Lumberjacks' Glory

The woods breathed life and wealth into the North Country for many prosperous years until logging waned and the jobs moved away. Today, a lone wooden lumberjack stands guard at the Municipal Park of Tupper Lake, a small town in the Adirondacks Park. On the first weekend of every July, however, the Woodsmen’s Days festival transforms the park from a sleepy deserted stretch of patchy grass into a bustling kaleidoscope of color and motion.

On Friday wranglers, farmers, chainsaw wood carvers, food purveyors and craft sellers set up stands on the grounds chasing the indignant birds and creating nightmarish traffic on the two lane road that is the main thoroughfare for the town’s business. All day Saturday and Sunday year-round locals in floral tank tops and preppy second-homers in polo shirts descend in downtown Tupper with their dusty pick-ups and sporty t-tops to feast on the competitions under the hot summer sun.

Log pulling and pole climbing harks back to the golden days of logging that ushered the long-gone prosperity and fuelled the local economy with jobs justifying general and specialty stores, hotels, restaurants and public schools. At the festival nowadays, young men and boys scale man-made wooden poles; with axe and wood-peg they secure a foothold with the peg, pull the peg below and gash the next higher one rising as fast and as high as they can until the winner reaches the top. The sturdy farm horses in pairs pull tons of cement blocks, in 500 pound increments, and charge forward under their handlers’ coaxing until the strongest team out pulls the competition. The air is thick with their perspiring breath and the clouds of dust they stir as they drag their load. At the gazebo, the children stick their giggly faces in wedges of watermelon and race to the thick white rind under the anxious scrutiny of their camera toting parents.

The park smells of fried bread and grilled sausages, ketchup smeared plates and Styrofoam cups accumulating on the grass as the day progresses. The craft stands attract idling gawkers who finger old snowshoes and homemade chotchkes while the amateur merchants sip their lukewarm beer. The most theatrical participants of the festival are the chain saw wood carvers. Their pre-sculpted wares are exhibited for the art competition; menacing bears on hind legs, majestic eagles with wings stretched wide, elaborately carved benches are on display and for sale. A competitive chain saw carving contest begins at noon; at the whistle, massive power saws roar on as the artists straddle their logs and start cutting, trimming, shaving their bear or eagle or bench until the whistle announces “time up”. The creations and judged and auctioned off right away.

I felt sweet nostalgia strolling through dust and noise, sipping beer and wiping sweat imagining older times when the competitions were a natural outgrowth of the daily toil rather than a production to attract sorely needed income for the struggling town.