Beaver Island History - Helen Collar Papers
Lumbering
P. 62, 114
As early as 1845 steamers called for refueling. Cable's dock (where did I get this?). As late as June 1882 the steamer Champlain called for wood (Life S. S. report at the Museum).
The way the economy worked - they fished in the summer & cut cordwood & hauled it to the docks in the winter. With no horses or oxen they probably got it to the beach, loaded it in boats, & got it to the dock that way. This checks with Mary Conaghan Vesty's description.
The Mormons cut cordwood & erected a steam mill for sawing lumber. By 1900 the southern 2/3 of the Island was in large holdings - the Irish had moved to the northern 1/3, with 90% of the northern 1/2 held by the Irish.
Sweet's Mill on Sand Bay - it must have been running in 1891, because Pat Mulroney was killed there at that time. It stood on the shore property, just across from the end of Hannagan's Rd..
Beaver Island Lumber Co. - the largest operation - hired more than 100 men:
Mill brought in the fall of 1902 - capital $75,000
Put into operation 1903
Ceased operation 1915
Since 1900 - the Antrim Iron Co. cut large acreages for chemical & charcoal wood. The logs were shipped to Mancelona for processing.
Present mill - gets out hardwood for crochet mallets & balls.
B.I. Lumber Co.:
W. E. Stephens, Pres. Payroll: $3,000 per month
John S. Stephens, Vice-Pres. 60 men in woods
- both came from Freesoil, Mich. 60-70 at mill
5-10 transporting timber
A daily capacity of 30,000 feet of hardwood by June; also a single machine with a
capacity of 75,000 feet per day. The output of both during the first season amounted to
500,000 ft. [of] lumber, 2,000,000 shingles.
Bought on B.I. 9,000 acres of timber, to be cut in 7 years.
13 miles of narrow-gauge RR
By 1905 a capital of $200,00
Chief markets Chicago & Milwaukee
Mrs. Williams says the Boadman Co. was operating in Traverse City when they went there in the summer of 1853 after the Battle of Pine River.
The narrow-gauge road's rails were taken up as soon as one field was played out & moved to a new area where needed. Compared with standard-gauge roads, these undersized roads were inexpensive. A locomotive could be bought for $4,000, flat cars no more than $169, & to prepare & metal the right-of-way averaged no more than $4,000 a mile. The old problem of getting logs from the place where the tree fell to the skidways where they could be put on carriers remained. To an extent this was solved by use of the "big wheels" - a pair of wagon wheels ten or twelve feet in diameter, which could straddle a felled tree or several logs, lift one end of the load off the ground, & so make it possible for a team of horses to drag the timber to the place where it could be loaded. A factory in Manistee made thousands of these big wheels during the last quarter of the 19th century."
- Bruce Catton, Waiting for the Morning Train, p. 115-161
Beaver Island Lumber Co. -
Organized Dec. 27, 1902, capital $75,000.
President - W. E. Stephens
Vice President - John S. Stephens
Secretary/Treasurer - G. Kitsinger
([the two Stephenses] came to B.I. from Free Soil, Mich., where they had
operated a mill for 10 years)
Mill had daily capacity of 30,000' of hardwood lumber; put in operation June 19, 1903. Also a shingle machine with capacity of 75,000 per day. Output of both above in first season - 500,000' of lumber, 2,000,000+ shingles. Much of this first lumber used to construct company buildings - offices & houses.
Bought 9,000 acres of land on B.I., to be cut in 7 years (also purchased "a vast amount of timber coming from other sources").
Constructed 13 miles of narrow-gauge RR.
Plant & schooners & other property "at this time (1905) represents a capital of $200,000."
Employed 125 men: 60 in the woods, 60-70 in the mill, others employed transporting timber. Payroll: $3,000 per month ($24.00 per person per month, average!!!).
Chief markets: Chicago & Milwaukee, between which & the Island the company runs its own steamers.
A stave mill added, with capacity of about 25,000.
- Northern Michigan
1 Bruce Catton, Waiting for the Morning Train: An American Boyhood. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1972.