Wayne Reilly, Bangor Daily News, has a short but information packed article today about the turn of the century demand for river drivers on the Penobscot River in Maine.
The employment agencies “raked over the large cities” with the result that men of all nationalities, many of them recent immigrants, were sent into Maine by the train load. The writer complained, “Many of these had never had a cant dog in their hands, nor seen a tree felled. … It is calculated that after a few weeks experience, three of these newly arrived foreigners are about equal to one good woodsman.”
Worth the read!
Tom Remington
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