Booming Wood

Booming Wood. . , Before World War II, most of the wood supply for the mill as well as the several saw mills which operated in Dryden was delivered by water. The wood was cut generally in the winter around the hundreds of miles of shore line of Lake Wabigoon and its many branches and tributaries. It was hauled to the lake by horses and sleighs and dumped on the ice. The company owned many horses, however, people from as far as Saskatchewan would come with their teams to earn some extra money in winter hauling wood. The biggest trees were cut into boom logs which were fastened end to end to form booms. A boom would be drawn around a quantity of floating wood and the ends attached to a tug boat , in the early days steam powered, later diesel powered. Depending on the size of the tug the quantity of wood could run into thousands of cords , the biggest load on record was 4100 cords. These large tows of wood moved very slowly , and could take up to a week to make a round trip, during which the crew lived on the boat. , After World War II more and more wood was hauled to the mill by truck, and as the stand within ready access of Wabigoon Lake and its tributaries became depleted water transfer of wood declined and eventually disappeared. The last tow was brought down the lake by the Anglo Duchess on June 13, 1977. The river continued to be used to sort and transfer wood into the mill until July 29, 1982, when the last tow was brought down the river by riverboat Dryden 4 to the mill slasher located on the point of land directly south of where you are standing.