North Country At Work

Seneca Ray Stoddard photo of crew of lumbermen felling and limbing spruce trees with double-bitted axes in winter, circa 1880-1890. Essex County in NYS.

Aerial view of logging road leading to the “skid head,” where logs were loaded onto bobsleds to be transported out of the woods. This photograph captures the whole process of loading logs. Men rolled logs down onto bobsleds attached to horses; teamsters waited their turn to load. Pictured are a hauling sledge, logs and lumber, […]

Men posing “after a day’s work measuring timber” in 1900. Circa 1890-1900. Raquette Lake, NY. Courtesy of Professor A. S. Bickmore. Donated by Fulton Town Historian Leon C. Baldwin.

Drive of pulp wood logs on a branch of the Boquet River. Management posing with the “peaveys,” hook tools with sharp pointed end used to roll logs. Circa 1890- 1900. Essex County in NY. H.M MacDougal was donor.

Moving winter firewood in Essex County, NY. Samuel Starbuck driving John Deere Model MC two-cylinder bulldozer, hauling logs for firewood in winter of 1978. A can of chainsaw gas on top of the firewood. Chestertown, NY. Photo taken by Curtis Pack. Donated by Caroline H. Fish, former town historian for Chestertown, NY.

Pete Liberty’s lumber camp; employees pose for a photo in the snow. Circa 1890-1900. Ausable Forks, NY. Donated by Mr. and Mrs. John Liberty, October 4, 1977. Photographer was named Cheeseman (other details about photographer unknown).

The tunnel camps. Looking north, showing Mr. and Mrs. L.D. Raymond, cook and caretaker. Peter Lobdell was the logging foreman. Photo taken by Grant W. Humes, 1922. Harrisville, NY.

L.D. Raymond at the tunnel camp foreman’s office, headquarters for the logging operation. Harrisville, NY. Circa 1890.

The crib tunnel dam, a temporarily dam built when logs were being driven on the river. Dam would be closed so the water backed up behind it. When there was enough water and logs built up behind it, the dam was released to allow logs to float downstream to the mills. Harrisville, NY. Circa 1900.

“The early logging camps of our company, just after the turn of the century, were located in our original 80,000 acre tract of timberland along the St. Regis River in northern New York.” Circa 1900. Jefferson County in NYS. Originally printed in the St. Regis News Volume 2, Number 9 of September 1974, a newsletter […]