Another weird thing found...

I have a camp in Northeast Maine,...kinda the birthplace of logging. The camp next to mine was the storeroom for the area owned by my employer International Paper back around 1910. Anyway, I was up there yesterday and saw a piece of metal sticking out of the the ground and pulled on it...no go. I hooked my trusty Tundra up to it and yanked it out. I did not take a pic , but its an easy thing to describe. Its 1/2 inch square steel, 18 feet long. At each end, there is a 90 degree ,4 inch point. I thought it was something they hammered into something but there are no hammer marks,and the points are sharp. It looks like some kind of measuring tool for something. Its not a tool for surveying as its not 16.6 between points. Any old loggers in Maine here? ideas?

 

Log stick, for measuring the logs. It might be called a scaleing stick ?

 

I thought that as well,but its 18 feet between points. Strange length. I have a few log scales. They are used to estimate board feet in logs. For sure this thing is some kind of measure.

 

Here is a picture of one end

 

Here is a guess, when I was a kid I used to play with my cousins on the Columbia River, and we'd sometimes run around on log rafts (don't ever let your kids do this, if they fall in and the logs shift they could die).
But I seem to recall similar things being used to tie the log-rafts together; logs in the center of the raft would be loose, but they'd be encircled by connected logs; some chained up, but others connected by long bars with right-angle spikes on the ends. Drive the spikes into two logs to hook them together. Of course, my memory may have faded over the intervening 60 years.....
If not this, maybe a similar sort of log-industry use.

check out the antique logging pins in this photo, from a website on antique logging tools.

 

Thanks fakes....we also thought it was used to tie logs or something together. However the points are so short, 4 inches and its never been hammered on. Also they arent hooks like you would think something to hold would have,they are points. And the precision between them , exactly 18 feet is kinda weird. The camp where was found is well over 100 years old. It was an original International paper company ,store house where they stored horse tack,tools ,food,and even has a root cellar. Its on its 4th floor as well,as when the floor rotted out,they jacked it up,built a new floor and put new beams and leveled it up on large rocks. I thank you for your input.

 

But 18 feet? Strange board length. Its so weird.

 

Watch this video and be entertained by the "Log Drivers' Waltz."



One of my favorite videos of all time.

 

& while reading the above posts I was thinking to post this too Yourturn, so imaging when I saw it and thought .....ya....that's just about right !!!

Now I'm going to go watch it....and sing along...as is my want to do !!! THX !!

 

I can't help but sing along with it too, Komokwa.

 

Maybe it's a barge length..

 

Barge? For like logs? I dont know.....It would be an pretty small barge.

 

well, like a raft of logs would have been very large....18 feet across , maybe ??

I'm just throwing that out there....

 

Ok . I see. No, its not that. We drove the logs down the rivers and they were boomed with long length of chains. Plus the corners have never been pounded with anything. no hammer marks, etc. it looks like it was make to be used like a caliper of sorts, but for what?

 

No pounding , maybe means it was never used......but I see where you're going with this.

 

I certainly remember seeing logs chained-up, mostly, rather than hard connections....in the photo I posted the 30-inch "log holding pins" shown sure look like shorter versions of your long one, with the short but sharp right-angle ends.
Does anyone know how those short ones were used, and if there would have been a use for longer versions?
Searching for that term results mostly in commemorative buttons (pins), and nothing useful.

 

It does look like those 30 inch pins, but 18 feet? The log dogs shown were used to keep a log from rolling around when you worked on them with like a broad ax. Its a weird piece for sure. I have asked everyone I know about this thing, Young and old alike and I work in the forest products business. So far,.....zip!

 

The log dogs shown were used to keep a log from rolling around when you worked on them.

I understand. It has got me curious; I love a mystery.