Mill job spans 50 years
Laurie Pinch celebrates five decades at Melanson mill
MELANSON – Dropping out of junior high is not a path Laurie Pinch would recommend to any youth today, but it worked out well for him.
He was 14, going on 15, that September in 1966, when he felt the slam of a teacher’s yard stick. A conflict resulted at the old Horton District High School and Laurie refused to apologize.
“I walked out and I got to the Port Williams corner and a truck driver I knew gave me a ride.”
He found himself at S.G. Levy and Son’s Mill in Melanson and started work the next day. The wages were 65 cents an hour then at the planer mill and 90 cents at the larger mill.
Over the last five decades Laurie experienced three fires at the mill and he’s done most of the jobs at the four-generation family operation. He’s piled lumber, been a baler, an edger and for the last 14 years the resident sawyer.
Laurie’s job is to feed lumber into saw machinery that is calibrated to appropriate specifications. He likes the largely outdoor work except on miserable hot days when he’s found it’s hard to stay awake. Cooler weather is fine for him because the small cab that he operates has a heater.
Unlike the last century, the Levy mill is the only one of its kind in the Annapolis Valley today, according to Laurie, although there are two smaller portable mills. And he’s proud of the mill’s survival.
“Everybody buys here,” he notes. “Mainly the local people. Not too many of the big guys.”
Laurie has no plans to retire. He likes working close to home, where he’d have little to do but garden. His employers want to celebrate his work history on Sunday, Oct. 23 at the Gaspereau hall. The party will take place from 3 to 5 p. m.
Four generations at the mill Running a lumber mill isn’t easy today. Garth Levy, who took over running the mill from his father, Ivan, says some days he thinks he’s in operation for the sheer love of the work. His local competition, Long’s Mill in White Rock, shut down some years ago.
He has his son Gary working along with him at the mill, while his other son, Greg, operates Bulldog Logging Ltd. Wife, Susan, runs the on-site office.
“We’ve changed things around,” Garth says. “We’re doing better than we were 10 years ago. We do 40 – 50 house frames a year, so we’ve found our niche.”
The mill runs mostly hemlock at 16 feet or longer lengths. He says mostly the logs come from about a 50k radius.