ITEM

Volney Roberts and Lee Roberts, interviewed by Linda Hubbard, March 31 – April 14, 1970, Greenville, Maine.

Bookmark and Share
Identifier
NA 0571 (local)
Date
March 31 1970 (Inclusive dates)
April 14 1970 (Inclusive dates)
Summary

V. Roberts discusses lumbering in the Moosehead Lake area in the early 1900s; how he got involved in lumbering in 1904; driving a six-oxen team; various jobs he had in the early 1900s; lumber camp food; a day’s schedule at a lumber camp in Soldier Town; camp furnishings; entertainment in the form of singing and pranks; getting to the site in Soldier Town and the path the logs took down river; purchasing food in bulk; his grandmother’s traditional medicines; process of moving felled trees; tools used in the woods; eating lunch in the woods; estimating how much timber a lot would produce; bringing supplies into camp in the winter; caulk shoes for river driving; his case of blood poisoning and the long trip to visit a doctor; a log-hauling tractor c. 1920; making roads with a tractor; Cooper Brook trestle; comparative hygiene of Pollacks [Poles] and Frenchmen; and the mechanization of logging with steam haulers and telephones to coordinate. L. Roberts discusses logging on Prong Pond Mountain beginning in 1935; use of par-buckles; setup of the camp; ethnic variety of workers; advantages of not shaving; lumber camp food; driving the tote-wagon; sleeping arrangements in the camp; lice and measures to avoid them; observations on Pollacks’ dealings with lice; responsibilities of a sled-tender; skidded yards versus piled logs; a fatal accident with a skidded yard; use of a snub-warp on steep roads; ram-downs and an accident on one; a day’s schedule; taking care of his horses; blacksmith work; pay; pranks; swinging a yard; icing roads; kinds of sleds – swing-dingles, tote-sleds, and woods pungs; britchen harnesses and belly-lifters for his horses; never touching another man’s equipment; troublemakers visiting camp; his horses falling through the ice; salted codfish; the old logging method as conserving and not wasteful; the new method of logging as wasteful and destructive; and his concern for the future of northern Maine. 

Creator and/or Contributor
Volney Roberts (interviewee), Lee Roberts (interviewee), Linda Hubbard (interviewer)
Language
English (Languages)
Other Subject Headings
Logging (forestry) (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Lumber camps (Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH))
Foodways (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Entertainment and recreation (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Pranks (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Logging tools (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Farming (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Occupational folklore (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Log driving--Maine (Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH))
Cultural groups (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Remedies (health) (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Logging accidents (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Nicknames (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Wages (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Tall Tales (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Conservation (Ethnographic Thesaurus (ET))
Temporal Coverage
Geographic Coverage
Greenville, Maine (Geonames)
Bangor, Maine (Geonames)
Moosehead Lake, Maine (Geonames)
Patten, Maine (Geonames)
West Branch Penobscot River (Geonames)
North Branch Penobscot River (Geonames)
Millinocket, Maine (Geonames)
Soldiertown Township, Maine (Geonames)
Rockwood, Maine (Geonames)
Jo-Mary Lake (Geonames)
East Branch Pleasant River (Geonames)
Tomhegan Bog (Local)
Kennebec River (Geonames)
Prong Pond (Geonames)
Churchill Bog (Local)
Fairfield, Maine (Geonames)
Yoke Ponds (Geonames)
Barren Mountain (Geonames)
Waterville. Maine (Geonames)
Old Town, Maine (Geonames)
Allagash River (Geonames)
Long Pond, Somerset County, Maine (Geonames)
Related Entities:
Volney Roberts (interviewee)
Lee Roberts (interviewee)
Linda Hubbard (interviewer)
Related Objects
First page of the transcript for NA 0571