The Lumberwoods, 1930

George Snow

In 1930, George Snow was fifteen years old. He was living in Rocky Harbour, Bonne Bay. In June he went with his father to cut pulpwood for the Bowater mill at Corner Brook.

THAT WAS THE ONLY WORK there was at that time. You had to go in the lumber woods or you went fishing. If you made a dollar in the woods, you got a dollar. But if you made a dollar fishing, you didn't get it. You traded it. That was the difference.

I went in with my father, Edgar Snow. The camps were in Lomond area, Bonne Bay. You had to walk then. You just took your clothes in a pack on your back. You walked because there were no roads those times, only trails.

The camps were just log buildings. You had a centre area about eight to ten feet wide. Each side of the camp was just one straight field bunk, almost like a fish flake. All on one level. There was a longer for a rail between you and the next man.

You would go and pick your boughs and make your bunk with a blanket. There were anywhere from twenty-five to forty men in a camp.

There was everything in them. At any given time you never knew what you were going to run into: lice, bed bugs, crabs. You mention it, it was there. Sometimes you'd have it fairly good. There wouldn't be too much of it, but other times it would be drastic. It didn't matter what time of the year, winter or summer.

They'd dump all the food. All the trash from the camp was dumped out there about a few feet from the door. Nothing was buried, and the rats, there would be millions of them.