classes, and so on. Modelers as well as railfans will enjoy the presentation and find much useful material. My only criticism is that the title, A Day in the Woods, belies the program’s vast historical content and might make it appear to be just another “runby video” of tourist road logging engines, al- though reading the rest of the jacket should dispel that notion and pique a person’s inter- est. Well done! — TOM KELCEC
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