Steaming horse logging
Vintage Logging

Vintage logging – Horses

Each Saturday morning I review 10 vintage logging, forestry and saw milling photos. This week’s review of vintage photos looks at the horses of days gone by and not that long ago.

Be sure to click on each picture to see the larger images.

1918 Horse drawn lumber wagons.
1918 Horse drawn lumber wagons.

W. Spokane St., Seattle, Washington, June 29, 1918.


Looks like an Ardennes horse hauling logs.
Looks like an Ardennes horse hauling logs.

Horses hauling a heavy sled of logs
Horses hauling a heavy sled of logs

Horses sledding logs during the winter
Horses sledding logs during the winter

mid 19th century on tramway in New Zealand
mid 19th century on tramway in New Zealand

In the 19th century most bush tramways were low-cost, laid with wooden rails and worked by horse teams. This typical small-scale operation has three horses pulling a single rimu log. There are no reins – the ‘trammy’ used verbal commands. The lightly constructed tramway is laid on a wooden slab foundation on the forest floor. Once it was closed down and had rotted away, scant evidence would remain of its existence. The date and location are unknown, but it is possibly Taranaki.


Draft horses skidding logs.
Draft horses skidding logs.

1900, Crissey Fowler Lumber Co., Colorado Springs, Colorado.
1900, Crissey Fowler Lumber Co., Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Horse logging.
Horse logging.

Horses hauling large log on wagon.
Horses hauling large log on wagon.

Four-horse team hauling large single log on wagon with eight wooden wheels near Port Angeles; unidentified man sitting on top of log; horses moving away from camera toward left; automobile on left.


Steaming horse logging
Steaming horse logging.

A Newfoundland born Canadian with a life long interest in woodworking, baking and anything else that peaks my curiosity.

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