LUMBERJACK STEAM TRAIN, LAONA WI.

On Aug. 17 Ken drove the five of us to Laona located in Wisconsin’s far northeast  to ride the steam train and visit the Forestry Museum.. As tourist railroads go, it was a tiny one. It took all of 15 minutes to go from the depot to the logging camp, Camp 5, now the Forestry Museum. This logging camp morphed into a group of permanent buildings for housing the loggers and for raising and storing  crops and livestock for feeding the loggers. Their jobs were to fell trees, delimb them and bring them to the camp for  transport to a sawmill. This logging camp was served by  rail. Others located on  the tributaries of the Wisconsin River simply floated the logs down the river to the sawmills.

Pictures were taken by a Canon A720 IS  8 mp camera. It fits nicely in a cargo pocket on a pair of shorts.

 

 

Passengers were encouraged to inspect the cab of the 100 year old Vulcan steam locomotive before leaving the station. This was a push – pull operation as there were no facilities to turn the locomotive. Passengers had their choice of riding in an open car, two passenger cars or two cabooses – perhaps all of the rolling stock of the railroad!

 

 

Here is the sunny side of the loco, a 2-6-2 Prairie. The brochure claims that it is the only one of its kind still operating anywhere in the world.

 

 

This is one of the cleanest cabs I have seen. The fireman told me that a tender full of coal lasts a week on the operation. They run 5 round trips a day.

 

 

Ken and Linda at the logging camp. We took over two hoursto look at the exhibits, have lunch and take the tram through the woods.

 

 

 

This flanger – snowplow is shown with a 600 hp. diesel switcher used on the New York Central 40 years ago.  l could not find any clue on the switcher of what company made it.

 

A few heavy machines were on display to show how logging was done in northern Wisconsin many years ago.

The sign explains that this Allis Chalmers tractor skidder was used in the 1940s.  That dies not seem ancient history to me, but it is to the younger folks visiting the site.

 

This is an even older skidder tractor built in 1920.

A tram took visitors through nearby woods where riders were told details of how the logging was done. The area had been selectively logged 9 times in the  last 100 years. It was hard to see any remaining evidence of logging there in 2015. Trees cut there under 12“ diameter were sent to the paper mills for pulp, and the rest to the sawmills for lumber.