Logging and Lumber

The largest industry on my model railroad layout is the logging and lumber industry.  The logging takes place on a mountain in the center of the layout.  The logging is served by a three foot narrow gauge railroad.  The logs are cut and hauled down the mountain to the lumber mill where the logs are dumped into a log pond.  The logs are cut into lumber at the sawmill then the lumber is placed in the lumber drying yard until they are ready to be delivered the customers via the standard gauge railroad.  Since the era of my layout is 1939 I try to keep the equipment and machinery faithful to that era, 1939 or older.

The sawmill pictured above is not on my layout - it is a postcard with a 1912 postmark.  My mill is actually larger than this and modeled after the style built in Pennsylvania in the early 1900's.  I will be discussing this in more detail with photos later.  Early postcards are great sources of information for modeling, and I have a substantial collection of old industry postcards.  That could be a hobby of it's own.  They augment my collection of old industrial books.  I changed from building kits a while back and now prefer to either kitbash if I have something that fits my needs or better yet to scratch build.  It is all fun, and modeling is a journey.