M. Well, it was up here on Campbells Creek, I worked some there.
A. Is that right?
M. That was back along in the 20’s, it was in the 20’s when I worked for
…….lumber company over on North Fork. You want some information?
A. Yeah. I’m kind of interviewing some of the fellows that worked back there
and trying to find out about lumber companies and lumber operation. Now, I've
read about everything that'’ been written about it, I’m trying to find out a lot
of their own stories. I’ve been taping a lot of people.
M. I’ve work lumber, I’ve worked logs, took me off of that and put me on a
cut off saw, that’s where I finished.
A. What company was that you worked for?
M. I don’t remember. They had sawmills all over that place. They had a
standard gauge track up to over here to the divide up that North Fork along the
time. There were more lumber companies over at Mountain Grove. They had a narrow
gauge tracks to haul up lumber, switchbacks tracks up the Allegheny Mountains
clear up here to the dock and transferred it on standard gauge tracks and shipped
it out of here.
A. You don’t remember any of the companies operating right in this area?
M. Huntley Lumber Company, that was about the end of my time. All I know
about them is what my dad told me.
A. Your dad worked with them any?
M. No, he operated this firm here. You know they had splash dams here both
at ……creek and …..creek
A lot of them logs floated out of here to Ronceverte. That was about my day
and time all he did, what he worked for was on the place here. You’ve seen these
logs that had to be dragged back into the water. That’s all he worked for.
A. But, you worked up at North Fork?
M. Oh, North Fork and after that Neola.
A. When did you quit working there?
M. In 1920 we load switched ties on a box car first end was pretty easy the
second end wasn’t. It worked pretty easy then the second end rough, buddy. What
made a man old, though. Where are you from?
A. I’m from Huntington, Marshall University. I have covered a lot of ground
over here.
M. …..that evidently was my uncle. He followed that clear into Ronceverte.
They had a big raft that went along behind it. Didn’t have big enough teams of
horses to pull these logs in as they went along you see. Wade that water didn’t
matter how cold it was. He said many a time he waded that water, came out so
cold he could hardly bend his knees, trousers broke right across the
knees-froze. He said he was killing himself after his brothers, but that of
course was another brother., one live to be 70 and my uncle lived to be 87, but
that isn’t what killed him. No, he can’t live forever.
A Well that was some kind of lumber operation in this county?
M There were saw mills in every hollow – over in that hollow, that was
before my time lets see 3 miles They would skid the logs out, built them with
logs and run them in there 3 miles slide, called them slides. My Dad worked on
that too. On that operation.
A I believe Rexrode told me there was still a slide around up here some
place, part of it still has not rotted all out yet.
M Well, probably is. But this one is all gone over here. Yeah, it was a
3-mile slide.
A When do you think that would have existed, if you can make a fair guess?
M In the late 1800’s, I believe, It was a railroad up in mainlander creek up
over the divide over on Cochran Creek and in there that they called……. I forget
that lumber company, but that was during my time.
A Do you remember any of the bosses?
M No sir, I don’t.
A Any railroads run close to this property?
M. No. That one that came out of Virginia was in sight, but it didn’t cross
our property—no.
A But you could see it over there?
M Yes, sir. That was a narrow gage job.
A. No big band mills in here or were there?
M. That one down there below Marlinton at the present time. That was
….interstate.
A. I’ve been up there to Durbin that the old Interstate Lumber up there now.
M. …..down below town. It used to be called….I believe there was a band mill
in there before….but it was not all electric like this one is. That all
electric.
A. I didn’t go through it.
M Well, Westvaco, They didn’t saw from this mill. They sent the work to
Covington, Virginia
A. They sent the work over to Covington?
M. They used to have a yard here ‘til the first part of last year. I think
it was March when they closed it down, some of these chipper blocks
A. Just shipping in big, putting them right in the cooker.
M. Yeah. Well those logs, they don’t all go in there. They tell me there’s a
lot of them chips lay over there so long they can’t get to them. When they get
to them they’re rotten. They have to haul them and dump them. They covered it up
a couple years ago and to help a little now they’re covered up.
A He is over in Covington now, does he commute?
M. Well, they closed this down. They had him different places closing up the
yards, the yards in Kentucky and one down in Richmond, Virginia and one down in
Danville, Virginia and then he was working in the shop down here near Rainelle,
I can’t recall the place right now , he’s about to lose his arm. He beginning to
move his fingers some now, transplanted a couple of nerves in there. He’s been
working on how to bring this chip wood in now, learning it ;write left handed,
of course, he was right handed before he got hurt and they have had him in
there.
A. Yes sir, is that your only son?
M. No, he is the oldest one the youngest lives in Roanoke works for Kroger.
A. What is your first name.
M. Arndt.
A. A r n d t. When were you born?
M. 1902.
A. What month and Day?
M. 5th of August.
A. 5th of August
M. I work for Southern States, you know what Southern States is?
A. Yes, sir.
M. I worked here in town in that store for 18 years, I quit there and had my
wife start working there.
I quit Southern States and was going to retire then. They wanted me to come
up there and I worked there 141/2 years..
A. At the stock market there is town?
M. Well its right on the edge of town in the building up where the old fair
grounds used to be. It’s the old market didn’t have a suitable place, didn’t
have the room down there and have a stockyard.
A. Do you know any of the old loggers around?
M. These old loggers are about all gone, well the McCarty was about the
oldest. He hasn’t been dead too many years and my uncle after he got so couldn’t
do too much he contracted timber cutting and some sub contracting, Amos McCarty
one of the last job and Woody Moore, I wonder if he is still living?
A Where does he live?
M. He lives over on Brown Street.
A. William Moore?
M Moody Moore.
A Moody Moore?
M. Yeah.
A. I have a name of Newt Moore…
M. He the assessor of our county.
A. He lives at Greenbank?
M. No, he lives at Dunmore.
A. How far is up to Dunmore from right down there at the road?
M.. Its 11 miles across from here about 17 or 18 from here. Moore he the
assessor and has been for several years.
A. I can find him down here.
M You might not find him this time of the year. He more likely out making
hay, but this time of the evening you could find him.
A Yes sir.
M…….(tape not clear) down at Dunmore, the road turns off to the right, and
it goes to the Wesley Chapel area, You can see it from the road. .
The first house you come to after you start up that road on the left
A. Someone told me he might have worked in the logging business or operated
a store or something.
M. That Moore is much younger than I am. Now his daddy might maybe his name
was Newt.
A. Newt Moore is the name I have.
M. What?
A. Newt, is the way it’s spelled, the way I have it here.
M. Now, maybe that is the way to spell it, some call him Newton. (skip)
M. Back Allegheny road down of the river there we call that place (bad tape)
He must be old.
A. He 91 I think.
M. He had a trashing machine.
A. Yeah, Cecil said he worked with him Yeah, Cecil said he trashed a good
many years after he quit the woods.
M. Yeah, he quit the woods …..
A. Yeah He not going very strong, but he still up. (skip)
M. Hevener, he used to be Sheriff of the county and my oldest son the one
here at home now was a deputy sheriff under him but he is a young man compared
to …… Yeah, Howard Hevener lives up above Arbovale.
A Yeah, I have talked to him
M. Howard is a nice person.
A. Yeah, he sure is. I talked with Richard Eye.
M. Yeah.
A. Matheny, the old man Matheny, he is 90 or 91.
M. Is he at Denmar?
A. No, he is at Barlow. ---Bartow, runs a store there, his son was a sheriff
just resigned.
M. Yeah, he resigned
(tape bad and ends)