Horse-Drawn Logging Sled

Titled, “A Good Load of Pulpwood,” this photography shows 19 tons of spruce and hemlock logs being hauled from the Woodhull Lake area in the Adirondacks on ice roads in the winter of 1911. Toggle chains hold the logs in place, and roadmen have sanded the steep downgrades so the heavy load does not overcome the horses. The logs were brought to the Moose River where they would stay on the ice with 7,000 other logs until the spring thaw carried them downstream to pulp and paper mills. In the 1920s, only about 20% of the state was covered with forest. Today, New York has more forest land than any other northeastern state – 18.6 million acres, covering 62% of the state.  

Since the early 1800s, logging has been a major industry in the Adirondack region of New York. As early as the 1850s, logging camps had been established in the inner regions of the Adirondack forests. The Adirondack’s forest is full of Northern hardwoods such as sugar maples, yellow birch and beech trees. These hardwoods were ideal for lumber production. By 1870, paper making from wood pulp was brought to the United States, making all of the trees in the region valuable, regardless of size or species. In addition to the hardwoods, softwoods such as hemlocks, poplar, balsam, and spruce could also be cut down.

Logging was a three-season business despite the Adirondack’s harsh weather and the inherent dangers of felling and transporting the large trees. Generally, in the spring and summer the loggers would begin to fell the trees, which would continue into the fall. Also in the summer, lumber camps, roads, and skidways were built.  A skidway is a framework on which logs are piled for storage until they are shipped.

In the fall, loggers would remove the bark from the cut trees and transport the logs to yards for export. Then, the production would be slowed to a crawl between the late fall and January. However, by late January enough snow would have fallen to haul the logs on sleds to banking grounds where they would be stored to await further transportation by sled or river driving.

From the banking ground the trees could be transported in one of two ways. The trees could be loaded onto a sled and hauled down the mountain on the roads cleared the previous spring and summer, or the logs could be pushed into the river and floated down the mountain, a method known as river driving. Both methods were dangerous and hard work.

The log sleds could carry thousands of pounds of logs downhill. The sled drivers would sit on top of the logs on the sled while a few men would help guide the horses. Although hauling the logs over the snow was considerably easier than hauling them overland, an even more efficient system, the use of sprinkler wagons, came into effect around 1890.  First, a sled carrying a light load of logs would go down the road in order to make tracks in the snow. Then, the sprinkler wagon would follow, sprinkling water through rear vents onto the tracks. The water would freeze in the sled tracks, making the trip easier for the heavier log sled to follow.
    
The men who worked on the sprinkler wagons went to work as early as 2:00 am! They worked by the light of kerosene torches or lanterns. The water tank on the wagon held approximately 40 barrels of water, enough water to ice only 1/3 of a mile at a time.

 

How does geography impact local economies?

 

Describe the scene in the photograph and evaluate the impact of geography on the local economy.