Southern Forest Museum in Louisiana
Can you hear the whistle blowing? Or hear the rumble and clang of the wheels along the track? Smell the new-cut timber? See the crews moving logs through the mill making lumber for the Nation?
The Southern Forest Museum and Research Center at Long Leaf, Louisiana is a place where this scene comes alive! The museum is around a half hour away from Alexandria [Louisiana], location of the local airport. Fulfilling its mission of examining and interpreting the heritage of Louisiana’s southern forest industry, the museum is a “can’t miss” for visitors to the area.
During the period of US heavy settlement, there were over 2500 sawmills in the South! As Don Powell, Executive Director of the Louisiana research center said, “Forestry had a huge economic early impact.” In fact, between 1890 and 1920 the US population doubled, and lumber sales tripled.
The museum sawmill [below] was built in 1910, during the peak of the Louisiana lumber industry. Currently it receives no government funding to support the restoration or research, but relies on admissions and memberships. I was lucky to have Sonnie Milton, Group Tour Director, and her husband, Kent Milton, give me an in-depth tour of the inner workings of the Long Leaf sawmill.
A volunteer doing the track change on the train ride.
After a thorough investigation of the museum’s interpretive center, the journey begins with a ride back in time down rusty railway tracks. Once the center of a bustling industry, abandoned pieces of metal and parts fill the treed area that has grown up. There are, according to Kent, many treasures still to be restored from their outdoor resting place.
This 4-line Clyde Skidder [below] operated in the woods on temporary railway tracks. It arrived at a logging site after the trees were cut and trimmed. The crew anchored the skidder with guy wires and a wire rope was run into the woods. Logs were grabbed by tongs and hauled into piles near the tracks. Working on the skidder was a dangerous job because of the rough conditions and the great speed of the logs. This is the only machine of its kind anywhere in the world.
Timber was brought to the mill by locomotives like the one below. It is Locomotive #400, a Baldwin 4-6-0 that was built in 1919. The 4-6-0 means it had 4 wheels [2 pair], 6 driving wheels, and no wheels under the cab. Two of the large humps on top are Sand Domes, which stored sand to be dumped on the track in slick conditions. The center hump is a Steam Dome used to store steam to blow the whistle!
Locomotive #400 hauled logs to the Long Leaf Sawmill. Originally it burned coal, but was converted to burn heavy fuel oil later on. Its last trip was to Lecompte on December 9, 1952.
The loader, shown below along with tour guide Sonnie Milton, was the first step in moving the logs into the mill. There are only 7 of these machines left in the world, with 2 of them being at Southern Forest Museum and Research Center.
This chute carried the logs into the mill.
Of course, with all of this specialized equipment, the machine shop was one of the most relied on parts of the sawmill operation. Using assorted specialized machines, machinists were able to build everything from bolts to large metal parts that broke. All of the machines in the shop, each with a special purpose, were run by one central engine and a series of belts. At the mill’s peak operation, 5 or 6 employees worked in this area. Below, you can see guide, Kent Milton, explaining how everything functioned.
Inside the mill, numerous laborers worked setting the widths of machines that cut the boards into specified sizes. Belts and conveyors fed the lumber in one end, while a finished product emerged at the opposite end to be bundled for shipping. I could only imagine the heat, noise and dust that employees would have endured on their shifts!
On Valentine’s Day in 1969, Mill employees left for home after a shift just like any other. However, they never returned to their duties again, as the Mill was locked up, never to re-open. Inside the Museum warehouse area there is still the smell of new wood from piles of lumber stacked, waiting to be shipped.
For more information on visiting Southern Forest Heritage Museum and Research Center, visit http://www.forestheritagemuseum.org/.
Copyright 2009 Linda Aksomitis. Published in SnowRider Online Magazine in October 2002.
Winter Getaway to Tallahassee, Florida
| When the weatherman announces you’re living in the coldest place on the planet, it’s time to hop a plane to somewhere warm–which is what happened to me in March, 2003. Tallahassee, Florida’s capitol city, was where my finger dropped on the map, so off I went to investigate their 75 degrees of spring air, leaving the frigid winter weather to the rest of the family around town!
With its sprawling city limits and rolling hills, Tallahassee isn’t quite what you expect in Florida. However, the trees were certainly green, and hanging with the Spanish moss I’d come to expect from my trips through the Southern states. Tallahassee also has five official canopy roads where the moss-draped oaks create an emerald tunnel.
In fact, I found lots of Southern charm in this small city, along with a rich history, and appreciation for the bountiful gifts that nature has bestowed on the area. |
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Tallahasse has been recognized as a capital leader for more than 8 centuries. This diaorama of the of the aboriginal people from around 1450 shows the area as a ceremonial center. The photo was taken in the Museum of Florida History in Tallahassee. The museum also houses the bones of Herman, a mastodon between 12000 and 18000 years old, who would have weighed in at over 5 tons. |
| Tallahassee’s wildlife museum was chartered in 1957. In 1962 it moved to the outskirts of the city onto 56 acres, which allows the animals to be housed in natural habitats. This is a photo of one of the wild cats in the museum. All of the animals there have been rescued or are unable to return to their natural habitats due to physical problems. http://tallahasseemuseum.org/ |  |
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The Concord Schoolhouse embodies the African-American community’s struggle for an education. It served the needs of the African-American community in Leon County for over 60 years before being relocated to the museum to preserve the heritage of African-Americans. The earliest record of the school is in 1878, where it educated the children of former slaves. The earliest known teacher was Lucien Fisher, who taught in 1893. The school was used until 1968, when the students were intergrated with the rest of the community. The historical interpreter pictured here is Sabrina, at the Tallahassee Museum of History and Natural Science. |
| Wakulla Springs State Park is just outside the city of Tallahassee. Wakulla Springs, which means “strange and mysterious waters” has been occupied by humans for nearly 15,000 years. Studied since the 19th century, the park springs have immense underground caverns littered with the fossilized bones of giant sloth, armadillos, camels, and other ancient “park visitors.”More recently, it has been used as the filming location for such movies as the Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan “Tarzan” movies, “Creature from the Black Lagoon” and “Airport 77.”
Wakulla Springs web site: http://tfn.net/Springs/WakullaSprings.htm |
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The Wakulla Spring is a pre-ice age sinkhole connected to an underground cave. It contains 11 distinct natural communities, including basin swamp, dome, floodplain forest and floodplain swamp. This is the Anhinga bird, whose key unique feature is that its feathers become wet in the water, allowing it to dive through the water more easily. Without boat motors running, the waterways are filled with the sounds of numerous birds and wildlife species — listen. It’s an experience you won’t easily forget! |
| This car is a 1903 Stanley Steamer Stick Seat Runabout. Its home is the Tallahassee Antique Car Museum — http://www.tacm.com
The museum received the 1999 National AACA First Place Award as the number one museum in the United States for the preservation of antique cars. It houses 85 cars, all carefully restored and maintained in show quality. Some of the features of the collection include Batman’s Bat Cycle, and two Batmobiles used in the original batman movies, along with the Duck the Penguin rode in the Batman Returns movie. In addition to cars, the museum houses many children’s toys–mostly cars from matchbox size to the peddle car used by the Little Rascals, plus a large collection of boat motors. |
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Tallahassee has America’s largest concentration of original plantations — 300,000 acres, among 71 plantations, exist between Tallahassee and Thomasville, Georgia, a mere 28 miles away.This photo is of the Goodwood Plantation, which is inside Tallahassee’s city limits. It is currently a a museum and gardens open to the public for viewing and special events. http://www.taltrust.org/goodwood.htm
Some of the home’s features include the oldest frescoed ceilings in the State, a gazing globe garden, and priceless furnishings such as a Mycean urn. |
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From the spun glass art of Dale Chihuly’s Seaform show at the Mary Brogan Museum of Art Center to the exquisite natural beauty of the new camellia flower, Tallahassee is a memorable destination… |  |
Categories: Museums, Tallahassee, Florida Tags:
Minot Scandinavian Heritage Center
Minot’s Scandinavian Heritage Center is an outdoor museum situated at the Visitor Center in Minot, North Dakota.
Scandinavian Heritage Center in Minot
Open year-round, the Heritage Center celebrates Minot’s Scandinavian past. The second lower level is home to the Sons of Norway’s Minot Thor Lodge, which is a meeting place and reference center. The first lower level houses the year-round offices of the Norsk Høstfest.
Norsk Høstfest, North America’s largest Scandinavian Festival, celebrates its 30th year in Minot, starting the evening of October 9th and running until October 13th, 2007. Attended by tens of thousands annually, the Høstfest allows visitors to celebrate and partake in the Scandinavian culture and entertainment.
Heritage Center Windmill in Minot Scandinavian Center
The windmill, one of the most recognized pieces of artistry brought to North America by the Scandinavians, looks out on South Broadway in downtown Minot.. This restored Danish windmill, housed in the Heritage Center, was once used to supply water and grind wheat by Carl Olson at Powers Lake. Originally built in 1928, it was dedicated, along with the Flag Display at the Heritage Center in October, 1992. It sits on a new concrete and rock base in its present location.
A full-size replica of the Gol Stave Church, originally built in 1250 and currently housed in Oslo, rises above the manicured lawns and manmade waterfall on the Scandinavian Heritage Center grounds. With a base of 60 feet by 45 feet, and about 600 feet high, this impressive Stave church is even more interesting on the inside than the outside.
Gol Stave Church in Minot, North Dakota
Stave churches were built in Norway between the 10th and 12th century by Christian missionaries. The intricately carved interior doors of this replica church feature wood carvings by Philip Odden and Elsa Bigton of Barronet, Wisconsin.
The inside of Minot’s Gol Stave Church Museum is completely carved of wood, and glows a golden yellow with the light. With a ceiling that narrows, while it rises, the church interior posts, beams, and carvings draw visitors’ eyes to the realms above, which no doubt was the intent of the Christian missionaries who first imagined the design more than ten centuries ago.
Inside the Gol Stave Church in Minot
The palisade constrution of logs split in half and rammed into the ground provided a sturdy, enduring construction, so the churches became focal points across Norway. Archeologists suspect that close to 2000 of these churches were built here, as well as some in Sweden and the United Kingdom. Decoration of stave churches featured an intriguing combination of Christian designs intermixed with what is often assumed to be pre-Christian Viking motifs, such as the interwoven dragon motifs.
The Dala horse is another Swedish icon at the Scandinavian Cultural Center. Like the Stave Church, the Dala horse is entirely made of wood. The tradition originated in the 1700s as a winter pastime that pleased both carvers and the children who received the little horses. As time passed the horses were painted red, likely due to the ready availability of the color from copper mines. The use of the kurbit, or gourd, as decorative motifs for the harness and saddle come from the bible story of the plant which grew up around Jonah as he sat outside the city of Ninevah, and protected him from the sun’s devastating rays.
Dala Horse in Minot Scandinavian Heritage Center
Whether you’re taking the highway through Minot, or stopping to visit in North Dakota, spending some time at the Scandinavian Heritage Center will be worth your visit!
If you go:
Visit Minot, North Dakota — www.minotnorthdakota.com/
Norsk Høstfest – www.hostfest.com/
Visit North Dakota — www.ndtourism.com/
Copyright 2007, Linda Aksomitis (Pub date – June 25, 2007). All Rights Reserved.
Categories: Minot, North Dakota, Museums Tags: Scandinavian
Gulf Shores, Alabama – Sun, Sand & Sea
When it’s minus 40 degrees and the wind is howling, I always say it’s time to look for a warm spot with lots to do. Last winter I discovered the thirty-two mile stretch of Alabama’s gulf shore around Gulf Shores/Orange Beach. With The Beach Club in Gulf Shores as my central point, I set out to discover the area.
I was ready to stretch my legs and enjoy the sunshine when I arrived, so I headed out for a hike. Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge was perfect. I took the two-mile hike (one way) up the Pine Beach Trail, which had lots to see and learn on the way.
The first thing I noticed was the unfamiliar sound of locusts–while I’d heard of them, I’d sure never actually heard the hum of a swarm.
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- Gulf Shores beach
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- Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge
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- Janet from Sailaway Charters
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- Soldier at Fort Morgan
Some other amazing things included: wind-bent Sand Live Oaks, a ghost crab, a beach mouse, the Piping Plover, different varieties of cacti, reindeer moss and saw palmettos, along with the alligator slide. Panting my way right to the end of the trail, the wind-swept dunes were a great reward for the exertion.
When you’re from the prairies, like I am, everything on the Gulf is new and exciting, so I found myself an educational tour. Janet & Skip Beebee at Sailaway Charters were some of the best teachers I ever met! A group of us boarded the “Miss Janet” for a tour through the estuaries and backwaters of Longs Bayou and Wolf Bay on the Gulf.
In a few short hours Janet taught me the basics of life on the water: shrimping, farming oysters and crabs, and more amazing, what lives in the water! I was able to get up-close to all kinds of sea creatures, such as the puffer fish, silver eel, sea robin, croakers, jelly fish and mud flounder. She pointed out the different kinds of birds, shore grasses, and gave us a run-down of rules and regulations as well. This was the best nature tour I’ve ever taken–bar none!
While I’m in an area I always have to check out the history too–and discovered Fort Morgan. My Living History Interpreter, Bill Matthews, did a fabulous job of telling us why the Fort was important for more than a century, and what it was like to live in the Fort. A site of defense through the: War of 1812, Civil War, Spanish American War, and World Wars & II, the Fort is located at the end of a peninsula, protecting the US from invasion through the Gulf waters.
Fort Morgan flies a variety of flags to show all of the Nations that have claimed it through its tumultuous years, including France, Spain, and England. From the men’s living quarters to the powder magazines, the areas of the Fort are in exceptional condition—the Fort isn’t a replica, but rather a well-preserved historical structure. Part of the reason can be explained by the fact that the Fort wasn’t occupied on a full-time basis, but only when there was a threat of invasion. For much of its life it was occupied by solitary maintenance men assigned to walk its empty walls.
I was in for some great Gulf shore meals too! King Neptune’s Seafood Restaurant in Gulf Shores was fabulous. I enjoyed sampling the crab claws with cocktail sauce, an oyster platter, and thick gumbo–with a sumptuous bread pudding for dessert. The Gulf Bay Seafood Grill offered meals just as tasty in nearby Orange Beach. Try the Jumbo Shrimp stuffed with crab meat, along with steamed zucchini for a memorable dinner. Doc’s Seafood Shack served up a great plate of one of the local specialities, royal red shrimp.
And I have to admit I spent some time just laying on the sugar white beaches, soaking up the sunshine, building sandcastles and watching the kids have a great time.
After all, the beach was right out the back door of The Beach Club. From my sitting room I watched waves lap against the shore and enjoyed a fresh fruit breakfast from my kitchen. When the sun set, music and the king sized bed were all I needed to drift away.
There was only one flaw to my Gulf Shore visit–it didn’t last nearly long enough. Before I knew it I was back to winter.
If you visit:
Area information: Alabama Gulf Coast Convention & Visitors Bureau: 800/745-SAND.
http://www.gulfshores.com
Gulf Shores is the last point on Alabama’s Hwy #59. It is about an hour from Mobile, AB, and Pensacola, FL
Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge: 12295 State Highway 180; Gulf Shores, AL
Phone 251-540-7720
http://www.fws.gov/bonsecour/
Sailaway Charters: 24231 Gulf Bay Road; Orange Beach, AL
Phone 251-974-5055
http://www.geocities.com/sailorskip/testimonials.html
Fort Morgan: 51 Hwy. 180 W., Gulf Shores, AB
Phone 800-745-7263
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Morgan,_Alabama
Restaurant Guide: http://www.al.com/gulfshores/cityguide/index.ssf?dining.html
Categories: Beaches, Gulf Shores, Alabama, Historical, Museums, Parks Tags: Beaches, Hiking
A Day in Halifax's Big Three
The three most important stops for visitors to Halifax, Nova Scotia: Pier 21 national Historic Site, the Halifax Citadel and the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.
Categories: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Historical, Museums Tags: MaritimeMuseum, Pier21