19th century logging — Labor shortage

There was a labor shortage in the logging industry in 1880.

“Lumbermen report that the tribe of choppers is yearly diminishing and promises in time to become utterly extinct,” The Glen’s Falls Republican reported on Dec. 28, 1880. “A demand, it is said, exists for a class of workers in the woods of Warren County. Men out of work, and who can wield the ax, might pass the winter profitably by transforming themselves into hewers of wood in the wilderness.”

In other 19th century logging news collected from historic newspapers of the region:

• “Thirteen of Finch, Pruyn & Co.’s teams, and a number of workmen who have been employed in the woods near the Boreas River during the winter returned home yesterday,” The Morning Star of Glens Falls reported on Feb. 19, 1894.
• “More than one-hundred loads of logs and wood have been driven into town each day this week,” The Granville Sentinel reported on Feb. 9, 1894.
• “Commodore Bradley of Olmstedville was in Glens Falls yesterday and completed what is said to be the largest cash sale of standing timber ever made in this section,” The Morning Star reported on May 1, 1894. “The purchasers are The Norwood Lumber Company, of which The Morgan Lumber Company and Henry Day are members. The timber includes spruce, pine, cedar, and balsam, and is located in the town of Long Lake.”
• “Oscar Ordway (of North River), with a force of twenty-five men, commenced his log drive at the mouth of the Boreas River, and last night camped at the Balm O’ Gilead Brook,” The Morning Star reported on May 18, 1894.
• “The thaw of the last few days has sent about 50 to 75 teams out of the lumber woods,” the Stony Creek correspondent reported in The Glen’s Falls Messenger on March 5, 1881.
• “The paper mill company’s teams finished drawing logs from the Rice and Walker lot last week,” the East Corinth correspondent reported in The Morning Star on Aug. 31, 1894.
• “The Griffin Lumber Company has received an order for eight carloads of baled shavings from P.D. Armour Beef and Packing Company in New Jersey,” the Sandy Hill correspondent reported in The Morning Star on Sept. 5, 1894

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