July 2012                Page 2


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Sat July 7

Drove to Grand Rapids, MN, today with Bob and Karen, expecting to participate in a 10 am presentation on Butterflies and Dragonflies at the Children's Museum, and a 11 am to 4 pm artisan and artist fair at eth Forest History Museum. Apparently, the information we had on both was wrong, but we spent a wonderful several hours at the Forestry Museum. All exhibits were staffed with personnel in costume and character explaining the logging camp that existed here on this site about 1900.  Grand Rapids is on the Mississippi.  Logs were cut in winter, moved on horse drawn sleds over ice roads, then piled near the river bank waiting for the spring thaw and snow melt to bring the logs down the Mississippi. Logging camps contracted for delivery of a certain amount of timber, and the loggers were not paid unless that amount was delivered down river. A hard life.

 

 

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bob and Karen at the two-man saw...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Persheron  (sp?) horses and the special horseshoes for ice traction.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 A visitor

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Coming home to Crosslake, we stopped for a concert at the village square, with the House of Cash singing Johnny Cash songs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday July 8

 

We went to the Log Church again today, followed by a lunch at Subway then a visit to two museums.  These were the Model Railroad museum and the Historic Log Cabin Museum, both in Crosslake. 

The model railroad museum, called the Northern Trackers, was a delight.  Several gauge models and a large collection of articulated locomotives (so many wheels the engine has to bend in the middle to go around curves!). The smaller gauge was a model replica of the area towns around 1900.  The larger gauge featured town and circus scenes, as well as lots of model scenery.  Here are some pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Enough trains.....


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