Image via Wikipedia

 From the time when a woodsmen cut down his first tree until today the forestry industry has left an impact on the lives of many people who have worked in it, from the logging camps to the sawmills that manufactured the lumber and boards to build North American houses, buildings and bridges. This was truly a home grown industry that later supplied the world with exports of quality timber. The following are some of the stories I have heard over the years as I worked for a short period in this industry, fortunately in the sawmills and not the logging camps which were at one time one of the most dangerous places in the world to work. The first time that I had an idea of just how dangerous it was to work as a logger was in the local pub after working in the sawmill all day some loggers had come in and joined us at our table. They had been given the day off because one of their co-workers was killed on the job, they told to me how it was just like any other day of laying cable to the logs when the choker chain was wrapped around a group of logs and the skidder pulled the chain taunt, it snapped with such force that the chain come back and cut one of the men in half killing him instantly. Not all these accidents are related to working in the bush some deaths also accrued in the sawmills before safety legislation was passed which made it mandatory to place guards on saws and lock out the machines. Before this was done there were cases where people fell into saws or machinery was turned on well being worked on I had heard of one incident where a man was working on the inside of a giant chipping machine which cut pieces of waste wood into chips, he was in the the steel shaker conveyor when it was turned on, he was cut to pieces. There also was a fatality where I worked involving a logging truck driver who was killed when the logs shifted on the trailer and crushed the cab of the truck. But the most poignant story happened in the 1940s before the safety regulations came into effect, a man had been caught up on a log on the loading deck and was about to be pulled under the deck by the logs which would have killed him instantly  a pole cutter was working at the time their axes are as sharp as razors. The man who was stuck to the log asked him to cut his hand off and free him, the pole cutter had to first get permission from the supervisor who denied him permission, maybe for litigation reasons I don’t know needless to say the man was pulled under the deck and killed. To this day I am grateful that I have never worked in a logging camp, these are just a few of the accidents that have occurred over the years in the forestry industry, I hope to see this majestic industry recover from the pine beetle infestation and carry on for another 100 years.