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Friday December 31, 1915
From the Archives of the Industrial Worker: The "Life" of the Migratory Timber Worker

As the Industrial Workers of the World begins a campaign to organize the timber workers of Northern Minnesota, Hellraisers offers this account of the life of a migratory timber worker from an anonymous logger, originally published in the Industrial Worker of July 2, 1910. The conditions under which the "timber beasts" live and work have not improved much, if at all.

WHO SAID A LOGGER LIVES?

The question has often been asked: "What constitutes living?" If it is the mere fact that we have life in our bodies and are plodding along in search of a job with our blankets on our back, then we are all living.

If "living" means to have all the good things of life, all the comforts of a home, and a life guarantee that such comforts shall continue as long as we are willing to do our share of the work, then we are not living, but simply saving funeral expenses.

It is estimated that there are 50,000 loggers along the Pacific coast, and it is a conservative statement to make that not one percent of them can say that their home consists of anything better than a dirty bunk furnished by the boss and a roll of blankets that they are compelled to tote about from pillar to post, many times only to make room for another toiler who has left $2 for the job in the tender care of the fat Employment Hog, who will divvy up with the foreman or superintendent. This is incentive enough to soon discharge him, so that a new recruit can be divorced from his $2, and so this endless chain of men tramping to and from the employment shark and the job.

Do They Drink?

Sure they drink. That is, the most of them do. Saloon keepers have waxed fat from the scanty earnings of the lumberjack. The saloonman knows when every pay day is in every camp in his neighborhood. He also knows that the lumberjack will bring his blankets into the saloon for safe keeping until he has a look about the burg and buys another job.

The saloon is the only home he has, and there are to be generally found his friends from other camps, who are, of course, always glad to see him. Then the check has to be cashed, which is considered a favor, and the lumberjack reciprocates by buying a drink "for the house," which means all hands, if the gang is not too large. The saloonman is also glad to meet the new arrival with the check, and he too does the honors by "setting them up." Sometimes the checks do not admit of a large "blow-in," as the two-by-four (time check) was administered before a "stake" was made.

In parts of Montana this employment ticket graft is "worked to a frazzle." There are camps that are known to have three crews of men. One crew coming to the camps with the "tickets for a job"; another with a two-by-four going away, and the other crew at work in the woods producing 20 times more for the boss than the wages could buy back at night.

When men are plentiful and the labor market is well stocked, then the employment shark reaps the harvest. If men are scarce and times are good (which means lots of hard slavery) the boss generally tries to "hang onto" his crew after he has selected a good, sound, husky bunch. He can't afford to monkey with the "divvy on the employment ticket" then, as there is much more money to be made in keeping a full crew.

Checks for 5 Cents

Pay checks have been issued to first-class lumberjacks in Montana by no smaller a corporation than Jim Hill's railway, for amounts ranging from 5 cents and up; scores of them for amounts less than $1. The reader will doubt this statement and immediately say that it would be almost impossible to figure a man's time down so fine. Not so.

This check may represent all the cash a worker will receive after working four or five days and perhaps longer. The employment fees in these particular cases are deducted from the wages earned, as in hard times the men have not the money to put up to the "HOG" in advance. Then there is the dollar for the doctor and hospital. (There is generally no hospital and the doctor could not pare a corn.)

Poll tax must be paid, which is generally about $4, if it has not been paid at some other camp, and if the worker loses his receipt, he pays again. Spring mattresses are on sale generally, and as they are fixtures to the bunk, they have to be paid for. The next fellow buys them over again. Boots, rubbers, socks, tobacco, etc., are for sale by the benevolent company at double their town value, and, of course, the woodsmen must have clothes and tobacco.

It is now easy to understand how a man could be paid off with a nickel, 15 cents, 31 cents, etc. After all the grafts are worked and deducted from the wages due, the bank check represents the balance due.

Every employer of labor in the camps does not work the graft for all it is worth, but the employment shark graft is quite general, as is also the doctor.

The Food

The food is generally of the coarsest kind. Although not the fault of the cook, as many of the camp cooks are of the best in the land. Good butter is a rare article in a logging camp. Some of it is as white as wax, and as rotten as a putrid carcass, if smell goes for anything. This brand of "Ole," as the men call it, is very cheap, but strong. Strength is what the boss wants.

A lumberjack in Montana put some butter on the railroad track (so the story goes) and the train was derailed.

The "main squirt," or superintendent, occasionally visits the camp and eats with HIS MEN. He pronounces the food fine, especially the butter, and shows how tough he is by plastering it good and thick on the bread. He generally takes to the timber or the automobile immediately after supper.

Environment

The environment in which the lumberjack as logger lives is anything but a pleasant one. It consists of working long hours, eating poor food, sleeping in overcrowded bunk-houses, which are alive with vermin (lice and fleas), being robbed by Employment Hogs, packing the blankets, and having to leave them in the saloon in town, where many call home.

From the toil of these men a few have made millions and live in the palatial mansions in the cities. The streets are named after them, and they are generally the leading citizens. They have their automobiles and their yachts, and to say the least, they revel in luxury.

When the logger has produced more logs than can be sold or consumed, he is immediately laid off until a demand is created. The boss calls this "CURTAILING PRODUCTION," and the lumberjack calls it H--L.

If a machine can be procured that will get out twice as many logs as men and donkey engines, with the same sized crew, in it goes. The "flying machine" does this very thing and it was only this year that thousands of men were laid off for a month at a stretch on Hoquiam Harbor to satisfy the great productivity of the "flying machine." The boss got rich, as the "flying machine" drew no wages, and did not need feeding when standing idle. The workers got poor, because the boss did not want them to work. They had by long hours of labor, together with some working man's invention, worked themselves out on the street.

The boss logger is organized to control the price of logs and lumber. Whether times be good or times be hard he has a cinch on the situation.

The slave logger is not organized to control that which he has to sell to the boss-HIS LABOR POWER. No effort has been made to shorten the hours of labor. No organized effort has been made to rid themselves of the "EMPLOYMENT HOG."

Thousands of loggers are buffeted about on the sea of capitalism with their blankets on their back, having no other purpose in life than to be "looking for jobs," and thus satisfying the greedy man or a few parasites who have by hook or crook gotten control of one of the natural resources of the earth, which was provided by Nature for the common use of mankind.

If we are agreed that the forests were intended for mankind and not for the enrichment of a few gluttons, then it is up to the loggers and all workers employed in the lumbering industry to wake up and organize right, so that they may at least live.

Let us begin by getting an eight-hour work day and tying a can to the employment shark. It is up to the workers to do the curtailing by doing less work each day. There is only one union that is really worthy of the name of a "labor organization" in America. It is founded on the truth-THE CLASS STRUGGLE. The irrepressible conflict between the toilers and the parasites; between those who own the tools and do not use them, and those who use them and do not own them. Between master and slave.

Join your union today and take an interest in the work of getting all together. It's your duty. Do it. If there is not a local of your industry in your nearest town, then start one. If you dont know how to start one just ask the "INDUSTRIAL WORKER," or the first I. W. W. secretary you can locate.

A LOGGER

[Drawing of Blanket Stiff & I. W. W. stickerette added.]

SOURCE
Rebel Voices: An IWW Anthology
-ed by Joyce L Kornbluh
PM Press, Mar 1, 2013
https://books.google.com/books?id=sE0Qc0M61fkC

IMAGES

Blanket Stiff, Industrial Worker, April 23, 1910
http://depts.washington.edu/labhist/laborpress/Industrial_Worker.shtml
IWW Silent Agitator, Don't Buy Jobs, Read the Industrial Worker
http://www.folkarchive.de/coffee.html

See also:

"Hellraisers Journal: IWW Plans to Organize Timber Workers of Northern Minnesota from HQ in Duluth"
-by JayRaye
http://caucus99percent.com/content/hellraisers-journal-iww-plans-organiz...

Industrial Worker [IWW Newspaper] (Spokane, Seattle: 1909-1930)
-Report by Chris Perry and Victoria Thorpe
http://depts.washington.edu/labhist/laborpress/Industrial_Worker.shtml

I.W.W. "Stickerettes" or "Silent Agitators" by Catherine Tedford
http://peopleshistoryarchive.org/exhibit/iww-stickerettes-or-silent-agit...

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