'Daylight in the swamp,' came early

"It's daylight in the swamp, boys - roll out. Roll out or tumble out - but GET OUT! This is the day to make a fortune." - Song of cook's helper getting lumberjacks out of bunks in the morning.

The only day off for lumbering camp crews was Sunday and there was much to do in preparation for the next week, so the day off was actually only a change of pace. Doing wash, mending clothes and repairing logging equipment occupied much of the day.

     Four o'clock in the morning came early for men in the woods during logging days. They knew, too, that it would only be quitting time when the foreman couldn't see the end of his axe after the sun had gone down.
     Other conditions improved from the 1850s well into the turn of the century, but the working hours never changed - there were logs to be put up and each foreman had to earn his salt.

Never intended to be easy

     Life in the camps was never intended to be easy, but it was one of the few ways the first men in the area and many immigrants could make a few dollars.
     When the ground started to freeze in November or sometimes in early December, lumberjacks trusted the chores to their wives and headed for the woods. They would not emerge until the spring thaw.
      They left small farms and sawmills, many of which closed when the log supply was exhausted from holding ponds and booms.
     Before lumberjacks arrived in the logging camps, much other work had to be done. It started early in the year when "lookers" or "timber wolves" sought the best timberland.
     Finding it, they registered claims on behalf of their bosses. Some sold for as little as $1.25 an acre.

Campsite prepared

One of the "Things do to" loggers on Sunday was to pose for pictures during the latter years of the industry. Here reknown photographer Charles Can Schaick of Black River Falls managed to round up a crew in the Jackson County area. Both oxen and horses were being used to haul logs.

     By the end of July or during the first weeks of August, the foreman and his building crew braved vicious attacks of mosquitoes and insects and started to build camp.
     During the first years camps consisted of a single building, with one partition serving as a shed for oxen used by teamsters. The other half was a combination bunkhouse, cook's quarters and equipment storage space.
     At first most camp crews consisted of only a dozen or so men. However, by the 1880s, some ranged up to 75 men and numerous buildings, including a cooking and dining hall area on one end and a bunkhouse on the other.
     By this time there was a separate shed for oxen and then horses. Also built was an equipment building, a blacksmith ship and possibly a filer's shed.
     A man coming to camp for the first time had much to learn.

Cabins had low sides

     He found he had to be careful how he entered the shelter lest he known his head against the top of the door because the sides in some instances were only two or three logs high and the top log ran over the door.
     Inside he'd find bunks along the walls but no mattresses nor the comforts of sheets and pillows. Instead, he'd soon learn how to make a bed of balsam bows to keep the bugs away. Some used tobacco for this purpose. Loggers were bothered continuously by insects.
     Men used jackets for pillows and many slept in their clothing.

Crawl in on hands and knees

     Getting to bed required crawling in on hands and knees and the rule was that everyone slept with his feet to the center of the room.
     Cabins were equipped with tin was basins and a roller towel and stools. Drinking water came from a barrel near the door.
     In the center was the fireplace - in later years iron stoves were used - and the smoke curled out of a four to six-foot opening in the ceiling.
     At night teamsters often hung harnesses inside the building and men brought in their equipment.

Light goes out early

Loggers took pride in how high they could pile logs on a sleigh, particularly if someone was around to take their picture. This picture, taken early in the 1900s, indicated the size of loads hauled to the river's edge or to rail pickup points by teamsters.

     Lights went out at 9 p.m., except on Saturday night because Sunday was a day off, although several of the lumberjacks in some camps earned money cutting shingles on Sundays.
     Saturday night generally was time for a little tomfoolery and often "greenies" were victims of old camp tricks.
     One trick was to cover a man with a blanket, lift him up and guess his weight. It was called "Weigh the Sheep."
     When a greenie was picked up, another man would slop a pan full of cold water under him and he was set down in it.
     Cooks would rise about 3:30 a.m., and the cook's helper would wake the teamsters at 4 so they could feed the stock before breakfast. The rest were awakened at 4:30 and this always created grumbling.
     There was absolute silence at meal time. The foreman, reading the rules, said: "If you don't follow them, there will be no food."

The rules were: No talking at table except to ask for food. You must sit in your assigned places. You can't change places without permission. And you can't leave until everyone is finished.

Early food choice restrictive

The noon meal was brought to loggers in the woods to conserve time because the men often were working miles from the main camp. Diets during the first years of logging were very restricted. However, toward the end of the 1880s when transportation of supplies was mande easier by improved roads, better food was available for camp cooks to prepare.

     Choice of food in early camps was quite restricted. The diet consisted primarily of bread or biscuits, beans, salt port, molasses, oleo, beans and dried fruit. Occasionally, a member of the crew may have contributed a deer.
     During the first days the cabin was filled with the strong scent of liniment. Men rubbed it on aching backs and arms. It would be that way for several more days.
     Most lumberjacks, by nature, were a rowdy group, but long working days generally kept tempers at a low keel.
     Also, men dismissed for fighting forfeited much of their pay.
     Men were assigned to various jobs in the woods. There were those who marked trees to be cut, men who cut trees, swampers who sawed trees into logs after trimming branches. Ins some places, swampers cleared brush and made paths to the tote road on which logs were hauled to banks of streams.
     In early years trees were cut close to streams and oxen hauled a few at a time. However, as the easier pine was cut, loggers had to move further from the water.
     They had to build roads and horses were brought in because they could maneuver better on the icy roads with larger loads of logs. Often the slower oxen were injured and had to be destroyed when a load of logs went out of control and struck the team from the rear. Horses could maneuver faster to avoid this danger.
     Roads wee watered to make them easier to pull sleds on, but when the path went down hill, crewmen called road monkeys had to throw hay or sometimes salt to slow the track.

Logs marked at stream

     At the stream logs were stacked and marked by using a large maul which affixed the company's logging mark. This was generally done three times so that at sorting booms further downstream, men could channel logs into the correct sluice to the mill. Three marks were needed because one or two were always under water.
     Before logs were cut loose in the spring, a scaler measured them and determined how many feet were available so the mill owner could plan accordingly.
     In late March and early April, men usually started getting restless in the camps. The thaw would bring the start of log drives and many lumberjacks would have to get back to their fields.
     Stories of logging camp days and the dangers of working in the woods were to fill the air for years around the home fires - well after the end of the era.

-Arnie Hoffman

Extracted from the Eau Claire Leader Telegram
Special Publication, Our Story 'The Chippewa Valley and Beyond', published 1976
Used with permission.