My First Sawing

             Last Sunday, the 7th, the sawyers trusted me to be the clutch man. At least one Sunday a month, the museum fires up the saw to offer live demonstrations of a running sawmill. Our saw is a circa 1923-1928 American No. 1 Variable Belt Feed Saw Mill called the "best Small Saw Mill made for use with Farm tractors and other similar power." Two can run it dangerously, three can run it with caution, four you can breathe, and five or six makes life easy. We had five on Sunday.

While not our Sawmill, it's an ad copy of the economy size

          At least I didn't use half numbers, as did The American Sawmill Machinery Company to name the sawmills that hailed from the Hackettstown, New Jersey factory. The company had a wide list of sawmills, one named Heavy Duty 7 1/2, but my favorite little ordering fact was that they made left handed sawmills on request. Our mill can cut logs up to 24 inches in diameter. We can cut larger logs, but it takes a constant rotation of the log to cut. The American Company is a familiar name to amateur and professional sawyers.

           Anyways, I ran the engine, a Caterpillar diesel from the 1950s. I would engage the clutch to get the mill running and disengage the clutch to kill it. To engage, you have to push a large black rod into an upright position without going too fast. Going too slow isn't an option either as it takes muscle to engage, just not too much muscle. It seemed as soon as I engaged it the head sawyer told me to disengage it. That or it would just run and run, and I would feel like I need to shut this down.

The clutch disengaged

         My impressions of the mill consisted of awe and respect. First, what waste of a log. The old cliche the guys tell me is for every board we cut, we donate a board to the sawdust bin. On Sunday, we cut a small ash log, and I think the whole room was coated in dust. Luckily, the dust is repurposed by a farmer for his animal pens. Still though, Bob Alt, our beloved volunteer and Board member, still had to sweep the windows today.

       Second, the raw power of that blade. It really strikes fear into you when you see it just disintegrate the wood. It's amazing to see the sawyers struggle rotating a log on the cage, the carriage that carries the log into the blade, and then watch the blade treat the log like it was pudding.

Rolling the log

   
          Third, it took me a long time to be comfortable with the placement of the other sawyers. It shows you the training involved with the sawyers and the personal awareness needed by a sawyer. One needs to know his or her surroundings at all times and still be confident enough to employ tunnel vision to finish an aspect of the job. What I'm getting at is the blade needs to be feared enough but yet defeated enough that you can keep the blade clear so no real injuries occur.

     Fourth, back to waste, one can see why particle board and various other repackaging of wood occurred. One is left with many tiny pieces, crooked pieces, and more oddities to get perfect slabs. Instead of just wasting the lower quality wood, companies found a way to use it. One day sawing shows you this need. I will never curse particle board again.

All the dust from Sunday produced by a small log

   All in all, the experience was dusty, loud, and fruitful. Thank you gentlemen for letting me be a part of the sawing. Some new research items though for me: the deafness of sawyers, "sawdust" lungs, and the history of particle board and other repurposing of the unfit slabs.


Image:
http://www.hackettstownlife.com/forum/382532

Lumber & Martin Luther King

                April 3. This day moves me to tears every year. Of the billions of April 3rds, only April 3, 1968 moves me. On this date, Martin Luther King gave his I’ve Been to the Mountaintop speech in Memphis. Today, April 4, marks when the symbolism of the speech became reality. As I’m wont to do, I now want to examine the life of MLK and the aftermath of his assassination through the prism of lumber. Often these connections make up the setting, serve as the backdrop of the main story, but I like to bring them out and weave a story out of them.

                The real point of most of these types of articles is to show the prevalence of lumber and to show how central lumber is to everyday life. It isn’t to say that lumber caused action or lumber molded MLK’s life… well maybe if the evidence shows it… Rather, I find it interesting how lumber is everywhere. 

                In Going Down Jericho Road by Michael Honey, the emotions running through Memphis on April 4 and 5, 1968 can be summed up by “He died for us, and we’re going to die for him.” The release of a broken dream swept through the city of Memphis. In the middle of the fiery outburst, O.W. Ferrell Lumber Company became engulfed in the literal flames of discontent. Supposedly, flames 100 feet high raged as Memphis and other cities were teetering on being “burnt down.”  Much has been written on the “riots,” and it is worth a read to understand the many reactions and emotions following the death of MLK (Honey, 443).

                What happened to Ferrel’s company can be interpreted as why MLK was there in Memphis to begin with. Memphis was caught in a worker’s strike along mostly racial lines. The appointed meditator,  Frank Miles, owned a lumber company, E.L. Bruce, that was mostly staffed by African-American workers. The sanitation strike threatened to empower his workers, and more importantly, he was concerned that any release would cause his lumber company to burn. Real fear. Real issues. Real segregation. This is why MLK was there. People had their own interests. Miles was afraid if the negotiations went south his lumber would be ash (Honey, 444). It always amazes me how people could never go the next step and say if I know this anger exists, why?