In your November-December issue you had a picture of old time
logging using a 2-wheel cart or dolly where one end of the log is
loaded on the cart while the other end of the log drags on the
ground. The driver rides on one of the wheel horses. This was
called-a jerk-line where several teams were used. This system was
used frequently when I was a boy.
Am enclosing two prints showing an earlier system of dragging
log and saw-milling in North Carolina. These pictures were
furnished me recently by a friend and neighbor, Theo. Greer. They
were taken in 1900near Zionville, N.C., where he was born.
The mill and ox teams belonged to Solomon Younce, his
grandfather, whose forebear came from Holland in the late
1700’s. Mr. Greer as a boy of 5 years, is shown astride the
lead ox in the picture at the mill. The logs were dragged without
benefit of wheels.
C. R. MILLER Route1, Yacolt, Washington
‘THE BRAVE GIRL’
Just a word about the picture in the January-February 1960 issue
of the ALBUM, page 17. As you say, the ‘brave girl’ who did
this stunt is my daughter, Joyce Calame. I am at the throttle and
the owner of the engine, James Whitbey, is at the wheel.
ROY A. CALAME, R.D. 2, Orrville, Ohio
MY GUESS
My guess on the engine on page 11 of the March-April ALBUM is a
Port Huron. By the rims of the drivers and hubs – and I do not
remember any other company building 19 hp engines.
HENRY GUNDERSON, Box 650, Fargo, North Dakota
LETTER
I was very much interested in the pictures of the Blandy steam
engine printed on page 18 and the Scheidler Portable on page 23 of
the March-April ALBUM.
When I was a boy, some fifty odd years ago, my uncle owned an
interest in a sawmill that was pulled by a Blandy engine of exactly
the same type shown in Mr. Gay’s picture. It had the octagonal
shaped steam-chest on top of the cylinder and the eccentric rod
shaped like a triangle. The small cast iron steam dome and curved
steam line were the same. This was the second steam engine that I
ever fired. My father had a Gaar-Scott a little earlier that I
first tried to keep hot.
As for the old Scheidler, my brother and I bought a sawmill back
in the twenties that was powered by an old engine just like the
picture Mr. Crow sent in. Ours had a 10 x 12 cylinder with piston
valve and the outside valve gear with the eccentric on the outer
end of the crank pin. The boiler played out and the old Scheidler
went for scrap in 1943 when our country needed it so badly.
Many thanks to both Mr. Gay and Mr. Crow for taking the trouble
to photograph these old ‘Iron Men’ that I had almost
forgotten.
CARL B. ERWIN, 219 North Allen Street, Harrison, Arkansas
SOME INFORMATION
About the old steam engine on the front of your March-April 1960
issue, it was interesting to me as I own and operate a small
woodworking plant. I have an old International engine 42 years old
that doesn’t know any other work than pulling a line shaft
loaded with machinery. It runs today as good as new.
About the picture of the old one-lunger gas tractor on the back
page of the January-February issue — the engine could be a
Fairbanks-Morse tractor as the picture does not give a clear view
of the chassis assembly. I rather think that the wheels, frame and
gears are the product of the Ohio Manufacturing Co. who sold these
trucks to all comers who installed their own make of engine,
calling it a tractor of that make.
I had the pleasure of working on one of the old tractors that
International Co. put out in 1906 with a 15 hp open crankcase, hit
and miss engine. They were not successful as plow engines as the
friction wheel would not deliver the full power of the engine.
Kansas, at that time was a favorite place to try out all new
contraptions that came out and contraptions some of them were!
AUBREY L. BOBBITT, Uniontown, Kansas
