Gigantic stump from Asphodel tree was featured at 1904 World’s Fair
The first machinery to be put into operation for a newly formed town or village in the early 1800s was generally a sawmill. Compared to today’s standards, these early mills would have been relatively crude and inefficient. However, they got the job done and provided the timber required to physically build the homes and businesses of our predecessors.
One, if not the first, industries in the township was the production and sale of timber, plentiful and of excellent quality, wood from this area was in high demand both here and overseas; it was used in the construction of everything from ship masts to barrel staves.
Countless logs made were harvested and floated out on the areas rivers and waterways to be sold to buyers in distant lands. The fortunes of many early entrepreneurs were found in our pristine forests.
Wood was the main fuel used for heating and cooking well into the 1900s, mostly supplied by local farmers or as a side business from local lumber companies.
One massive stump photographed more than a century ago, however, did not end up as firewood.
This large piece of wood was harvested in early 1904 from the Asphodel farm of Patrick Fallon, who was pictured standing on the log with John Doherty, the driver of the team of horses pulling it.
Photographed at the four corners in Norwood, this massive chunk of Canadian Elm was on its way to the Norwood train station where it was shipped to the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis, Mo., to be part of the Canadian exhibit.
I will endeavourer to provide a more in-depth story of the local timber trade in a future column, once the ongoing pandemic subsides and it is safe to access our township’s historical archives again.