Knute Rauk discusses where he was born; when he and his family came to Shevlin; his father's hardware business; the Beltrami County Advocate; operating the printing press at Shevlin; banks in Shevlin; the Mallard Call newspaper and early Mallard. George Kerr talks about his paper route in Brainerd; his dream of being a railroad engineer; logging on the Gull River; the Stony Brook and Northern; a railroad machine shop, possibly at East Brainerd; the lower and upper landings; the dangers of unloading logs; the use of stakes to secure logs on train cars; the Brainerd and Northern Minnesota railroad; and railroad operations at Lothrop. Charlie Wight is also present. The Kerr interview continues in BCHS 120b.
Archie Logan discusses deadhead logs; where log marks were recorded; the lengths of logs; how logs were loaded on railroad cars; most prevalent species of timber; cedar yards around Kelliher; the logging railroad from Nebish to Red Lake; where logging took place in the mid-1880s; the logging railroad out of Crosslake; the narrow-gauge line at Gull Lake; smallpox in the lumber camps; quarantine in a lumber camp; and the source of the Mississippi. Leonard Dickinson is also part of the conversation. The recording is part of a series, continued from BCHS 115a, BCHS 115b, and BCHS 079a, and continued in BCHS116a and BCHS 116b.
The interview with Charles William Vandersluis (CWV) was conducted by his son, Dr. Charles Wilson Vandersluis, on an unrecorded date in an unrecorded location. Vandersluis describes traveling through northern Minnesota as a hardware salesman for Janney, Semple, & Hill Company starting in 1901. He discusses traveling by foot and train, including a description of a stopping place outside Little Fork, Minnesota. He describes selling to logging companies and mercantile stores. He also describes the early buildings and businesses of towns like Farley, Turtle River, Red Lake, Solway, and Redby, Minnesota. He describes the early days of Brainerd, including building the Central School and Episcopal Church. The interview continues in BCHS 029b.
Silas Carter discusses the post office at Isle; carrying the mail from Mora to Isle; having a charter boat on Mille Lacs with his dad, and some of their passengers and freight; remembering a rumored Native American uprising; the tugboat Gracie Dee; working as a cook in West Superior as the docks and Minnesota-Wisconsin bridge were being built, and setting up a kitchen; getting a tip on a homestead near Tenstrike and going out to it; Farmer Hines; being hospitalized with rheumatic fever and not getting into the Spanish-American War; and Frank Dudley and his wife's slot machines. The recording is continued from bchs078a.
