A Finn Logger Lives Here

This photo comes from Eli Sampson’s scrapbook. I can’t translate the caption, so when I copied the photo, I called it “A Finnish logger lives here,” for the clear-cut, scorched earth removal of every tree on the homestead, probably up to the border of the property.  That’s how Eli tended to prune. There were two large camellias just outside of the front door of his house on Minnesota Street in Coos Bay, and there were two or three cedars on the downhill edge of the lot. When we came to visit, Vake just stood back and laughed because Eli had pruned them so severely that they were absolutely butchered.  The text that Jon has found, from his book on a century of history in Coos and Curry Counties, in OR, seems to share that aesthetic. The stumps that were left after timber was cut for a house were burned out, and were sufficient to keep a fire going for fifteen years!