(Before her death, I had the opportunity to visit with Joy Anna O'Donnell. During our conversation, the subject of timber came up. Joy shared with me some of the things she had learned from Paul Croy regarding logging. Her remarks have been edited to accommodate available space.)

Not too long ago Bonner County traditionally relied on lumber as its principal industry. Some residents made a living by farming and cattle but timber was king. The original population of the area consisted of Scandinavian, German, and Anglo-Saxon loggers and ranchers; however, the Dust Bowl brought in a great number of flat landers from the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma. This mixture of cultures naturally brought a collection of graphic and colorful words.

Although the old-time loggers rarely bowed to superstition, they did refer to God as “Old Hughie,” and during thunderstorms would comment, “Old Hughie has his hair up today.”

If it was short on superstitions, logging did provide a vast number of terms. “Tin Pants” and wool shirts are “stagged” to avoid catching on limbs. A “cant hook” is a peevee without a “spud” (the spike hook) and was also referred to as a “glom stick.” A widely-used threat was “When I get my cant hook on that so and so Š” To “glom-on” to something or somebody had the same derivation.

The men working the river drives were “bank beavers” or “river pigs;” and they worked the “wings,” “centers,” and “rear” (actually the front) of the drives or maybe they were members of the select bateau crews who called the starboard and port sides of their boats the “bow” and “stern.”

The continuous wading in snow water caused “squeak-heel,” which earned its name from the audible squeak heard when a victim walked. A logger would wade in cold water when the Achilles tendon tightened because that would bring the only relief, “Because in the water you didn't feel it anymore.”

A teacher, newly arrived in the West, was first struck speechless and then sank into a state of shock when a tenth-grade boy, in response to her query about his father's occupation, matter of factly answered that his dad was a pimp.

Her gasps, interpreted as a desire for further information, brought forth the explanation that he pimped for a cat belonging to Joe's dad - a fact that Joe solemnly verified by nodding.

Not until she had been requested to repeat this juicy revelation to the majority of the faculty and their friends, did someone show compassion and explain that “pimping for a cat” was a respectable occupation in Bonner County. The “pimp,” equipped with a chainsaw and peevee, precedes the cat removing fallen trees and other obstructions.