“Don’t all lumberjacks cut down trees?” Quiz wanted to know.
“Not exactly. There’s a lot of different jobs in logging just like in any other business. There’s sawyers, high riggers, yarders and river hogs. After lunch, I’ll take you out to the stand we’re cutting now and show you around.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
A Birling Match
In spite of the fact that Jonas Driscoll kept insisting that all the glamour had gone out of logging, Sandy and the boys found the business of cutting timber fascinating. The husky lumberjacks were amazingly thorough and efficient. Jonas pointed out one massive pine, at least three feet in diameter, that seemed to be the object of heated discussion among the sawyer gang. Long strings with leaded weights dangling at the ends were fixed on the trunk at various heights to determine the tree’s angle to the ground.
“Them plumb lines help ’em figure out which way that old feller would fall naturally,” Jonas explained. “Then they got to take the wind into account and the distribution of the foliage, plus a few other things. After that the gang boss decides how to make it fall where he wants it to.”
“What difference does it make where it falls?” Jerry asked.
“Well,” Jonas drawled, “a big feller like that could squash a whole crew if it fell wrong, for one thing. Or it could end up leaning against another tree, which is kind of messy.” He pointed out a stand of seedlings to the left of the big tree. “Or it could break up a lot of those babies; that’d be cheating your grandchildren out of some fine timber. A good crew boss can drop a tree smack on a little wooden stake and hammer it into the ground.”
Quiz looked impressed. “I’d say your crew bosses must have a thorough knowledge of mathematics to be able to predict the angle of fall so accurately.”
Jonas scratched his bald head. “Well, I don’t know, son. I suppose quite a few of the boys these days have book learnin’. ’Course, in my day, the way you made crew boss was to lick the old boss.”
“Did anybody ever lick you, Mr. Driscoll?” Sandy asked.