The Powder River County examiner and the Broadus independent. [volume] (Broadus, Mont.) 1919-1935, 1922-06-23
Real Life in the Timber Not Much Like
Idea Scenario Writers for Movies Give

the Montana forests differs from q
small town in only two respects-its
population 10 usually 100 per cent
male, and It is more peaceable. But
between the logger and the manual
worker In town there are any num-
Der Of minor differences Of character
and disposition.
For one thing lumberjacks are &C.
complished eaters and are better fed.
At Stark, 40 odd miles northwest of
Missoula, on the wooded slope Of the
Bitter Roots, where several hundred
of them carry on for the Anaconda
Copper Mining company one OF the
largest timber operations in the
world, each man ate his own weight
in food every three weeks last win
ter.
For another thing they are better
housed. Whether they are In per-
manent quarters or in the peripatetic
camps built on railroad trucks, they
have electrically lighted dormitories
or barracks and bathrooms equipped
with hot and cold water.
Contrary to widespread belief, the
lumberjack, generally speaking, is
thriftier than his brother worker in
town. Missoula banks received as
savings deposits the major part of the
timbermen's wages every payday, ac-
cording to the A. C. M. accountant at
the camp.
Moreover the logger is far more
democratic. Anybody is welcome who
can pass the tests of muscle and
thew. He drinks less moonshine,
prefers tea to coffee, snuff to chew
ing tobacco. He is more pacific than
stevedores or sailors, and fights less
than men of other categories des-
cribed as manual workers. Working
month in and month out for a year
or more at tretch, he cuts, trims
and loads his six or seven hundred
feet of timber every day. In leisure
moments he reads books, newspapers
and magazines. If the printed word
is beyond his comprehension. as It
frequently is, he listens to more for
tunate brother read aloud. or devotes
his brief evenings to cribbage or
checkers. He rises at s o'clock in the
morning, and is asleep by 9 at night.
All classes of men are to be found
among the timber workers. The av-
erage lumber camp usually can show
types of all races, creeds and condi-
tions. Literate and illiterate, the
man with ancestors and the man with
none, live and work together, and
peace and amity Is maintained among
them by simple expedient-one ia
miliar to every man or woman who
went through boarding school: Talk
ing at meal time is discouraged. The
lumber camp bosses long ago dis
covered, as did the mother superiors
of converts and the headmasters of
boys schools, that noisy mess-hall
is breeder Of trouble and strife.
The camp at Stark. which in real
ity is a collection Of logging camps
known collectively az the Nine Mile,
has been in operation q half dozen
years or so. It supplies the logs from
which the new A. c. M. mill at Bon
ner manufactures the $4,000, 900 feet
of finished lumber required each
year by the company's mines, smell
tiers and metal refineries in Montana,
Idaho and Utah. The mill, which Is
considered the finest in the country.
capable of turning out half q million
feet of finished product daily, went
on two-shift basis June 10. and in
consequence the lumberjack colony
at Nine Mile expects an even buster
season next winter.
Only skeleton crews are in the
woods now, gathering up and burn
ing the debris Of last seasons opera
lions. Two hundred and fifty men
were employed last winter, but twice
that probably will be the number
when cutting is resumed.
Production was at the rate Of ap-
proximately 100000 feet every
ninety days up to May /.
Food consumption amounted to
$4,000 pounds a month, or ZIG
ponds per man. Each lumbeFjack
consumed daily 6.97 pounds Of bread.
meat, fish, eggs, cereals, vegetables,
sugar. butter, tea, coffee, syrups and
spices. One interesting item Of the
camp commissary report was that
100 eggs were the monthly allotment
for each employe. and another that
the buying had been reduced to such
scientific basis that meals, which
anywhere else would entail an ex-
pense of at least Is cents, were serv-
ed to the lumberjacks at 81 cents
each. For board and quarters the
men paid 1920 a day, which after
deducting the cost Of food, left 10
cents day each for the use Of $12,-
900 worth Of army blankets and bed
furnishings with which the barracks
have been supplied.
The story of the lumberjack 40 no
really is at the Nine Mile IL told
briefly by f. W. Mallory. q captain
of engineers overseas, who IL now the
logging superintendent.
"All the romance Of numbering
Is in the North Woods melodramas Of