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Photograph of 126-foot Felled Tree and other logging camp scenes
Three interesting cabinet photographs showing Pacific Coast logging operations, quite likely in northern California or perhaps in the Pacific Northwest. One of the views shows two loggers in the process of chopping down a massive tree. Another image shows a 126-foot long felled tree being readied for shipment on two railroad platforms (the log has a neat manuscript note at the base: "Length 126 ft. / 11,500"). The third image shows loggers in a logging camp working on smaller logs, with two horses, as well as a young girl present.
While the scenes in these photographs are not identified, it is likely that they depict a western logging camp, perhaps in Humbolt County, California, or in the Pacific Northwest. They bear a strong resemblance to photographs by Edgar Cherry depicting redwood logging in Northern California. Cherry chronicled these California logging operations in a famous photographically-illustrated book, Redwood and Lumbering in California Forests (San Francisco, 1884).
The vertical image showing the two loggers at work is strongly indicative of redwood logging in California. The loggers are posed mid-way through felling an enormous tree, standing on springboards (also called "planks" or "board holes"), which were inserted into the notched holes cut into the tree. They are using long-handled axes, and there is a large undercut already made. The size of the tree trunk is massive, likely 10+ feet in diameter. The size and straightness of this trunk are fully consistent with Sequoia sempervirens (coast redwood) or possibly Sequoiadendron giganteum (giant sequoia). Both species were logged in this style in Northern California in the 1880s. Other West Coast conifers (Douglas fir, Sitka spruce) also get huge, but this tree’s bark texture and sheer bulk suggest redwood or giant sequoia.
![Parts of E. California and S. E. Nevada, N.W. Arizona and S.W. Utah __ Atlas Sheet No. 66 [Shows Las Vegas!]](https://storage.googleapis.com/raremaps/img/small/92030.jpg)
