The MFRS Sawmill
The following section has been adapted from Girvan Harrison’s So Ya Wanna be a Ranger?: The Maritime Forest Ranger School 1946—1996. For those who haven’t yet read this work, it’s a wonderfully detailed account of the history of our institution, from its inception to the mid-1990s. Copies are available for purchase at MCFT reception should any of our readers be so inclined.
A sawmill used to be a poorly arranged collection of inadequate and obsolete machinery used to convert logs into sawdust and slabs. Owned by one or more optimistic lads and operated under a thin guise of respectability known as “Lumber Company,” it provided for a God-awful number of families, all local, provincial, and federal governments, several machine shops and a bookkeeper. Its only income was derived from the sale of a by-product consisting of some odd-shaped pieces of wood known as “lumber.”
- Author Unknown
Although the above tongue-in cheek quotation pokes fun at one of the country’s oldest industries, it emphasizes the often uncertain times in the lives of some sawmillers. It also emphasizes the need for education: education in producing good lumber, and education in the business aspects of the industry.
As the school took shape in 1946, another building was being constructed. It was also to be a training facility, but one without the traditional classrooms and collection of blackboards, desks, and chairs. It didn’t even have heat. It was an “Oxford-type” sawmill, and it was intended to familiarize the MFRS student with sawmill operation and to produce the lumber necessary for instruction in spruce, white pine, and hardwood lumber grading.
Most of the equipment for the mill was donated, and the rest (except the power unit) was purchased second hand, so the mill cost MFRS about $6,000. The machinery was inside a covered building. On the mill floor, which was about ten feet above ground level, were the log deck, the carriage and track, the circular saw (inserted tooth), the roll deck (half live), the edger saw, the transfer table, the trim table with trim saws, the slab cut-off saw at the end of the roll deck, and of course the ever-present collection of peaveys, hammers, and wrenches.
The log carriage, a metal frame on wheels running on a track, was moved by a pulley and cable system operated by the friction feed works and controlled by the sawyer. Metal head blocks and knees moved the log toward the saw as required. The sawyer used a set board marked off in inches to determine the cut once the log was aligned on the carriage. Metal dogs held the log in place as it was being sawn. The lower floor housed a new diesel power unit, a belt and pulley system, and a sawdust conveyor extending the length of the mill and used to carry the sawdust outside to a pile.
The mill was built on a temporary foundation. For the first few years this proved to be satisfactory, but each year it became more difficult to keep the mill “trued up” to saw accurate lumber. Also, over time, the mill was being used to produce more lumber for school needs. In fact, the MFRS woods crew began to use it in spring, summer, and fall when outdoor work was hampered by weather. Finally, Ted Bedard and the sawyer, Ray Parker, had had enough. They discussed the matter with Hank Blenis and got his blessing to do some much-needed repairs.
During the summer of 1954 the building was raised and concrete foundations were poured for the building, under each bearing post in the lower part of the mill, and under the diesel power unit. The $2,000 was well spent because after these renovations the mill could produce fairly accurate lumber.
In the mid-to-late 1960s, Hank set up a “five-year plan” to harvest an overabundance of white pine from the UNB woodlot and the Noonan Block. This plan involved cutting approximately 3500,000 fbm of pine annually. The lumber sawn from these logs was air-dried and graded out to about 80% #3 common and better using the Canadian Lumbermen’s Association pine grading rule. Not bad. For several years, various grading authorities such as the Canadian Lumbermen’s Association, the Maritime Lumber Bureau, and the North-eastern Lumber Manufacturer’s Association (New York) conducting grading courses at the Ranger School using lumber produced in the MFRS sawmill to qualify lumber grading inspectors.
The MFRS sawmill served the school and its students faithfully for many years, but early in the 1970s the idea of a sawmill training school for industry was conceived. This would eventually prove to be the death of “the little mill that could,” for it was quickly going the way of the Model A Ford, the iceman, and the butter churn. Part of the catalyst for an expanded sawmill training program resulted from industry’s acceptance of Donnie Clark’s “saw doctor” courses. Donnie began as a contract instructor for MFRS in 1975 and taught courses in saw filing and maintenance. He and his noisy troop of learners were ensconced in a makeshift filing room in the basement of the McCormack Building. On many days the whole school reverberated to the clanging whacks of the apprentice saw docs as they hammered their saws into shape. Ironically, I suppose, we students were also being hammered into shape upstairs – usually a much quitter process.
Hank had preciously decided to test the waters in the early 1970s for this perceived industry need. He asked the Maritime Lumber Bureau to conduct a survey of mill owners throughout the Atlantic provinces, and the survey of participants endorsed the concept of a sawmill training school by a large majority. They gave Hank the “demonstrated need” necessary for him to pursue the project. In 1974, the New Brunswick Forest Resources Study also recommended that a sawmill training facility be established in conjunction with a new “Forest Technician School to be built near the MFRS present site.”
Hank wanted more facts. In 1974, he sent Ted to visit the sawmills and training facilities in British Columbia. The next year Ted found himself looking at facilities in Finland and Sweden. His summary was to the point. It was now very apparent that sawmill training was not adequately developed in the Maritimes.
During 1979 Hank learned that the research sawmill at the Forest Products Laboratory at Petawawa might be “disposed of.” He thought the school would be the most logical recipient of this training aid and approached the federal Treasury Board. They moved swiftly and five years later hank was informed that the mothballed sawmill would be dismantled, crated, and shipped to Fredericton. Meanwhile, in 1981, Hank asked Ted Bedard to serve as the chairman for the sawmill advisory committee. The members of this committee were:
Crawford, W.C., Technical Services Officer, N.B. Department of Commerce and Development.
Etter, L. E., Executive Director, Nova Scotia Forest Product’s Association
Ledwidge, L., Ledwidge Lumber Company Limited, Nova Scotia
Lockhart, D., Executive Director, New Brunswick Forest Products Association
Love, B., Dead River Sales Limited, New Brunswick
Potter, J.K., Assistant Senior Director of Program Planning, N.S. Lands and Forests
McCulloch, R., Manager of Wood Resources N.B. Commerce and Development
Rumbold, A.G., Executive Director, Maritime Lumber Bureau, Nova Scotia
Smith, F., Manager, Ashley Colter (1961) Limited, New Brunswick
The Terms of reference for this committee were very explicit. They were to “work in cooperation with school architects to establish a contemporary facility capable of utilizing space to train in all areas of sawmilling technology.” That they took their task seriously can be gauged from the wide range of recommendations put forward by the committee. They included: ample space for instruction; ample number of classrooms; more than adequate space on sawmill floor; larger than normal filing room; adequate space for additional machinery, and computer installation; kiln drying facilities; chipping facility with covered chip storage; and a large storage area for logs and lumber. In short, the committee recommended a “world class” training institution. And that’s what they got.
In his June, 1986, director’s report, John Torunski noted that the training sawmill superstructure was complete. The willingness to cooperate and join forces to pursue a common objective has always been a hallmark of forestry people. Unlike many scheming, empire-building bureaucrats, forestry people can pull together. From late 1985 to early 1986, 124,000 fbm of lumber and services were donated to the school by various New Brunswick and Nova Scotia firms.
Torunski’s June, 1987, director’s report noted that work was progressing. The band and circular saw area and the chipper were in place. The main sawmill area was about 50% complete. By that time all remaining structures of the old MFRS had been demolished and the ground leveled. The old mill machinery had been removed and put in storage, and in February the “little mill that could” had died in a blazing inferno.
The new training sawmill is housed in a 25,200 square-foot two-story building. The main sawmill floor consists of two-by-fours placed on edge, twenty-one kilometers of wood if they were laid end to end. This floor was chosen, certainly not because it’s easy to keep clean, but for the flexibility it offers in adding or removing machinery: it’s easy to put a hole in the floor for new machinery, and just as easy to patch the hole if a machine is taken out.
Training equipment in the new mill now includes log infeed decks, Ring and Rosser debarkers, two automatic carriages with computer assist on each, air and hydraulic carriage feed works, doublecut band and circular headrig, a gang edger, a two-man trimmer, a six knife chipper, a 6,000 fbm dehumidification dry kiln, and a stress grading machine. There’s also a millwright shop containing a milling machine, a metal lathe, and a hydraulic press, and an extra-large saw maintenance and repair shop complete with all the necessary equipment for instruction in leveling, tensioning, and sharpening band and circular saw.
On April 1, 1988, the new training sawmill was turned over to the Maritime Forest Ranger School. Its cost to date was $4,405,461.56. The main function of the mill was to update skills of those employed in the sawmill industry. It also assumed the role of the old sawmill and provided a basic introduction to sawmilling to students enrolled in the regular forest technician program. And it had a third important role to play: as a research site for industry and the academic community.
The teaching philosophy of the training sawmill is similar to that of the forest technician program: I hear, I forget; I see, I remember; I do, I understand. The training sawmill fortunately has the advantage of being able to restrict class sizes to a maximum of fifteen students. With a yearly average of one hundred students rotating through the programs everyone is able to participate fully in all aspects of the course and receive individual instruction should problems occur.
A mill, especially a training sawmill, is not a static thing. While the door keys were still warm from the April 1, 1988, ceremony transferring it from the contractor to MFRS, expansion plans were already in the works. During 1989, in a joint effort between the school and the University of New Brunswick, a 6,000 fbm dehumidification dry kiln was constructed. Also that year MFRS erected a 24’ x 60’ pole barn for storing lumber and a roof over the green chain. Over the next few years a stress grading machine, a computerized lumber tally system, and a bark shredder were installed. In 1995, a 4,000 square-foot addition was added to the mill to house a new five-head molder, a finger jointing machine, and a knife grinding shop. It would appear that the mill manager, Ernie Strickland, is justified in saying, “I’m as busy as a one-legged man in a butt kicking contest.”