PORTAGE
The portager was the man that
kept the logging camp supplied with food or anything that was needed. He
portaged from a depot camp at the river that had been stocked the previous
summer by the scow men. He would carry mail in and out and sometimes news from
the outside and the lumberjack looked for his arrival. He would usually make
one trip each day but that depended on the distance he had to go. He would
bring anything from a bottle of pain killer to a grind stone. Let us say
something about a grindstone. It was a very important piece of equipment. It
was a must in the lumber camp. I don't know what they would have done without
one. On Sunday this wheel was kept busy. Turning this stone was a mean job to
say the least. Those axemen pressed down awfully hard.
This reminds me of a little story, true or
false it doesn't matter. The foreman asked the portager to bring him a
grindstone on his next trip in, so he picked up the stone at the depot, put it
in a bag and put it on top of his load. On the way in he stopped overnight at a
halfway camp. Some fellow wanted a stone like that or he just did it for a
trick. However he had a bit of a problem to find something to put in the bag to
replace the stone, but looking around he found the very thing, a piece of ice
in a tub, round and not unlike the grindstone. He Took out the stone and put in
the piece of ice. In the morning the portager checked his load, everything seem
O.K. When he arrived at the camp the foreman was already in the yard. "Have you
got the grindstone?," he asked. "Right here", said the portager and he threw
down the bag and the ice broke in two. "Now look what you did, you broke my
grindstone." He looked in the bag: "That is no grindstone, that is just a piece
of ice." The portager said, "Thats funny, it was when I left the depot. In this
terrible cold weather it must have turned to ice."
Tobacco was one thing that the portager must not forget
as nearly all lumberjacks either smoked or chewed. Two popular brands were
Prince of Wales and Napoleon It was chewing tobacco but they smoked it just the
same. He enjoyed a clay pipe with a stem broken off so short that the bowl was
no more than a couple of inches from his nose. When it got old or seasoned as
they liked to call it, it was hard to break. It was also strong in another way
too. Loaded with Prince of Wales, it was potent.
HAULING OFF
When the winter cut was
complete, sometime after New Years, some of the crew would go home but most of
the horses would stay, as they were usually in very good condition. They would
get double harness and this is where the competition started as teamsters took
pride in their horses and harness. Some would decorate them with red white and
blue drop rings and keep the harness oiled and shiny and they would plait their
manes and tails. They would be a delight to see but this was only the start of
the hauling off season. A lot of those horses that started out so proudly would
suffer a lot of hardship and cruelty before the winter was over. Some would get
thin, leg weary and played out, as the competition grew stronger as the winters
went along.
Then what they called a bucking board went up
on the camp wall, figures telling what each teamster had hauled each day, week
and month. I always thought this board was a factor in the condition of the
horses in the Spring and led to nothing but cruelty for them. As in every trade
or profession we have good and bad, so it is with teamsters. After supper some
would go into the stable, brush and curry their horses and take good care of
them. Others couldn't care less, just threw them some feed and that was all.
The best teamster carried no whip, the bad ones did. As the winter went along
you could see by the horses which were the real teamsters.
The teamsters went to the stable about five o'clock in
the morning and fed and watered and harnessed the team and then came into the
camp and wait for breakfast The loader would hear the team coming out of the
stable and help him hitch the team to the sleds. Let us speak here of the
logging sled.
The logging sled was built for one purpose
only - to haul logs. It was quite massive and built very strong, two sleds, one
front and one tail sled. They were connected by two chains, crossed so as to
form an X. This allowed the tail sled to follow exactly in the tracks of the
leading sled. The logging sled had three basic parts, first the runners.
They were about six feet long and ten inches high in the
middle, then a bunk from runner to runner, the length would depend on the width
of the road that they would use. Then came the rocker, tapered slightly
underneath from the middle to the end. This allowed the load to turn freely
when the load swayed. The bunks were kept in place by iron rods or starts as
they were called, one on each side of the bunks which were grooved for them. A
king pin through the rocker and bunk kept the rocker in place and allowed the
runners to turn. The runners were shod with steel. In the ends of the rockers
were two holes through at an angle and a long chain with a hook on one end and
a grab on the other, attached by a small and short chain. This chain was called
a corner bind. When a log was placed on the end of each rocker, hooked and
grabbed, the long end of the chain was left hanging down, then the space in
between was filled in with logs and jammed down very tight. Usually short spurs
were inserted into the rockers to keep the logs from slipping, then the next
tier of logs was placed and a cross chain was taken from one side to the other
and grabbed to the corner bind chain that had been left for that purpose. A
skilled loader could build a straight wall of logs, till he had sixty or more,
then a long chain called a wrapper was thrown around the load. This was for
safety. There were many ways of hauling off. The method used depended on what
sort of road was used. Hauling on a long level road would be different from a
mountain or hilly road. The management would decide about that when they
planned the operation. I think I have hauled on most every kind of road there
was on the Restigouche River. 
I will tell you of my experience
in one of the bigger camps on the Upsalquitch River where I was a teamster. We
were hauling on what they called an iced and rutted road, although all valley
roads slant more or less to the river, except for what was known as a pitch of
falls, in plain words, just a steep hill and usually not very long.
A rutter was a simple affair, two massive runners with
two steel blades projecting through each bottom about four inches and a bunk
and as it needed lots of weight, it was made very heavy, hauled by two strong
horses.
This was a two man job and they had to work at
night. Of course this road had to be in good shape and hauled on for some time
before this rutter could be used. When it passed over the road it left a rut
about six inches wide and about four inches deep.
Following was a water tank holding about a thousand
gallons of water. As there usually is a stream running down every valley, water
was no problem.
The tank had two holes in the rear with
two plugs, one for each runner. Filling this tank with buckets or kettles was
mean work and with only a lantern for light, didn't make it any easier and as
the nights were very cold, in the morning the tank would be covered with ice
and also the man.
Although I had been a teamster in small
logging camps, I could put a set of double harness together and also throw them
on a team of horses as quick as most men bigger than myself.
Although I was slight I was strong, at least I thought I
was.
