Donkey
DonkeyThe Steam Donkey in Martin Grainger's Woodsmen of the West
In the beginning of the 20th century, the logging industry in B.C. and around the world saw a dramatic change in the way logs were being logged. Techniques came and went although some stayed longer than other. New technologies played a very important role in this change; none more than the invention of the steam donkey. In Martin Grainger's Woodsmen of the West, Carter's acquisition of a steam donkey allowed his men to be more effective and efficient while logging in the wilderness.
In the early 1900's, British Columbia, barely 30 years old, was seeing an increase in the demand for lumber due to the rapid increase of population around the Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island regions. In 1901, these two regions accounted for 58.5% of British Columbia's total population. The majority of the new population were immigrants. Most of these immigrants were Chinese, Japanese, and other Canadians coming to B.C. from the rest of Canada. One of the main factors attracting immigrants to B.C. was the opening of the CPR. It opened up new trade routes previously unknown to the isolated British Columbians. This increase in demand for lumber forced logging camps to look for new methods to log as much forest in the quickest amount of time possible. Carter, the boss-logger, money hungry man that he was, got his loggers
only to fell trees that were close to shore. As Grainger explains, "In those days good timber was plentiful- good timber, on sea-coast slopes, that could be felled and shot right down to water- hand-loggers' timber." Most boss-loggers of the early 1900's were looking to make cash and make it fast.
A typical logging camp at the turn of the century consisted of approximately a dozen men. The tools used by these loggers were not particularly developed as would have been preferred. In fact they were quite heavy and beastly. If one was to take a trip back to a logging camp around the turn of the century one would see various tools such as: heavy jack-screws, a light ratchet screw, big seven-foot saws, axes, and heavy chains for chaining logs together.
A logger's typical work day, as Grainger describes it, would start before the break of dawn by getting in one's rowboat and rowing to the desired spot to begin the day's tasks. Now before a logger could start logging an area, they would have to construct, or in loggers terms, "hang" a boom. A boom is a series of logs chained together and anchored to the shore at each end. It would stretch across the surface of the water creating a man-made harbour. It's purpose to trap the cut logs so that no logs could wander of to sea(72). A logger's daily tasks consist of: carrying their heavy, awkward tools up the hillside, chopping...
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