hello everyone tonight

I noticed above --Margaret at Macdonald and Lawrence Timberframing LTD has got quite a project on the go--64000 bd ft of timber to hew, and just to put that in perspective for those that can not comprehend quantities well here is my take--

Through a full season at UCV the waterpowered saw mill there running 7 days a week from may till oct would cut out 20000 bd ft of lumber, so that number above is equal to 3 seasons of logs, that is quite a pile for sure, and I know because I purchased them for quite a few years

There is going to be a few blistered and calloused hands for sure!!--

that brings me to remember my hewing team, their hands would be a disaster, blisters, and bandages wrapped around to try and give them some relief--the pine pitch--it was bad once it became coated on a handle, actually tear the skin that covered the water blisters--I am just saying it as I have experienced it myself when I spent many days hewing in the heat early in my career--I would smile when a new recruit came on board--thought he was a pretty good man, but the broadazxe brought him down a notch or two

I also remember Earl Calquhoun --gone now-- but quite an old guy he came on board when he was about 60--could really tell stories and entertain--when he was young, I suppose in his mid 20's, he enlistred to go out west on the harvest excursion-he ended up in the red river valley--wheat country--

Well wheat out there did not grow short like wheat here in Ontario probably twice as high, well let me tell you he learned to wear leather gloves, he thought he was quite a man until they threw him in a 60 acre field, a team of horses and one wagon, when it rained the clay there would gather on the wheels and literally stop any forward motion, and your feet would weigh 50 lbs each--well earl was a good hewer but let me tell you one thing you didn't touch his gloves--

Earl was quite a rugged individual andhe would be hewing in one location and I would be in another not far away--well where did all the young girls go--right over to earl to take his picture, used to burn me up!!!

Morley Warner was another lad he drove the horses when we ran the tread mill to produce horse power, it would just about drive him crazy everyone would want to pet the horses--he would mutter--"wish I was a horse"

well got to go

NH