Logging

A Young Boy’s Journey to Manhood: An Ancestral Move

Becoming a Man         

    

Jack Middlebrooks, my Great Great Grandfather was born in 1900 to Emily and Harper Middlebrooks. He was one of eleven children, two of which died as children. Jack, being the eldest living son, had great responsibilities, even as a child, to his mother and younger siblings. Jack’s Father Harper did not provide for the family and left for years at a time to ‘work’ but never sent money home. As a result, my Gredad was forced to fill his Father’s shoes. At the age of 10, he left home and travelled North to the logging camps to work as a cabin boy. One of his main responsibilities, besides making beds and cleaning, was checking the beds for rattle snakes. By the end, he had collected a box filled with their rattles. Jack worked long hours there and would return home after several months, while sending money to his Mother in the meantime. Of course his meager earnings were never enough. One memory Jack has told members of my family is that he ran into his Father once, who reported that his Mother and siblings were doing fine at home. However, when Jack returned home, he found that his Mother had just given birth, and the younger children were trying to make a soup out of dandelions. His Father had never sent any money home. After finding them like that, Jack walked 20 miles to the nearest store to buy them food. He would have walked the same road that I often travel to get to my cottage. Its stories like these and my family history that makes me so thankful for everything I have, and everyone I have.

Being a Man

              

       With a wife and infant son of his own, Jack found himself struggling once again. While Jack loved living off of the land, with his small farm and his hunting and trapping, sometimes it just wasn’t enough. On those occasions Jack once again had to return to logging. According to a study done for the Muskoka Watershed Council this was common, ‘land was acquired from native populations by treaty and to supplement meager farm income, settlers often worked in the logging camps in the winter months.” ( (Muskoka Watershed Council, 2012). In 1924, with his wife and baby, Jack travelled up the French River to spend the winter working in a logging camp. He remembered that once you were up the river, it would become too icy to travel back until spring. Upon arriving to the camp and being assigned their 10’ by 12’ cabin, he learned that there were not enough cabins for all of the workers. As such, he was forced to share the cabin with his brother and his wife who had also come to work at the camp. So, the put up a sheet in-between the two beds and spent the winter in very close courters. Apparently it would get so cold that they had to sleep with a lantern under the sheets to keep the baby warm. While Jack missed his home, this was an economical necessity.