Early Days in Columbia Falls
Sawyers worked in teams with crosscut saws. Standing on springboards made it possible for them to avoid heavy butts, pitch pockets and twisted grain near the base of trees. Tall stumps with springboard notches remain throughout the woods today.
This scene is from July 4, 1891. Robert Saurey Sr., his wife Mary and eldest son Robert Jr. camped near the south edge of what would become Columbia Falls. The town was little more than a tent city at that time. Saurey homesteaded here, worked in the area woods and lived to be 100.
Logging was the cornerstone of the Columbia Falls area economy at the turn of the 20th century. Early day loggers used horses to drag large loads of logs from the woods. Long time resident Frank Mateka is holding the team.
From the Plaque