By Pierre Ratte
When gold kicked off the forty-niners’ rush to California, San Francisco boomed. Wood for buildings came from Sonoma County and the North Coast. Towns, like Forestville, were named for timber and associated lumbermen. George Guerne and partner Thomas Heald began logging here in 1865, and now we have Healdsburg and Guerneville.
Armstrong Woods is named after Colonel James B. Armstrong, former Union Army soldier and lumberman who saw into the future. Originally intending to log the Big Bottom Valley (Russian River’s lower alluvial plain), Armstrong gifted 440 acres, then another 160, of old growth redwood forest to his invalid daughter hoping it would become an arboretum. It is now the 805-acre Armstrong Woods California State Natural Reserve.
Fun facts: The oldest redwood in Armstrong Woods is the Colonel Armstrong Tree, estimated to be 1,400 years old. The tallest is called Parson Jones, at 310 feet. Sonoma County purchased 240 acres of Armstrong Woods in 1917 for $80,000. It opened to the public as a state park in 1936.
As early as the 1920s, thinner band saws began replacing circular blades due to kerf efficiency. Kerf refers to the thickness of the blade and loss of wood to sawdust. False teeth are not even, damaging and ripping wood, dangerously creating a condition for a saw to buck or bind. A steam donkey is a portable engine used to winch large stumps and logs. The mechanical donkey was patented by John Dolbeer in 1881 in Humboldt County.
Paul Bunyan, the legendary lumberman, probably derived his name from the French-Canadian expression bonyenne—meaning “good heavens” or “oh my.” The first print appearance of Paul Bunyan was in Michigan’s Gladwin County Record in 1893. Paul and Babe the Blue Ox became famous through William Laughead’s (yes, that is his real name) advertising pamphlets for the Red River Lumber Company in Minnesota, which claimed Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes came from his footprints and the Grand Canyon was created by his dragging axe.
In a different context, woodshed refers to a quiet place where musicians play, and “woodshedding” means practicing a difficult musical passage.
Armstrong Redwoods State Natural Preserve is located at the north end of Armstrong Woods Road out of Guerneville. It includes a visitor center, public facilities and self-guided nature trails amid the towering redwoods. Visit tinyurl.com/43p859x4.
