Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1900-11-22
BANGOR'S GREAT LOG BOOM.
Maine LumbermRn Who Has Handled
More Logs Than Amy other
Man in the World.

William Corners, of Bangor. who, as
rafting contractor at the Bangor
boom for more than 80 years, has
handled more logs than any other
man in the word. He is now 65 and
it was so years ago that he first took
a pole and went to wor-; at the Ban
gor boom.
The Bangor boom is a great place,
says the New York Sun. 1t is partly
above and partly below the great dam
at the head of tidewater on the
Penobscot, and within the Enclosure are
sorted and RATED all the logs from the
headwater of the river hat are intend
ed for manufacture at the Bangor mills.
AS the mills are from two to five miles
distant from the boom at Bangor, and
from Is to IS miles below the receiving
boom at 0Idtown, the floating or driv-
ing of the logs to them is an important
industry, employing many men and oc-
cupying every day for six months in
the year. In the dullest year $4,000, 900
feet of logs are RATED at Bangor boom,
and sometimes the amount is as much
as 20, 000, 1000 feet.
Formerly all logs were RATED at the
mills in lots of 800 or 400 pieces. These
RATS were propelled by two men with
scull oars, and it was a tedious and diff
cult job. Sometimes the long RATS
would twist like great water snakes
and get tangled up with vessels at an
Choir in the harbor or with steamboats,
under way. Now the days of the scull-
oar men are past and almost forgot
ten. The RATS are bigger and they
are towed by a little steamer which
drags 1000 or 5000 logs along without
any trouble.
There seems to be a popular belief
that the log supply on the Penobscoti
very nearly exhausted. This is far from
the fact. The lumbermen have to 60
farther than formerly to get their logs.
but there are many entire townships in
northern Maine that have never yet
felt the logger's ak, while in many
Others that were cut over years ago the
spruce growth has renewed itself. Pine
being less prolific than spruce has dis
appeared rapidly, but although pine
has long since ceased to be an impor-
tant factor in Maine numbering, there
is still a great supply of it in some re-
gions, and Mr.. Corners says that there
are still just as good and just as big
pine trees in Maine as ever there were.
As to the spruce becoming exhausted.
that alarm was commonly heard 20
ears ago. and yet there has been Gu
since then on Penobscot waters alone
2,226, 900 900 feet of spruce cut of a total
lumber cut of 1858, 141,6 GAL feet. In he
coming winter about 200, 900. 900 feet
OF logs viii be cut on Penobscot waters
the pulp mills alone taking about 80.
000, 900 feet.
In the so-called flush times there was
a great and reckless waste. both of
logs and lumber; when a few logs or
a few sticks of timber went adrift they
were allowed to go-nobody made much
effort to them. Along the
banks of the Penobscot, from Midway
to Bangor, are hundreds of frame
houses that were built of lumber picked
up adrift, but now it is very seldom that
a stick of lumber worth saving is
picked up in the river. When in times
of freshet, as often occurred before the
many improvements made along the
river in booms and dams. whole RATS
or logs of lumber used to break away
and go down with the swift current.
the seldom could tell whether
or not they recovered all that belonged
to them. But now there is a strict sys-
tenn of marking and accounting; moth
ing is wasted. The only danger to the
spruce is the cutting OF so many small
trees for pulp, but even that can be car
ried on for generations yet without
denuding these forests.
William Corners has been the boom
contractor for IS years, and in that
time there have been RATED under his
direction about 1,73.00o 900 feet of logs,
enough separate pieces, if placed end
to end, to reach twice around the world.