Vancouver Island Logging (1938 - 1944) Historical Footage 

I was born and lived here on Vancouver Island my entire life. It's wild to see how everything looked before I existed.

Great logging history film . Hard work and much danger , men like this is what made the Canada and USA what we became . Thanks for the video . From a Pennsylvania Logger .

AWESOME video👏👏👏👍👍👍these MEN were as TOUGH as NAILS!!💪💪

I did this back in the day with my father he logged in Yale B.C. with a wooden tree! Old school.

This video is a treasure. I’ll be playing it for my Mom later today. She’s an 85- year-old widow of a man who worked in the woods his entire adult life and some of his teenage years too. He started setting chokers at the age of 16 in Zeballos in the mid- to late-1940s. He married, had a family, built a house with his own two hands, and was a good, honest, and loving father to me and my siblings. His work had its ups and downs. I remember when a close friend of his was killed at work. The man was a faller who lived just up the road from us. Jimmy Ross, may he Rest In Peace. Jimmy had a wife and four kids and a house in need of some TLC. The guys from work all gathered together after the funeral and worked on Jimmy’s house and yard for the weekend. One year the company asked my Dad to come to a dinner and dance thing in Vancouver at a hotel. They gave him some stuff for his being accident-free for 28 years. Him and another guy from the same place who worked together were recognized. The company, M&B, used to give the men bottles of rye whiskey and turkeys at Christmas. These gifts slowly got smaller and smaller until they disappeared completely lol. Edit: Sorry for the long comment! Us old people get rambling sometimes.

ya can't get more Authentic folks !!! awesome....boy. i LOVED it

That people worked super hard to grown their cities, amazing

My dad worked for 40 years at Weyerhaeuser. I loved coming to work with him and smelling the pulp mill and helping him to spray paint the logs after measuring them. I remember a mountain beaver jumped out of a hollow log, and my dad's friend took his scaling stick and wacked it across the log yard.

My husband's uncles are part of this history...they and their families lived on floating logging camps on the north-west coast of Vancouver Island, most of them worked as fallers. This is wonderful historical footage of those hard-working men of the day.

Worked For MacMillan Blodel Eve River Division for 25 years loved it😎

Born and raised in Nanaimo, lived a 20 mile radius all my life. This video is Wonderful!! Thank you so much❤

born and raised on the island. this is some really greatfootage

Been climbing year round for 30 yrs.And running the business, fixing equipment, in the summer 100 degree heat, and freezing winters. Still do it every day at 63, the biggest , baddest trees around. Still feel humbled by these guys.

My grandpa was a logger in the Cowichan valley in the 50's. One day he was putting the cable on a log when the guy at the controls fell asleep and fell forward on the lever. The log jerked up and sent my grandpa flying 20 feet. He landed in a pile of wood chips right next to a stump. Definitely dangerous work.

Good stuff, the old sailing ship is now a wreck dive in Powell River BC

I can say that never had relatives do any Logging .But did live in small logging town on the west cost of Vancouver Island .When I was a kid in the seventies .

Many thanks to the maker of this video.. I’m all a ‘glow!! 🥰🙏🤟

I grew up in the Comox Valley, another area with a proud logging background. The resident farmers worked the bush in the winter and the farms in the summer. Much of my family history is documented in "Island Timber". Nice to see the film, reminds me of the old Super 8 movies my dad used to show us from his days in the bush.

It is great to see how they did the logging 100 years ago, they still use some of the same ideas

Percy Logging 1979 Knight Inlet Best Experience of my life setting beads hook tender " Eskimo " Toughest man I ever knew

hard dangerous work respect !!!!

I had uncles that logged around that time period (1935-50ish) and they lived on Great Central Lake in a float house and logged in those woods until the great central lake sawmill shutdown in 1952. They were expert fallers known everywhere in Port Alberni and the surrounding area. Their Names were Alvin and Clive (Gunny) Brown

Now yer loggin! Absolute gold, thanks for posting this gem.

So cool many of the same tactics still used to this day on the very few cable sides that are left

Cool video. Thank You. Reminds me of remote Drilling Camp. Rig crew, cooks, slings, winches, pipe, picking up pipe, and casing. Very similar atmosphere.

Really enjoyed that, thank you

I'm old school,grew up in Sooke and set choaks most of my younger years.Love the old timey music.A lot of younger people might think their actually riding a donkey to town but i'm sure it was some kind of steam donkey or such. Great footage! Thanks

gosh darn cool splicing cable on site throwing the log grapple on the log on the run

Helps to visualise things my father spoke about , High Lead , Whistle Punk ,Donkey , Chokers , Cork Boots , Paris Boots , Bull Cook etc.

These guys were REAL men- balls of steel - like the iron workers of major city's skyscrapers they appeared to be fearless

Stewart and Welch were in the mining business as well. There are a couple of mountain peaks named after them in the Cheam range mountains in Chilliwack

Great film great songs!

Coolest thing ever man, thanks for posting

Amazes me the size of the chokers. Must be 2 1/4 or 2 1/2". The bell must weigh 65 or 70 lbs. lol, hard work.

Agood book to read is Sometimes a Great Notion, oregon Eugene in the 60s, city kid goes to work with distant family, excellent book.

Cool post ! Lived in Cowichan all my life.

Even though I love the music… Every single lyric and every note… I’m also thankful for the section that has the real sounds to. I don’t think it can be appreciated enough, what a treasure this footage is.

The dog looked happy.

Best dam ABC song I have ever heard. If thay would have thought me this song in elementary school I might have learned my ABC's Sooner. God bless.

Wow! tree topping with an axe!

After welding for 20 yrs im planning to get class 1 and drram of driving log trucks!!

Nice, 🙏🏼👍🙏🏼

Im sitting here thinking to my self this is the most dangerous shit I've ever seen in my life. These dudes are crazy

Nice

These tunes speak to me..

I’ve got the log drivers waltz running through my head watching this.

Cool

That train at about 22 mins looks like one in Qualicum Beach or possibly the one by the main drag in Courtenay

I've been logging for 30 years humble Timber cutter did I tell you what them guys are True Timber cutters it was hard he sure wasn't easy if they had the wheel and heart I said all my love out to all the barbers may God watch over you and keep you safe cuz at the end of the day we go home to our families and loved ones amen East Tennessee shout out to all you loggers

Our Cook at Harrison Lake used to bang the 2 hunks of rail iron at 3AM during fire season, so as a prank we hung it in the cookshack, haaa he must of thought, jokes on them, no breakfast call, but no breakfast either, didnt piss in his porridge again, our Camp was towed onshore from the Lake at Spring Creek, still see some of the logs that were the skids in the Alders,

Seeing old timber forests will blow your mind

So interesting to see this sort of thing. Important historical significance. It would be good to transfer the original film to a better medium than the poor videotape that was used before digitizing.

How can I find out who did the mandolin music? It sounded like Nate and Harley Bray, AKA The Bray Brothers.

does anyone have, pictures of the floating A-frame Washington steam skidder on sprout lake bc Canada

Wait till these fellers get a load of a power saw, which is just coming about during this time.

Nerves of steel they had to shimmy up those tall trees to axe off the crowns!

Where were you able to find a copy of this? Iv been looking for years as my grandpa had a copy on vhs in the 80s that I wore out watching on repeat

hey just wondering where i can get access to a copy of this or names of the people in this video.

Great footage! Does anyone know for what reason they’d bother to ‘top’ the tree before the felling of it?

Anyone know the name of the song that started this video ?

I'm wondering if you or your kin are in these films? awesome stuff....Would'nt catch me topping a tree at 200 feet with nothing but an axe,my hat goes off to those brave men that put us on the map.I'll sip a whiskey for those boys

its where i signed up 1980

I asked for a flip, and you gave me a canuk.

does anybody know who sings that version of the song that plays between ten and 12 minutes

were you aloud to talk in the cook house at meal time? i'm from back east, we had to keep quiet and if you didn't, the cook would kick you out, never happened to me, but i have seen it happen lol

Song in the beginning?

My grandpa hauler trail boat of logs by horse back In The day just to build a house for the government to tell him someone elce already bought the land.

i expected to see a skadill comment.

OHHH !! THIS !! MUST ;! BE !! BUCKIN !! BILLY !! RAY !!! SMITH'S !!! ANCESTRY !!! CHANNEL !!!!

how many guys died out there in the bush, and in those days they raped it. I fell right of way to Jim Mitchell Lake, and Thelwood over Buttle lake, almost bought it twice and that wood wasnt even harvested as it was in the park. I never felt better in my life. 6 beers befor supper and 3 after, calories hah 3000 plus, and spitting railway spikes.

Tough mofos earning a buck compared to the 200 plus pounders nowadays fiddling with joysticks to cut a board !

no -40. would of done this over oil field work.

Kid nowadays don't know what work is . . Young men lost there lives workk g now kids won't even give it a try no modivation. Eat shit sleep play videogames . God bless these men that built this industry

good video except for the annoying creep that is so irritating, singing

Sad. Old fools

Steam engines run the show in the Bush and trains not gas or diesel think about that. Men were asked to work and the job was done, I have worked in the forest business for 22 years every day was extremely challenging and fun wish I could be there