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the log, you would come down with that pole, that chain would roll and pick that log up. When you?d pull that pole, that pole would pick that log up.
Guerin: So it was a lever.
LaFrance: Yes. And you?d tie that lever down.
Guerin: And your grandfather, did he have a mill of his own?
LaFrance: No, he hauled logs for little mills. They had a little mill at Lakeshore -Krankey?s saw mill. And what they?d do with this thing, they would haul these logs over any landings - they got two or three landings back there - and when they would get wet they would throw them overboard and put five of them together, and take a pole and nail them on each end and then chain them together. And catch a tide falling, and then pole them down to the mill.
Guerin: They would push-pole?
LaFrance: Yes, they would push-pole along the banks.
[Mr. LaFrance shows an advertisement from the Sea Coast Echo of January 4, 1896, mentioning the April sale by Christian Dorn of the English Lookout post office.]
Guerin: What would a good ox sell for in your day?
LaFrance: I don?t know, but I can tell you what we used to get for a cow. Five dollars. Three dollars for a Galf, and it had to be a damn good calf, too. When they would get killed on the railroad track, we would get eight dollars. But they had two brothers - they would come all the way from Bay St Louis to butcher a cow, throw a sheet over it, go back and put it in the ice house, and next day take it down to Main St. and sell it. They would go from here to Bay St Louis with a horse and wagon with a cow with just a sheet thrown over it. It would take all day long.
Guerin: Was that in the summertime?
LaFrance: [Laughing} Yeah!
Guerin: Tell me a little more about logging. How long would it take a man to cut a good size tree?
LaFrance: Two men. They would use a cross-cut saw. They had a man every day who would do nothing but file saws. Bill Dawsey was the saw filer. You. got five cents a log. They had 8, 9, 10 sets of saws. A tree about the size I showed you would take them about five minutes We walked miles, and worked all day. You?d take a jug of water with you, and go back to it this time of day, and ... we?d go to the bayou or a stump hole and knock the grass and those minnows out of it, and drink right out of that hole.
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LaFrance, Jules (Poss) Interview-2004-13
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