Jack Wilkinson
March 14, 1995I joined Alexander-Yawkey Lumber Company, later Alexander-Stewart, soon after the partners purchased 48,000 acres of prime timber north of Prineville and started logging operations. I was married to a niece of one of the partners.
I had studied engineering and surveying at the University of British Columbia graduating in 1923. The partners needed someone to develop the property they had just bought. There were no roads, no property lines, nothing--it was just wilderness. There was an old Forest Service road that meandered around up through the brush but it was impassable unless the ground was good and dry. Back then, in 1938 and '39, there were no four-wheel drive vehicles.
I was hired as forester, engineer and surveyor. I kept time for the woods crew and scaled the fallers. The first year I worked seven days a week from 12 to 16 hours a day in order to get things lined out. I finally got a dependable crew to help.
The first Alexander-Yawkey mill was about two miles inside the south border of Forest Service land on McKay Creek. We skidded logs directly into the mill which was a short distance away, but as the timber was cut out we had further to skid. We averaged about 30,000 board feet a shift. We operated at that site about five years before moving further up on the right fork of McKay Creek. The final move, on Willow Creek, was the final setting for portable mills out in the woods.
It was called a 'portable' mill but it wasn't one you could just pick up, load on a lowboy, and move from one spot to another. It was a band mill with a steam operated carriage and it was usually set on a foundation. It had to be taken apart to be transported and set on a new foundation. Mainly by brute strength and awkwardness it was moved when necessary.
We skidded logs down the creek bottoms. Being an environmentalist I was concerned, even then, that we might destroy the fish habitat and everything else. I convinced the company that we should build roads and haul the logs out on trucks, and that is what we did. Meanwhile, I had hired the Grogan Brothers, a couple of gypo loggers who used a team of horses and a spar pole. They logged in isolated areas where it wouldn't have been practical to use a Cat. They cross-hauled with a truck.
There was already a planing mill and a pond north of town on McKay Road. They were established in 1937. In 1942 or '43 the sawmill was built. The logs were hauled into the mill by truck. The mill was a steam operated, state-of-the-art mill for that time. It employed about 30 people. Junior Daggett was general manager, Hi Merscerau was purchasing agent, Stuart MacDonald was sales manager. Across from the mill on McKay Road there was a cut-up plant owned by Daggett and managed by his son-in-law, Walt Lidstrom.
I was beginning to lay out roads in the woods. There were no access roads. We had a big crew with 'dozers, carryalls and other road building equipment. The crew and I worked from daylight 'til dark. We built a lot of roads in a hurry. Looking back now, it is hard to believe where we put roads. I finally acquired a contour map of the area showing the high and the low places. It enabled me to figure out where I could go to get the best possible grade. There was never a dull moment on this job. I lay awake many a night wondering how I was going to get a road around a cliff or some other obstacle.
One plan was to build a road down through Foley Creek. Foley Creek ran into a gorge where there was a steep drop-off and a falls. Someone at the Forest Service advised against this plan saying it was impossible. In one spot there was a pillar of rock--one huge boulder on top of another--and I was determined to get through there. We nudged the pillar with a 'dozer and the rocks came tumbling down, opening about 100 yards where we could drill and shoot for a roadway. We built a contour road down through the steepest part of the canyon and another 50 miles got us over into Trout Creek.
Alexander-Stewart cut their last log in 1972. They were cutting 30 million board feet a year and employing about 500 people. Two years previous to closing, there was a lot of talk about shutting down. I was sure that by going over some of the areas we had missed we could keep our 500 workers employed another two years. But some of that timber that we by-passed was in very steep country and we would have had to bring in helicopters to get the timber out. So in 1972 we gave it up.
The Alexander-Stewart timberland with the remaining timber was sold to Brooks-Scanlon at $30.00 an acre. We left a good residual stand of young growing trees which has since been logged by Brooks-Scanlon. The sawmill was dismantled and sold. The buildings were left standing and later purchased by Leonard Wilkinson of Coin Millwork.
I was hired by Pine Products in 1974 as land and timber manager. I supplied snags for Pine Products' two stud mills, one in Burns and one in Prineville. The snags were cut into 2 x 4" boards for the housing market. I remained at Pine Products 20 years until my retirement at age 70.
It was an interesting and fulfilling career with never a dull moment. I would do it all over again. I've spent almost a lifetime in the forest and I am saddened by the waste I see in the forests today. There are thousands of dead and dying trees that should be harvested. This dead material will become beetle and bug infested and subsequently the infestation will spread to green healthy timber in the forest.