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                  <text>EOS, ALAN and BEN

Bailey, Colorado

1

INTERVIEW BY ROBERT HULT DATED 7/24/02
RH – Robert Hult
AE – Alan Eos
BE – Ben Eos

Okay, today is July 24th, 2002, and this is Bob Hult and I’m with Benny and Alan Eos and
we’re at the Eos Mill, about 10 miles or so south of Bailey, Colorado. And were’ going to
be talking about their experiences here at the Mill over their lifetime. So Alan, can you start
off by just telling me what is your birth date and where were you born?
Alan
I was born in Denver and July 17, 1933 and growed up here at the saw mill and went to
school here seven years and then when 7th grade, went to school in Buffalo and drove there in a
’29 Model A every day.
Your parents drove you?
Alan

No, we drove.

Oh, you drove! Now this isn’t elementary school…
Alan

No, it was the…

Ben

7th grade.

So you were driving when you were in 7th grade. Okay.
Alan

Eleven miles every day to school and then we went to high school in Arvada.

All the way to Arvada?
Alan
Yeah, we build a cabin down there and mom stayed down there with us during the week
when we went to school and then we were back up weekends.
There was no high school here up in Park County?
Alan
There was in Park County but this is in Jefferson County and you had to pay tuition to get
to Park County.
Oh, okay!
Alan

See, it works now…

Yeah, there’s reciprocal agreements now.
Alan

Yeah.

Interesting. So you went all the way into Arvada for high school.
Alan
So, Mom and Dad wanted us to have a college education, but we never did make it to
college (laughter).
Alan

We’ve been saw-milling ever since.

So you’ve been here pretty much your whole life working at the mill.
Alan
Whole life. Well, we worked here - - well, when I graduated from high school in 1952,
then I was running the saw mill every day and then in 1954, we moved and the saw mill just
dissolved. Part to above Cheesman Dam on Molly Gulch and we sawed a million and a half, two
million over there and hauled most of the lumber to the Blue River Tunnel at Grant.

Park County Local History Archives

�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Bailey, Colorado

2

Okay.
Ben

For cribbing.

Alan

For cribbing.

Right.
Alan
And the new moved the mill to Kenosha Pass and we cut a million and a half, two million
off of Twin Cones…
Oh gosh.
Alan
From 1958 to 1965. Then we moved the saw mill to above Jefferson on Michigan Creek
and we cut a ten million foot sale on Michigan Creek and then we cut another ten million feet
between Como, Fairplay and 39 Mountain on down by Guffy… and then we moved the mill back
home in 1975.
My gosh. So you moved that mill quite a few times.
Alan

But the planer was always here, but our dad run the planer.

Now what was your father’s name?
Alan

Eric.

Eric. Okay, and he started the mill?
Alan
He started the mill and in probably in… oh, I don’t know, probably in the really early part
of the ‘30s because he built the log house that we moved into in 1935.
Okay.
Alan
But then he was - -he sawed and made lettuce crates as one of the big things that he
was into making and hauled them to get Denver and he cut ties for the narrow gauge railroad that
went through Bailey.
Okay, so before the railroad got going through.
Alan

Yeah, while it was still going through because it went out in ’37.

Right. So those were replacement ties then?
Alan

Replacement ties, yeah, so…

Interesting.
Alan
But then they used to raise - - when they first moved up here, they raised lettuce and
potatoes and sold - - and see, lettuce and potatoes don’t hardly grow up here anymore.
I was going to say, lettuce – here! That’s very surprising.
Alan

Yeah, that’s where he got into making lettuce crates.

Right. Before we get too far - - Benny, Benny you are Alan’s younger brother.
Ben

Right.

Okay. Let me get your birth date also.
Ben

I was born March 6, 1966.

Sixty-six? (laughter).
Ben

Yeah, 1936.

It’s just years.
Ben

Just get my dates right!

So you grew up here on the farm - - on the mill yourself also.

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Ben

Bailey, Colorado

3

Yeah, it was also a farm as well as a saw mill.

It was.
Ben

Yeah.

Now did your father buy this in the early 30’s?
Ben

He bought it in the early ‘20s, wasn’t it?

Alan

About 1924, or somewhere along in there.

Okay, was he from Colorado?
Alan

No, he was from southern Sweden.

Really!
Alan
1897.

He came here in - - he came to Philadelphia from Sweden in about 1910. He was born in

Okay.
Alan
And then he worked at a Ford factory in Moline and a couples company, a rubber - - they
made rubber products and then he got - -well, he was - - mom was born in Illinois but moved to
northern Minnesota when they were really little but then moved back to Illinois and that’s where
Daddy met Mom was in Moline, Illinois. They were married in 1920.
Okay, and they - - what made them come out here?
Alan

Here for his health.

Ah, okay and what year was that, you think that was in the early 20’s?
Alan

That’d be in the early 20’s because I had a brother that was born in 1923…

Ben

Yeah.

Alan

But never lived, only a day or two and…

And that was back in Illinois, or here?
Alan

No, that was in Denver.

So he was born in Denver. So they moved to Denver.
Alan
So they were in Denver in 1923 and then worked on Lookout Mountain for a number of
years…
Ben

He helped build the Lariat Trail going up.

Alan

Widen it out for a car from a horse drawn road, you know and…

Lariat Trail. Where is that today?
Alan

That’s from …

Ben

Lookout Mountain.

Oh, okay. Oh really. That’s what that is.
Alan

You know, from Golden to Lookout Mountain.

Right.
Alan
Yeah, he worked on it. They lived in Arvada, bought a house - were buying a house in
Arvada and he was working for Denver Gardener and he broke his back, something fell on him,
and he broke his back and then they lost their place in Arvada and moved to Lookout Mountain
and then moved - - then bought this place somewhere in there, I don’t know what …
Ben

They lived in a tent for two or three years.

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Alan

4

Two or three years.

Ben

Bailey, Colorado

That’s all they had.

So this would have been the late - - middle to the late 20’s then?
Alan
So, must have been something like that. I don’t know exactly some dates in there. Never
did find out.
Right.
Alan
But then they knew the Soderstrom’s and they knew the Holbergs, and see, the Holbergs
and Soderstroms, they’re…
Ben

Related.

Alan

Related.

Okay, because of their Scandinavian background?
Ben

Very well could be.

Alan
Yeah, I suppose, but then Daddy and Carl Holberg done a bunch of work inventing stuff
back in the 20’s.
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

But some of that family was in Moline too and see, they come out here.

Ben

Yeah.

Alan
So I don’t know exactly how all this … Mom and Dad never told too much about the olden
days, you know.
Yeah, interesting. I know I have the same concerns about my grand-parents and the things
that they did .Interesting. Now they were living in the Golden area, or Lookout Mountain.
Alan

Lookout Mountain then and then they moved up to here.

Now did they buy this outright or how…
Alan

Yeah, they bought this place then in the middle 20’s

Okay.
Alan

And they paid $10 an acre and there’s 80 acres here!

Wow, that’s amazing. Now what was his intent, was it to open up a farm here?
Ben

Oh, I’d - - just get out of the city.

Well I can appreciate that! (laughter)
Now if he had no background in farming and you said he’d never lived in a rural area – like
this must have been really rural back in that period –
Ben

Yeah, it was.

I wonder what the intent was. Was it to farm or you’d mentioned, he raised lettuce and
potatoes at one point?
Alan
Well, that was just enough to make enough money to get going, but I don’t really know
what he …
Ben

They never did say why they come up here.

That’s quite a challenge. It strikes me as having done a lot of these. The people just made
decisions and just did it. They didn’t’ plan a lot. They just made decisions and made it
work. They just made it work.

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Ben

Bailey, Colorado

5

Yeah, yeah.

Whatever it took. You know, this sounds like it could be that could be kind of similar. So
they bought this place in the late 20’s probably and came up here. Did they build a house
or was there a house…
Alan
Yeah, they build a house. No, there wasn’t - - there was an old barn is all there was and
then they - - well, they built the bunkhouse first, I suppose.
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

And the fruit cellar.

That’s the building you pass as you come up the road where it’s on the right-hand side?
Ben

Yeah, off the rock.

Yeah, where the rough rock foundations.
Alan
Foundation was and then they built - - then the next cabin there , the one next to it there,
and that was built for a chicken house but then that’s where they lived, in it, until the log was built
and then we built - - we moved into there in 1935.
Now do you remember that?
Alan

Yeah, I remember moving in there.

So you actually remember that, that’s the year…
Ben

I wasn’t born until ’36.

That’s right. So you probably wouldn’t remember that! (laughter) But you remember back
that far.
Alan

‘Cause Mom - -I remember Mom’s dad was here helping build the house and well…

Ben

Ron, her brother, come helped, too. Uncle Fred.

Alan
Yeah, Fred, Uncle Fred, came and helped and so… but I don’t know long it took them to
build the house but anyway,…
It’s interesting again you know, with no particular background in that, they just went and
built a house!
Alan
Yeah, right, you know, but he must have had something in mind ‘cause he was doing this
inventing stuff and then course evidently, the lettuce crates and the garden they growed. See,
they growed enough garden that the only thing you went to Denver to buy groceries was for sugar
and flour and you know,
Ben

That’s about it.

Maybe some lard, or … did they raise up there?
Alan

We raised cows and we butchered…

Ben

Pigs.

Alan
We butchered three pigs. They’d go buy the spring, early spring, they’d buy three little
weanlings and then they’d butchered one at Thanksgiving and the other two around the first of
the year. And then we had butchered a calf or you know, or a steer or something for meat and
then of course, the garden, that was all the vegetables and the cellar, that took care of all. Then
all the - - everything had to be canned that would spoil.
Sure.
Alan

Meat was …

Ben

Canned.

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Alan

Bailey, Colorado

6

Canned and the pork was Morton sugar-cure hams and stuff like that put in crocks.

So it was your mother, the two of you and that’s it. You had just two…
Alan

And a sister between us.

Ben

A sister.

Oh, you had a sister. Okay. And she was in between you two of your ages?
Alan

Yeah, uh-huh.

So you born all three pretty close together.
Ben

Yeah.

Okay.
Alan

She lives in Arvada.

Oh, okay.
Alan
Or was married and lived in Arvada and then … course this place is proper - - the house
and the property is hers.
Oh really?
Alan

Mom left that to her, so…

Okay. Now are you - - you actually have your own places. You’re in Shawnee (speaking to
Alan Eos).
Alan

Yeah.

And you’re at Friendship Ranch (speaking to Ben Eos).
Ben

Right.

Is there water - -is there running water on the property or do you have a well?
Alan
Yeah, there’s running water and then the spring - - the water for the house comes about
a thousand feet from the house.
Really!
Ben

It’s right back up (gesturing).

Okay. So it’s a spring?
Alan

Spring.

Ben

Spring.

It’s always been good?
Be

Oh yeah.

Alan

Always been good.

That’s nice.
Alan

Yeah, it runs - - it don’t have too much pressure in the house, but you always got water.

Yeah, well that’s really important.
Alan

So, you don’t need no electricity.

Interesting! Now in winter, what happens? Do you have to - - is the spring always flowing
in winter, too?
Ben

Oh yeah.

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Bailey, Colorado

7

So it - - so you just go out and get the water.
Ben

It’s piped.

Oh, you pipe it into the house, okay.
Alan

Yeah, they…

Ben

The first pipeline they dug in by hand, a thousand feet, seven foot deep.

It was rocky stuff. Seven foot deep? Well, yeah you want to stay below the frost, so, yeah.
Alan

Well, they dug - - no, the first they put it in and it was only around four feet …

Ben

The first, yeah.

Alan

And then they had to re - - it froze and then they had to re-dig it and go down deeper.

That must have been much colder winters in that period.
Ben

Oh, yeah.

Alan
zero.

January’s and February’s there’s a lot a days at 25 below zero. A lot of nights 25 below

I wonder why it’s changed so much the past few years it seems.
Alan

It barely gets to zero anymore.

Yeah, absolutely. I think the coldest we got last year is like about ten, maybe twelve
below and that was for one or two days.
Ben

Yeah.

And very little snow.
Alan

Right.

Did you get snowed in here?
Alan

Oh yeah, you know.

Ben

Yeah, there’d be…

Alan
There’d be a month at a time you don’t - - you didn’t go to - - if you went to Bailey, you
went on horseback.
Now what was in Bailey this period of time, in the say, mid to late 30’s? Was there much
up Bailey at that point?
Alan

Well, there was …

Not that there’s a lot there today, but…
Alan

There was two hotels.

Ben

Course the train stopped there.

Right.
Alan

The train stopped there.

Ben

There was a store that’s there now.

Where was the train station located?
Alan

Oh, I don’t remember. Since the highway come in.

Ben

Well, it was the hotel, the store and the hotel and then the train station.

Alan

Yeah.

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Bailey, Colorado

8

The store was the grocery store that’s there now?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

It’s there now. It’s the only thing that’s really…

Ben

That’s the only thing that’s …

Alan

That’s still there, ain’t it?

Ben

Yeah.

Alan

There was a big hotel behind the store and then there was a big hotel …

Ben

Right in front of the store.

Alan

Right in front of the store, between the Knotty Pine, where the Chinese restaurant is.

Ben

Right, somewhere in there. Yeah, there was a big hotel there.

Alan
But it burned down. They both burned down but I don’t remember what year; in the 40’s I
guess.
I was told there was a hotel up on the hill where that log company is, that builds log
cabins?
Ben

Right. Big one.

Big one. In fact, I’ve seen a picture of it. It had a big white veranda, it was a beautiful
hotel. That burned.
Alan
But then there was a hotel right there on the - - in the - - right down in the main street of
Bailey.
Ben

Yeah, right where the restaurant is there.

Where Crow’s Foot is now?
Ben

No, the Chinese restaurant.

Chinese restaurant, okay. So that building – what’s there now is completely different from
what was there then.
Ben

Right, right.

Alan

And the bulk station, that had to be there - - was that there when the railroad was there?

Ben
Yeah. ‘cause when I worked down there, we took out the - - one of the original tanks, that
horizontal tank and it was mainly for kerosene I guess, ‘cause everybody up here, you had had
kerosene lanterns.
Right.
Ben

And the railroad went right by it.

It’s on the route that 285 is on now?
Be

Yeah. Just about - - because the road went right in front of the store.

Oh, so there was a road and then there was the railroad.
Ben

Yeah.

So they were two - - they weren’t sitting on top of each other.
Ben

Right.

Okay. So the main road went right in front of the grocery store.
Ben
Yeah, and then the depot was - - I’ve seen a picture of this. I don’t remember it. But I’ve
seen a picture somewhere and the depot was about where the fire house that burned down here.

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Alan

9

By the river.

Ben

Bailey, Colorado

By the river. Between the tracks and the river.

Okay.
Be
There was a long building there. I don’t know…if it was in that movie that McGraw made
of the railroad; I think that’s where I’m remembering it.
Okay, that was what, ’37 that the railroad went out?
Ben

Yeah.

Okay, I guess that goes back, probably just before the turn of the century, or when it was
installed; when the railroad came through? ‘Cause it went to Como if I remember
correctly.
Alan

Yeah, it went to Como in 1860 something.

Oh, it’s that far back.
Ben

Yeah.

Wow, that had been there a long time then.
Alan
Yeah, I think that’s what I read on the sign up there on Boreas Pass or something or up
at Como. 18…
Did you ever go shopping in Bailey or did you always go to Denver to get what you
needed?
Alan
Well, you’d get groceries at the store, some groceries in Bailey, but then you’d - - when
you go to Denver, you buy flour in one hundred pound sacks, and
Ben
Well, and then the barrel - - but I can remember Daddy rolling a barrel of flour out of the
store there in Bailey on that old truck. What, a hundred pound barrel? The old wooden barrel?
Alan

Wooden barrels.

Really!
Alan

Well, like a fifty-gallon barrel.

Ben

I can remember him rolling that out. I wasn’t very big.

Yeah, but you know, being here where you’re located…
Ben

I don’t know if it was into a wagon or into the old truck.

Hmm. So you’d buy flour in barrels.
Be

Barrels, yeah. In fact, I think there one of them barrels in the attic up there.

So, what did you do for fun? I mean, again, now lets say, in starting in the 40’s or
something. Now you’re at that point in time, you’re about what? Anywhere from ten to
fifteen years old, somewhere around in there.
Ben

Like for entertainment?

Yeah. What did you do for fun?
Ben

We worked!

I see! (laughter). Well, there’s an awful lot to be done up here.
Alan

Skidded logs.

Ben

Skidded logs with the horse.

So you started working right away with your father as soon as you could?

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�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Ben

10

Oh yeah.

Alan

Bailey, Colorado

Oh yeah.

Ben
I don’t know, I can remember helping him turn logs when can hook candle was taller that
I was.
Okay!
Alan

Moving, stacking lumber and …

Ben
Stacking lumber, we used to stack lumber and we done all the plowing and the
planting…oats for hay and…
Alan
We used to raise enough hay here to feed three milk cows and a couple of extra cows
and a team of horse and a riding horse.
Okay. So you had quite a bit then. And you also had a vegetable garden then for
yourselves?
Ben

You bet.

Alan

Yeah, vegetable garden, yeah, we raised it. It was probably about like, an acre.

Yeah, okay. And you had enough moisture to do that!
Ben

Yeah.

Now could you take spring water and use it for that purpose?
Ben

Well, there was a creek running down there.

Alan

We irrigated.

Ben
Made ditches and irrigated and we spent a lot of time in the summer weeding the garden
on your hands and knees.
It would be the two of you and your sister?
Ben

Right.

My wife does that. My wife comes from a truck farm family and she - - that’s what she did
all summer, is basically weed. That’s what you ended up doing.
Alan

And then in the winter, you cut firewood.

When did you get electricity up here?
Ben

About ‘50.

Alan

Sometime in the early ‘50s, ’52 or … I don’t know. We had a …

Ben

We had a light (inaudible) for a …

Alan

32-volt generator.

32-volt.
Alan

You had sixteen two-volt batteries.

Ben

With batteries.

Okay, so you were charging the batteries primarily?
Alan

Yeah, you could run the generator one day a week or so many hours a week.

Right, okay, and then the rest of the time you were basically running off the batteries.
Alan

Batteries, yeah.

So it was all DC.

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Alan

Bailey, Colorado

11

Yeah.

Interesting.
Ben

You did your homework by the fireplace.

Yeah! And the kerosene lantern!
Ben

Yeah.

Now did your equipment run off of a like a diesel or something?
Alan

Diesel, yeah.

Ben

Diesel. He didn’t’ get the first diesel though until most of it was run with gas engines …

Alan

Up until the middle 40’s.

I’m told that gas was very difficult to get during the war.
Alan

Oh yeah but you - - but if you had a business, you could get all the fuel you needed.

Now you were very young during the Depression, from ‘29 to probably the beginning of
World War II. Do you remember much of that period and did it affect your father’s farm
here?
Alan

Well, I don’t know, they…

Ben

They just made do! (laughter).

You’re pretty isolated out here; you’re largely self-sufficient, so it was nothing like living in
the city.
Ben

Yeah, and …

Alan
…

The only time you went to Denver with the family was Christmas and Thanksgiving and

Ben

That’s about it.

SE

About it, really.

Now did you have family in Denver?
Alan

Yeah, there’s relations in Denver.

So you did. So there’s a family get-together kind of thing.
Ben

Yeah.

That would be a pretty good trip from here down into Denver.
Alan

Back in the ‘30’s it was and into the 40’s, yeah, it was an all-day’s drive.

Yeah, I’m sure.
Alan
And then during World War II, then they - - Daddy and Mom run the mill and sawed all
day and then they’d deliver these Government orders at night you know. First, then he had three
or four heart attacks in the 40’s and they found him twice along the road passed out beside of
Morrison one time and up on them short corners and they took him – somebody took him to the
hospital and then some other place he had another heart attack. But he kept on going.
I guess! And he lived to 96? I mean 1996?
Ben

No, he was 96.

He was 96 years old! That’s right, it was 1993 is when he passed away.
Alan

Passed away.

Ben

Mom and Dad was married 73 years.

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Bailey, Colorado

12

That’s amazing. Now he started the mill in the early ‘30’s. Do you have any idea what got
him going; what made him decide to start a mill here?
Alan

To build a house.

That’s a good reason.
Alan

He had lumber.

That’s the amazing thing about people. They just: “Okay, I build a house. Now what do I
need? I need lumber. So I go start a mill. Okay.”
Ben
He built the first mill in a machine shop and brought pieces up. He built the first mill
himself.
So he just created it. You mentioned he did a lot of inventing; was this part of the kind of
things he was doing?
Alan
Yeah, but he was a machinist when he worked in the Ford factory, he was a machinist
and tool maker. Tool and die maker.
Oh okay, right.
Alan
I got a couple of things he give me… some special stuff to put on the cap of a connecting
rod on a Model T to make it oil better ‘cause the rods were dip system in the Model T’s. It didn’t’
have an oil pump and then there was something else he give me for a Model T that made them
run better and then they invented some - - him and Carl Holberg invented an oil clutch back in the
20’s that he had wore out three cars with this one clutch.
Take the clutch out of the car and put it in another one?
Alan

Another one, yeah.

It probably worked really well.
Alan

Well, let’s see. The first saw mill he pulled with a 1926 Chrysler car engine.

So it was portable.
Alan

Well, just the engine.

Okay, I see, okay.
Alan
Yeah, you took - - cut the frame off behind the transmission and… and of course, his first
truck was another old Chrysler …
Ben

Touring car.

Alan
Touring car and they put a fifth wheel in the back and made a semi-trailer out of it
(laughter).
So the mill was built or initiated, you mentioned, he basically created himself.
Alan

Yes.

RH He invented the equipment and had it machined in Denver because of his machinist
background and he brought it up here and made the lumber for the house and then he
started selling it? Starting to mill as a commercial operation?
Alan
Yeah, selling it and then of course then he was - - he made the lettuce crates because he
was raising lettuce and then the neighbors would want some lumber and started cutting there and
cut a few railroad ties and let’s see…during World War II then he had government orders that he
had to do.
For… what were they…
Alan
Crating material to ship tanks and whatever overseas to the wars and then he … well, he
was building - - pre-built cabins back in them days, too. He built the walls and the roof in sections

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Bailey, Colorado

13

and then he would deliver them to the people’s property and they would already have their
foundation and the sub-floor down and then a small house they could put the walls and the roof
on in one day or maybe two days at the most and then the people that were buying the house
could then could finish them themselves.
So this was like pre-fabricated housing.
Alan

Yeah.

And he built it right here!
Alan
He built it right here at the mill and they started that in … well, he to start that in the late
40s after World War II.
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

And then continued doing that clear up until…

Ben

Well, my house was built in 1960 and it was the las - - one of the last ones that he built.

So your father actually milled the wood and built the house for you… in Shawnee.
Ben

Yeah, my house was built here and then erected…

I’ll be darned! So he actually built in sections. He could build a wall section?
Ben

Yeah.

And a roof section and …
Alan

In sections.

And just bolt together then?
Alan

He bolted or just nailed it - nailed them in.

Ben

The wall sections were actually tongue and grooved where they slid together.

Really!
Ben

Just the way it was built.

Nice.
Alan
But he sent houses, got several houses out in Nebraska and there’s some of them up at
Lanniger’s Lake and there’s some… well, all over.
Ben

Yeah, some of the first cabins up there Langer’s Lake he built.

And he built them here?
Alan

Build them here.

Now they would ship them thon a truck bed?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan
So when they had - - the sections couldn’t be any longer than most of the time, not any
longer than 16 feet and then you just put them together and the roof sections would be 8 feet
wide and whatever length it took to make the pitch of the roof.
Ben

Right.

Alan
So then he’d you know, deliver them to the site and then the neighbor’s would come
together and set it up. He had picked up windows in Denver and built the sections - - built the
openings to fit these certain windows..
So he’d deliver the windows separately then?
Alan

The windows and the doors and the roofing came with the kit.

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Now interior walls, were they done afterward then, after the…
Alan

Then the people that bought the house would put them in afterwards.

Ben

He would supply the lumber if they wanted like knotty pine or such.

So a lot of these are obviously still around then.
Ben

Oh, yeah.

SIDE B
So you’d build these - - all would be pre-fabricated here and put on a truck bed and then
taken out to the site where the foundation was already in place.
Alan

In place, yeah.

And probably take no time at all to put it together.
Alan
Put it together, yeah. So, he retired doing that and then with what I got old enough to start
sawing, then we bought these big you know, million, two million, feet bunches of timber so you
had to pretty well stay busy sawing in order to get that cut up.
Well, in the 30’s, were there - - I mean, would you buy lumber - - is it board feet when you
say million feet. This is board feet?
Alan

Yeah.

This is how it’s measured?
Ben

Uh-huh.

Would you buy leases to - - off of people’s property to lumber a particular tract of land? Is
that how it worked?
Alan

Well, I suppose you could, but it was all Forest Service.

Ben

Off the Forest Service.

Alan

Locally here.

Okay, so you would bid on…
Alan
Well, I don’t think - - back in the 30’s and the 40’s, I don’t think you bid on timber. I think
you just went out and they would…
Ben

They’d mark the trees and you’d cut them.

Alan

You’d cut them.

Really!
Alan
You know, they’d take a little section of ground here and there and they’d just mark it and
you just paid them for the trees and go to cuttin’. And then I think…
Ben

That’s the way they thinned the forest.

So it wasn’t a clear-cut type of situation.
Ben

No.

They would mark trees?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

Yeah, they marked - - the Forest Service marked the trees that you cut.

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Ben

Bailey, Colorado

15

And there’s areas around here that I can remember that we cut over at least five times.

Really.
Alan
‘Cause you would cut the trees that weren’t healthy, and then when they grow another
ten years, you go back and cut it again. But back in the 30’s, we skidded the logs with a horse.
Ben

All the cutting was done with a cross-cut saw…

Alan

By hand

Ben

An axe…

Is that a one-man person, or …
Alan

One man, Oly Olsen cut - - that’s all he done for Daddy was cut trees.

Oly Olsen. There’s a Scandinavian name if I ever heard one. He was a neighbor here?
Alan

Why, he came him from Sweden! I think he did.

He lived up here?
Alan

He lived in a cabin right here. He was a single fellow.

Ben

He used to cut with a two-man.

Alan

Yeah.

Ben

When we was that big. (gesturing).

So you drop a tree with a saw, one or two men, and then you’d have to limit with an axe,
okay, and now the top x number of feet probably isn’t of any real value, is it?
Alan
No, you left in the wood and then you cut the size of logs you wanted out of the tree and
then you cut them in eight-foot pieces or twelve-foot, whatever you were going to cut out of them
– saw out of them – and then pulled them to the - - where you could get to them and load them on
a truck and you loaded them on the truck up a plank by hand and a cat-hook.
So you had like a winch that would pull a log up?
Ben

No…

Alan

No,…

Ben

You just rolled them by hand.

Alan

Rolled them.

These are eight-foot logs; how big in diameter?
Alan

Oh, we’ve rolled them on as big as them barrels, fifty-gallon barrels.

That would weigh a lot!
Alan
And then when you sawed them in the saw mill, you’d turn them. You cut one side, and
rolled them by hand.
Just used one of these turn-hook things?
Alan

Yeah, cat-hook.

Ben

You ever see a cat-hook?

I’m thinking it’s a pole with a half-moon hook on the end.
Ben

Well, watch this (gesturing). This is a big one.

Yeah. That’s exactly what I pictured it.
Ben

This is a big one.

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That looks like a very old one, too. So that would just rotate a log then.
Alan

Yeah.

Now in the place you cut it, you would use a horse to drag it to the truck?
Alan

Where you could get the truck into it, you know.

Okay, the horse could go almost anywhere.
Alan
Anywhere, yeah. Then you rolled them up on the truck and - - but back in them days, you
didn’t put more than a dozen logs on, you know.
I guess! Now you were doing this in summer and winter both.
Ben

Right.

Alan
Yeah, year-round, yeah. We never, never - - though there’s days we didn’t work but now
the last ten years, I don’t think we’ve missed a day because we don’t have winter anymore.
Yeah, it seems like it. How far were some of these cutting areas away from here?
Alan

Oh, not more than …

Ben

About three miles.

Alan

Three miles, five miles.

Here, your location is great, you’re surrounded.
Alan
Back in them days, we logged in the 40’s over on the Berger property between here and
Bailey.
That’s private land?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

That was private.

Okay, so you’d also get private land.
Alan

That was the only I think we ever cut.

Ben

I think so.

The rest of it was all Forest Service.
Alan

All Forest Service around, yeah.

How did they ever determine what fee would be - - is it per tree or per track of ground?
Alan

Thousands. Back in them days, I remember paying $3 a thousand.

Thousand board feet?
Alan

Board feet.

So you’d have to look at a tree and estimate what the board footage is?
Alan

Forest Service had a way to estimate that.

Ben

A scale stick, a type of scale stick.

Alan
After the tree was cut down then you had to scale, a stick that had numbers on it that told
how many feet was in that log.
Oh, okay. A lot of work.
Ben

Yeah, you scaled it all when it was - - after you cut it.

Alan

Cut it, back in the olden days. Now, not anymore you don’t.

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Ben

Bailey, Colorado

17

No, not now.

Is there a Forest Service rep that would be out there with you or would he be here, or how
would he ever - - where would you actually do this measurement?
Alan
When you pile the logs up – when you skidded the logs – before you hauled them out of
the woods, then the Forest Service would check them.
Okay, so they’d have a representative come and do the estimates?
Ben

Mm-hmm, the estimates.

Alan

But they estimated the trees standing before you cut them.

Okay, that worked out then.
Alan

Yeah.

So you want to be on good friendly terms with that guy.
Alan
Yeah. (laughter) But anyway, yeah, they still estimate even this burned timber that we
bought here, it’s already been - - we know how much we’re buying when we buy it before we cut
it.
So when you’re logging in the late 30’s, early 40’s, that was going to railroad ties; it was
going to cribbing; what else - log cabins?
Alan

Log cabins and mining. We supplied some mines above Alma and …

Ben

Well, and then the tunnel.

Alan

And then the tunnel…

Ben

The Blue River Tunnel.

How about the Roberts Tunnel?
Ben

Roberts Tunnel.

Alan

Yeah, Roberts Tunnel.

That’s the same thing.
Ben

Yes.

Alan

So we got over a million board feet went in there anyway, we cut for that.

That’s amazing.
Alan
Over a million. ‘Cause all the railroad ties and then there was supposed to be a mill on
the other side in Montezuma that was supposed to supply the other side, but sometimes they
didn’t get enough and then we would run behind on this side.
How would you get jobs. Did you - - people just knew that you were in the business and
that they would come to you and say, “I need x number of feet?”
Alan

Right, ‘Cause we never advertised; we still don’t advertise.

Well, you’ve been here so long, people know that you’re here and if they need timbers like
this, this is the place to come. Are there other mills that are operating in the area?
Alan
No…down by Woodland Park, Pine Junction, Johnny Gossage has a little mill, but he
don’t cut very much. Dick Welch in Fairplay has a little one-man mill and that’s about all there’s
left anymore. In Evergreen, there’s a - - up Bear Creek there’s a little mill.
Oh, really.
Ben

But this is the only planing mill.

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Okay, so you do more than just saw. You do the planing, forming, shaping logs and I
noticed you have - - this makes the interlocking logs apparently. (gesturing).
Alan

And knotty pine and siding and…

So you do siding, too then?
Alan

Log siding.

You had married - what years? What year was it?
Alan

1960.

So you’d been living here, working in the mill all this time and you got married here. You
got married. Did you live on the property at that
time or did you move to some other
location at that same time or how did you do that?
Alan

No, I bought property at Singleton.

Where’s that?
Alan

Where the Silver Tip Lodge is.

Oh okay. That’s called Singleton?
Ben

Singleton.

Alan

That’s called Singleton.

I never heard that term before.
Ben

Well, that’s what – it’s on the map as Singleton.

Is it really?
Alan

Yeah, that’s the railroad days.

Okay, so you bought some property there.
Alan

Bought some property there and then he bought property up…

Ben

In Friendship.

Alan

Friendship in 1960.

Where did you meet your brides?
Ben

Square-dancing.

Alan

Square-dancing.

Really. (laughter). In Denver or out here or where?
Alan

At the Lone Pine Ballroom in Little Deer Creek.

The Lone Pine Ballroom.
Alan

Of course it’s not even there anymore.

Ben

Phillipsburg.

Alan

In Phillipsburg.

But then you continued to work here during that period.
Ben

Yeah.

Did you - - and during the War, you were saying, you were making crates for shipment for
these were government contracts?
Alan

Yeah, but mainly we just hauled the lumber to Denver.

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Yeah, you didn’t actually make the crates. You mentioned though, that your father actually
made lettuce crates by himself?
Alan

Lettuce crates.

Ben

Yeah, that’s where he…

That’s where ?pin? stock, isn’t it?
Alan

Right, yeah.

So he was able to make that right here and was it for his own operation exclusively or did
he sell the crates in Denver?
Alan

Sold the crates in Denver.

Okay, so the other farmer would be able to … (inaudible). That’s amazing you could grow
lettuce up here. I just can’t imagine growing lettuce at this elevation.
Alan

Well, Fitzsimmons Burland Ranchettes. Perry Fitzsimmons owns Burland
Ranchettes and back in the early days, that was what the made their money off of, was
raising potatoes and lettuce.
And the soil was good enough for the potatoes? Because I would think the …
Ben

That was great potatoes! They sold a lot of potatoes.

Do you think there’s less moisture now and that’s why you can’t grow things like that? It
certainly isn’t because of a longer season. It’s warmer now than it was then.
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

So, I don’t know.

Ben

I would say it would be the moisture, something in the sandy soil up there.

Alan
I was talking to somebody here not too long ago said they remember - - but there ain’t
too many people that remember back then anymore, back in the early…
Ben

Well, even the 50’s.

Alan

Well, they didn’t raise any in the 50’s I don’t think. When did Burland - - when was …

Ben

Burland Ranchettes started in…

Alan

I don’t remember.

I know Deer Creek Valley goes back to the 60’s, late 60’s. That’s when (inaudible).
Ben
This is early 60’s ‘cause it was about the time we got married that they started
subdividing Burland Ranchettes.
Alan
And then Jess Fitzsimmoms from Shawnee…he was a - - you’ve probably got some
literature on Jess Fitzsimmons, don’t you?
I don’t myself, but you know, there’s a gal out of Alma who is basically managing this
project and she’s the one that has the list of who we’re trying to interview. So I’ll have to
ask her about Jess Fitzsimmons. I’ll have to ask her and see if that’s one of the
individuals on the list.
Alan

Course now he’s - he passed away in… late - - no, it’s probably in the 70’s, huh?

Ben

Yeah, early 70’s.

Alan

But he used to be a ranger – Forest Service.

Oh, okay, so he was familiar with then area then.

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Alan
In this country and then …they used to - - back in the early days, they run a lot of cattle in
this country all over the forest, you know.
What is the connection with Carl Soderstrom and your father. Where did they first meet,
do you recall?
Alan

Through the Holbergs.

And the Holbergs are…
Alan

The Holbergs was …

Ben

Cousins to the …Soderstoms.

Alan

Is that the way it is?

Ben

Yeah…

Alan

Well yeah, Carl Soderstom, his dad and the Holbergs dad was brothers.

Okay.
Alan

No, it was …

Ben

Had to be a sister in there somewhere.

Alan

Has to be a sister or something, huh?

Ben

Yeah.

Alan

Didn’t Carl say?

You know, I’d have to look back on the tape. Unfortunately I don’t even have a copy of the
tape. I turn that to the County and I’d have to go all back and listen to the original. But I
remember him saying that he grew up on a southeastern Colorado sod farm basically.
Alan

Yeah.

And then he came up here I guess with his father, actually his family came up here and
then he started working at the mill here.
Ben

Our dad helped them move up here.

Yeah. There was a close relationship there.
Alan
When I was a baby, he was saying I was a baby or - - and Daddy took the old truck and
went out there and moved them up here.
Well, he showed me the cabin that they lived in and it’s still there. It’s in - - it’s getting
pretty rough condition, but it’s still there. Beautiful meadow that it sits in.
Ben

Yeah, it is.

Just a gorgeous location.
Alan
Then there used to be the Bancrofts and then the Mendenhall’s and then the - - there’s
some of the people at Wellington Lake; the Paynes and course, there’s some of them relations
that the gal that was out here when I was gone,
Ben

Yeah, she’s a Banc…

Alan
And … but Mom and Dad talked about riding horseback or in the buggy and going for
parties over by Wellington Lake to them people in the wintertime and in the summertime and
playing cards and stuff when we were little or babies anyway.
What does happen to be interesting up here? I mean, especially if you’re very young,
you’re really - - you didn’t have friends that were closer, right?
Alan

No…

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And there was nobody within walking distance, so it was basically your family.
Ben

Yeah, right.

That was it. And you had - - wood heat and kerosene lighting and long winters that were
very cold. That would be different!
Ben

Yeah, it was.

Alan

We didn’t know no different.

Exactly. You know, people did what they needed to do and I’m sure fifty years from now,
people will say, “How could possibly survive with what you have?”
Alan

Oh, it was easy!

Ben

Yeah.

Yeah, I guess in a lot of ways it was. Did you ever have any injuries or did you ever have
any real concerns about health up here?
Alan

No, we didn’t catch nothing ‘cause you didn’t see anybody that had anything.

That’s true. Nobody would infect you.
Ben

Yeah.

‘Cause you’re probably pretty much by yourself up here. The only time you had outside
was when you were shopping or selling some of the wood.
Ben

And if we cut ourself, we’d just wash it out with diesel fuel and go o.

I remember my grandmother using kerosene.
Ben

Yeah, well, same thing.

Same thing, exactly.
Ben

If you got a sore throat, you gargled with kerosene.

Alan

With kerosene.

Oh really? You gargle with it?
Alan

Or take a teaspoon of sugar, drip some kerosene on it…

Ben

And chew on it.

Alan

And chew on it.

And that would work.
Alan

That was for sore throat.

Okay (laughter) Did it work?
Ben

Yeah, it worked; we’re still living!

Apparently! (laughter) Are there any other home remedies you used that you recall that
you used? (Pause) What were your favorite foods up here? You grew here in summer…
Ben

Yeah.

Did you actually butcher the cattle?
Alan

Yeah.

So you had beef, you had pork…
Ben

Deer.

Alan

Deer.

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So you’d go hunting for local deer? Okay, so you had plenty up here.
Ben

And all this - - all the meat was canned.

Really! You’d can the meat, you wouldn’t smoke it?
Ben

No, canned it. Yeah, deer canned, was real good.

Alan

I guess you got to know the right recipe, but …

I’m sure. I never heard of canning meat. So you’d cook it first?
Ben

Cook it and then put it in a jar and seal it and …

Okay and then keep it in that stone cellar?
Ben

Either that or in - - we had like a fruit cellar in the basement.

(Inaudible)
Alan

Then in the summer we had ice boxes, an ice box in the house.

Okay, where did the ice come from in the summer?
Alan

Ice came from Fitzsimmons Lake in Shawnee in January.

Would they ship all summer then?
Alan
We had an ice house like in February or first of march before it melt – ice started melting.
Daddy’d get a couple truckloads of ice and we would pack it in sawdust and that would last all
summer.
You’d store it up here?
Ben

Yeah.

So you had your own little ice house here.
Alan

Yeah.

And it would stay all summer.
Alan

Oh yeah. Stay all summer ‘til winter.

Packed in sawdust. ‘Cause I also heard they’d pack it in straw sometimes, too.
Ben

Sawdust really would keep it.

Would you buy it in Bailey, or actually - - where would they store it in Bailey or where
would they store it?
Ben

We’d just get it off the lake.

You got it right as it was being cut.
Ben

Cut, yeah.

And they would take it up by train in the Denver and store in Denver for …
Alan

That’s what all them lakes were.

Right. They were dammed up at the south fork of the North Platte River and it would just
divert into those ponds and freeze up and they would saw it up. I think there’s still
actually some sleds that are still left there adjacent to that area. So that’s what they would
do. They’d get it in spring and you’d store it here and stay all…
Alan

Sometimes we’d go to Wellington Lake and cut it ourself.

Really. So you’d have just a saw and you go out on the lake and start sawing.
Ben

We had a regular ice saw.

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Alan

23

Cut it by hand.

Ben

Bailey, Colorado

Take a horse and a - - to pull it up on the truck.

How big a block were these?
Alan

Oh, two, three hundred pounds…blocks.

A lot of work. Everything was so much more of a challenge than it is today.
Alan

Then you had to figure out how much you needed for the summer.

So the ice house was partially underground.
Alan

Oh, sort of like.

Ben

Sort of like, yeah.

Somebody told me the Platte Canyon Church was originally a barn that was used for
storing ice. Do you recall anything like that?
Ben

It was a barn, I know that.

Alan

I know that, but…

Ben

I don’t remember about the ice but it could have.

Alan
Because it was the post - - the old post - - between that and Moore Lumber in there, that
used to be a lake.
Oh really.
Ben

Yeah. That was a - - well, the ice …

Alan

The ice …

Oh, that was an ice pond?
Alan

yeah, ice pond there.

Between Moore Lumber and where?
Alan

And the church.

Oh, that whole strip in there.
Ben
Yeah. Well actually, the dam went across - - well, just about by Moore Lumber and the
new Post Office, wasn’t it?
Alan

Yeah.

That makes sense ‘cause it’s parallel to the creek, so all you had to do is divert the creek
into it and it’d form up a nice little pond.
Ben

Then there was one …

Alan
Then there was – there two lakes. There’s one lake below Shawnee but then there was
two more below that. Cross from the school where the new football field is.
Right.
Ben

Yeah, that was ice.

You can see some of the areas that are dammed up yet that - - in fact, I think there is a sled
that’s out there yet that was probably used for harvesting ice. …What do you consider the
most difficult thing you had to face out here?
Alan

Oh, I don’t know!

Ever give that any thought as to what you considered to be the most difficult part of living
out here?

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Ben

24

I don’t know, we always had our own food.

Alan

Bailey, Colorado

Getting to Denver, I guess.

Did you ever get lonely up here?
Alan

No, there was too many things to do!

Ben

We was always busy.

Always busy.
Ben
Lot of times, the only times us kids got to go to school was when we went down to get
clothes for school for the year. I remember that and if you got a pair of shoes, that had to last you
until next year.
Oh, I’m sure. And you probably went through shoes out here if you’re doing this kind of
work, you’d probably go through some shoes.
Ben

So, you had to get them big enough and then of course, there’s nothing insulated.

Alan

didn’t have insulated shoes then.

Ben
I can remember Mom pulling an old pair of wool socks on the outside of your boot to keep
your feet warm from freezing in the winter.
Well, yeah it had insulated at that point in time.
Alan

Yeah.

I remember talking to Barbara Tripp and she said that they went through shoes a lot
because the granite, you know, in that area is pretty tough on shoes and they did a lot of
hiking so yeah, that was a toughy. So in particular, everything worked out pretty well
being up here. It really - - you probably have a lot of time to think about it, what you’d like
to have!
Ben

Right, uh-huh.

Alan

When we went to school here, why then we only went six months.

Oh, just six months.
Alan

Yeah, we went to school right here.

At the house?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

In what - -

Ben

What used to be a chicken house.

Alan

Yeah.

You’re mother home-school you then?
Alan

No, we had a teacher come in.

Really! So like come in each day?
Alan

No, lived right here. We had a place for her to stay and …

Oh really! So this was in the 30s again.
Ben

Well, the late 40’s.

So you had a teacher for the three of you.
Alan
The first teacher we had, had two kids of her own, so then there was five of us and then
when Bill Gunther bought the ?Feazler? place or which is Caldwell’s now, then …

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Ben

Bailey, Colorado

25

They had two boys.

Alan
So then there was … the most there ever was though going to school here would be
seven.
Ben

Yeah.

And that was in the chicken coop.
Alan

Yeah, it was in the chicken coop.

Well, that’s kind of neat, having a teacher right here!
Ben

Yeah.

That was her full-time job as a - - it was a lady that came in and lived here…
Alan

Lived here, a single lady, yeah.

And was just here for six months and then she goes someplace else?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan
Where ever her home was, I guess. I don’t know! I don’t remember where she was from
or - - must have been - - had to be from Jefferson county I imagine.
And she was paid by the county and so she just lived her. Basically she got room and
board here and that was it.
Ben

Yeah.

And for six months. So she was like part of the family for that period of time.
Alan
That’s right. Then the 7th grade, then we drove to Buffalo and then 8th grade, then we
built the cabin in Arvada and stayed down there.
That was a regular school, a public school?
Ben

Yeah, a high school, yeah.

Alan

Arvada High School.

Ben
It was credited, there was a high school there where Id-Ra-Ha-Je that was the Platte
Canyon School, but it wasn’t credited then and if we was going to go on schooling more, like
college, whey then we had to go to a credited school.
That’s interesting. Id-Ra-Ha-Je when it was first created or that’s what the high school was
before Id-Ra-Ha-Je took over, was not even an accredited school.
Ben

No.

Because I was told that Id-Ra-Ha-Je was put in basically because of Roberts Tunnel
workers. Is that true? Because there were a lot of workers coming specifically into the
county to work on a tunnel and so as a result of that, they needed to increase the school
facilities and that’s when they took over.
Alan

That’s when they built the school at Shawnee.

Oh, that’s the Shawnee location. That’s what took over for the for Id-RaAlan

Ha-Je.

Yeah.

Ok, that makes sense.
Alan

But I don’t think that was Id-Ra-Ha-Je then.

No, no they bought it after it had been turned out of - - it stopped being a high school.
Ben

Yeah.

Park County Local History Archives

�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Bailey, Colorado

26

Your father wanted you to go to college?
Alan

Yeah.

What made you not go? Why didn’t you go?
Alan

Well, there was plenty of work right here (laughter).

Ben

And I don’t think any of us really like school that well.

Okay, there’s the real reason. What years were you in high school?
Alan

High school would be from ’48 to ’52.

So that was the Korean War period. So you came out in the low ‘50s; came out of high
school in the early 1950’s.
Alan

Yeah, I graduated in 1952.

Ben

And I graduated in ’54.

And you came back here and…
Ben

Yeah, worked ever since.

Been working here at the mill. Do you regret anything about having done that?
Ben

Not really.

Obviously, you’ve done well, you’ve got quite a business going, and you’ve done what you
wanted. It’s very impressive, actually.
Alan

Just now, if that fire hadn’t of burned the saw mill down…

Ben

We could have retired.

Alan

We could have retired.

Yeah, isn’t that funny how things like that come up. Were there fires in the 30’s and 40’s
that you recall?
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

Oh yeah, every summer.

Ben

But they would be just small.

Nothing like what we’ve been having recently.
Ben

Because everything wasn’t’ as dry as what it’s been.

So that’s the primary reason we’re getting these big fires now.
Ben

Yeah.

And then you mentioned too, that they used to have these thinning programs where they
would thin - - you know, you’d be logging, but you’d be thinning the woods and that would
eliminate a lot of the fuel that’s now causing these fires to be so intense.
Ben

Yeah.

Alan

Course see, this country was all pretty well burned off in the late 1800’s.

Just natural fires?
Alan
Natural fires you know, and then see, then a lot of the timber that’s we cut in the 40’s and
50’s had fire scars on them from the fire in around 1900.
Right at the turn of the century.

Park County Local History Archives

�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Bailey, Colorado

27

Alan
A lot of the country burned off between Mt. Evans and Pikes Peak around 1900, I don’t
know exactly when it was.
Most of these trees then that just recently burned, they were less than a hundred years
old.
Alan
then.

Yeah, all the smaller stuff, eight, ten inch stuff, that would be stuff that’s growed up since

So a big one like here (gesturing)…
Alan

The big one here, the fire didn’t kill it, see.

So that pre-dates the turn of the century probably.
Alan

Yeah, so that tree there is 300 years old.

Really! Wow.
Alan

Probably, three hundred years ago.

And it got torched in this last fire?
Alan

Yeah.

What is your plan now? Are you going to work or a few more years or…
Alan

Yeah, probably another, let’s see… I’m 75 anyway.

You have to enjoy this work! You have to.
Alan

Everyday is something different.

Sure, that’s true and you have to get a lot of satisfaction out of creating something out of
logs.
Alan

And building this machinery and keeping it going and …

Well, that’s the other thing, you had to be very creative to be out here and doing this. So in
a sense you’re carrying on your father’s tradition of doing whatever you need to do.
Ben

He makes all the knives and stuff for different patterns.

You just make them yourself.
Ben

Yeah.

Do you have your own machine shop then, or you have your own (inaudible) machine?
Alan

That grinder there (gesturing) and the cut-off thing and the drill press.

Well, you’ll do with what you’ve got to do.
Alan

And then if we do any milling work well, I’ve got a couple of lathes.

Right. And repair parts. I would imagine you need to turn some parts occasionally.
Alan
‘Cause we make parts out of old parts. For most thing, sometimes you don’t - you have
to buy new stuff.
I imagine it must be fun trying to find replacement parts for some of this equipment.
Alan

Well, like this planer and all, there’s parts.

You can still the thing?
Alan

Oh, any parts you want for that. It’s three days away is all.

And this is a 1940’s?
Alan

It’s 1949.

Park County Local History Archives

�EOS, ALAN and BEN

Bailey, Colorado

28

1949 mill. The planer.
Alan
Yeah, Yates American A20. Now the one that the motor that I had, that was a sevenhead Watkins motor. I don’t know what year it was; it was probably made in the late ‘70’s, but it
was all electric. It had seven electric motors on each; a seven-head electric and then electric
motor on the feed, but it was real easy to set up and change from you know, to go from you
know, log siding to knotty pine paneling in fifteen minutes.
End of tape/

Park County Local History Archives

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