Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-09-10
Story of Paul Bunyan and His Big Blue OK
Is Americas Principal Bit of mythology

I swath 500 feet wide. He was seldom
nj a loss for an expedient-he thought
I'D his stuff Just as he went along.
| Look at the way be handled that job
up in the Big Tadpole country. mat
was the winter of the blue snow. Shot
! Gunderson had charge of the JOB at
! first and he landed all Of his logs In a
lake and in the spring when he was
ready to drive he doomed the logs three
times around the lake before he found
out there was no outlet to 1t. mat
would have stumped most any logger,
but not Paul Bunyan. When they sent
for Paul. he just threw his eye over the
situation and then got busy. Calling
in ~Sourdough Sam. the cook, who made
everything but coffee out of sourdough.
he ordered him to mix up enough sour
dough to fill the big watertank. Hitch
ing Babe TO the tank. Paul hauled it
over and dumped it into the lake. When
it "riz." as Sam said, a mighty lava
like stream poured forth and carried
the logs over the mountains to the
river. And if you don't believe it,
there's a lsndlocked lake in northern
Minnesota that is called Sourdough lake
to this day.
How was it. you ask. that Paul man
aged TO do that section hauling job?
Why, that was simple enough. What's
the USE" said Paul. as he looked the
job over, "of all this saving, swapping,
skidding. decking. loading, hauling and
landing? The object of the game is to
get the trees to the landing, amt it?
Well" So he hitched Babe to a sec
ton Of land and snaked the whole $40
acres at one drag. At the landing
the trees were cut off just like shear
ing a sheep and the denuded section
hauled right back to its original place
and left in prime shape for the real
estate agents.
OF course, Paul Bunyan was the first
fellow that ever marked the trees for
the sawyers. and he had his own way of
doing it. He just took a big pinch with
his fingers out of the trees he wanted
and you can bet he always knew his
own marks-which wasn't true of every
lumberjack. Take Chris Crosshaul, for
instance-recollect the time Paul saved
his bacon on that Mississippi River
drive? Chris took a big drive down
the Mississippi and when the logs were
delivered in the New Orleans boom it
was found that he had driven the wrong
logs. Here was n pickle. so Paul had
to be sent for. 1t was W TO Paul to
get those logs back upstream, but if
you think a little thing Ike that feazed
him, you don't know Paul. He simply
sent for Babe. the Blue Ok, fed her a
good big salt ration and then drove him
to tho upper Mississippi to drink. Babe
drank the river until he sucked the
current upstream and sure enough the
logs came up river faster than they
went down.
When the late war came on Paul, it
~ L. - -.
to service. He did ris bit. From 1916
to 1920 he was busy toting the sup
plies and building camps for q bunch of
husky young fellow-Americans who had
a contract on the other side of the At
lantic. showing a certain prominent
Europeon (who is now logging in Hol-
landl how they log in the United
States. After his service overseas with
the A. f. T, Paul could't get back to
the States quick enough. Airplanes
were too slow so Paul embarked 10 h,s
bark canoe. the one he used on the
Big Onion the year he drove logs up
stream. When he threw the old pad
die into high he sure rambled and the
sea was covered with dead fish that
broke their backs trying TO watch him
coming and going. As he showed off
from France. Paul sent a wireless TO
New York but passed the Statue of
Liberty three lengths ahead of the mes
sage. From New York to Westwood
he travelled ON skis. When the home
folks asked him if the Allegheny
Mountains aul the Rockies had both
cred him Paul replied, " didn't notice