Clouds of steam drifted from the large animals into the frigid sky. Behind them stood a sleigh loaded with fifteen white pine logs, each twenty feet long and from three to four feet in diameter. Tor released the safety chains from the side of the load and climbed to the top again. He pulled the heavy chains up, heaving them over and onto the ice below. Descending again, he grabbed his peavey, jammed it behind the chock holding the bottom log in place and gave a hard pull on the handle. The chock fell free and Tor stepped back as the huge load of logs thundered down onto the ice.
The young lumberjack climbed back onto the sleigh. Using the peavey again, he rolled the remaining three logs onto the frozen lake. He jumped back down, secured his peavey, threw the heavy log chains back up onto the oak bunks of the sleigh, stepped up to the horses, and grasped the reins.
“Back, back,” he said softly. The horses slowly backed up to the sleigh. Tor hitched them up, climbed aboard and, standing on the sleigh’s front bunk, gave his steeds a giddup. The horses pulled the empty sleigh across the bay and up the bank, then down the slick ice road to the cuttings.
Blackie Jackson, top-loader on this job and Mason Fitch, the chainman, were topping off another load as Tor came around the last bend in the trail. When the sleigh ahead of him moved out, Tor pulled his rig alongside more logs left by the trail.
“Time to stop your loafin’, fellas. I’m ready for another load of toothpicks,” shouted Tor.
“’Bout time you got here, boy,” replied Blackie. “You been sittin’ with your feet by the cook stove again?”
Blackie hooked a long oak pole into the rear bunk of the sleigh. The other end was laid perpendicular to the sleigh and rested on the frozen ground. Mason Fitch, still limping badly from his leg injury, did the same with a second oak pole. With these two heavy oak rails now forming a ramp, the two men used their peaveys to roll a pine log up and onto the bunks. Mason set the chocks and the log was secure.
Meanwhile, Tor unhitched the team and took the horses around to the side of the sleigh opposite the oak ramp. Mason laid a long chain on the ground between and parallel to the oak rails. One end of the chain was hooked around the center of the log they just loaded. Next, the standing end of the long chain was stretched straight out between the rails. With their peaveys, Mason and Blackie wrestled another log over to the ramp. Blackie jumped onto the sleigh. Mason threw the end of the chain over the log to Blackie. It now ran under, up, and across the center of the big log that lay on the ground. Blackie threw the chain down to Tor who secured the chain to the team’s whiffletree. With one hand on the halter and a soft giddup, Tor walked the horses ahead slowly. The chain pulled taut, and the eleven-hundred-pound log rolled effortlessly up and onto the sleigh bunks. The log was chocked in place, the chain set for the next log, and the process was repeated again and again until the sleigh held twenty-three logs. The sound of Sourdough’s loud gabreel announced dinner.
Tor took his team to the front of the sleigh while Mason gathered up the chain and threw it up to Blackie one last time. Blackie slung it over the top log and down the side. He jumped to the ground, grabbed the chain end, securing the front end of the load. Mason threw another safety chain across the back end of the load. Blackie snapped the chain binders down and climbed to the top of the logs. With the team hitched again, Mason, too, scrambled up next to Blackie, followed by Tor. A sharp whistle and a flip of the reins from Tor and the sleigh slid slowly down the ice road toward the lake. As the horses pulled they exhaled large clouds of vapor into the frigid air.