Old History photo # 90

Old-school lumberjacks who fell giant trees, 1889.

That was back when men were men and women were women.

great old pic

Actually, that was back when men were men and the women were too! Great photo.

Would love to see how they moved that after. How big a lenghs, if split and how.

What is the diamond shaped piece in the middle of the log cut?

The size of those trees is just mind blowing to me, can’t imagine standing next to one, let alone cutting it down with hand saws

The tools of the logging trade pictured here are a double-bladed axe, cross cut saw, (also known as a misery whip), springboard, and gunstick. The area where the men are lying is the uncut and was made by the two choppers with axes. The gunstick is the scissors like tool that would have been used to make the final depth and angle adjustments to the undercut so that the tree fell in the desired location. Once the undercut was complete, two men would use a cross-cut saw to make a backcut (on the opposite side of the tree) so that the tree would topple from the stump. Any mistakes and the tree could fall in an unintended direction possibly causing injury or death to the logging crew.

Great pic. Those trees are on the top of my list of things I want to see before I kick the bucket.

Looks like a couple cord of wood at the base of the tree just cutting it down.

Thanks for the explanation. Would they also make side notches due to the saw being shorter than the diameter of the tree? I believe I have seen old photos of that.

I agree. Doing any of that without modern heavy equipment would seem all but impossible

Good explanation on the GUNSTICK
physics and geometry working at it's finest moment

Yea......like they would re-chop the notch if it was a couple inches off LOL. I believe those were used just to see where it is going to go. Screw that- send it.

Thanks for explaining

Same here.

A must see. I was there to see them in person years ago. Pictures do them no justice.

There is quite a sense of wonder when you are among trees like that. I remember driving through a hole in a large tree when I was on vacation with family as a child. I also remember as late as the 1980's when there was a slice of a large tree at a rest area in Washington. They had marked the rings with specific historical dates, such as 1776, 1492, the birth of Christ, etc. Some of those trees are over 2,000 years old.

Someday maybe

Imagine one of those falling across your trail. Very cool picture. Thanks

What did they do with it once it hit the ground? It would take a pretty good team of mules to move those logs.

Pictures don't even come close to the awe you will feel seeing them in person. I've been in the redwood groves three or four times over the years. The first time in the 60's as a kid on family vacation.

Wonder if any of those fellers came down with " cedar lung ' caused by the thujaplicatin in that tree
you can see the tree healed itself at the core with that dark rot showing

So where is the best place (State park) to go see them?

There are various groves along the redwood highway in northern California close to the Oregon border. These are the coastal redwoods the world's tallest (Sequoia sempervirens). The other California monster is the giant sequoia Sequoiadendron giganteum. It is found around 5000 feet in the Sierra Nevada. The most famous specimen being "The General" which has more cubic feet of wood than any other tree recorded if I'm not mistaken.