Our Sawmill
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As told by Gurney Baverstock:
As told by Allan Pizziol: I decided to talk to Chester Carlbom, a neighbour, who operated a portable mill for several years cutting tie blocks for the railroad and rough lumber for sale. Chester had gone through a bout of bone cancer and was in remission but decided he could help convert it to hydraulics. After a month or two of trying we were successful in the changeover. We now had a safer saw mill. The original Perkins engine had to be resleeved and was replaced with a Detroit diesel. In order to keep the snow off and make the mill operational in inclement weather, we built a frame over the mill and covered it with a parachute purchased from Army/Navy Surplus. We now have the sawing area shed roofed. Our first endeavour was to cut material for our first new cottage, “Birch Haven.’’ We cut all the lumber and planed it wherever we could. The high school gave us a lot of time on their shop planer thanks to Laurie Metza. For our part we made sure the lumber was clean and dry. As well a contractor in Dryden, Horst Lang and a couple of little hobby planers enabled us to complete Birch Haven in June, Aspen Lodge in July of 1995 and Cedar Crest in May of 1996. While doing Cedar Crest we found a mill in Thunder Bay to plane as well as tongue and groove the lumber. Zeke Bartz in Dinorwic does our dimensional lumber, (2x4, 2x6, etc. and beams (4x4, 6x6, and 8x10). Over the years we have cut thousands of feet of rough Spruce, Red Pine, Black Ash, Cedar, Birch and Tamarac from locally cut logs, hauled out with our 1950 Timber jack skidder. Over the years we have completed Dogwood, Evergreen and Firlough cottages, remodelled the Shower house/Laundromat, added the shower-house suite, and remodelled the bathrooms in Lakeview, Lookout, Small Log, Big log and the Office / Office Suite with our very own lumber. This year, 2008, we will use our cut Tamarac to do our new dock deck. Each cottage has an album of pictures recording the journey from site cleaning to excavation to finish product. Our invaluable crews have been Treacy Harrison, master log builder from Thunder Bay, myself, our sons Chris and Colin, Jamie Arnold, Tom Cappell, Brady Harrison, Bill Kuzemchuk, Borden Kent, Nelson Kewakundo, Larry Binguis. |