Oregon Century: Part 30 - Logging Railroads By Ron Brown September 25, 2009 MEDFORD, Ore. - When the clatter of horses hooves and rattle of the wooden wheels gave way to the hiss of steam and the rumble of iron on steel rails, the pace of settlement and development in Southern Oregon took a giant step forward. "The first one was down at Pokegama, which is just near Hornbrook. Then the second logging railroad that they built was on the west side of the Klamath Lake. Pelican Bay Lumber Company built that. And from then on they built railroads up around Kirk. But they had six or seven operating out of there at one time, bringing the logs in. And it just kinda went from one thing to another," Author & Railroad Historian Jack Bowden said. What it went from was the sleepy little village of Linkville to the boom town of Klamath Falls in the first decade of the 20th century. Logging the big pine country of South Central Oregon is directly tied to the use of railroads to bring out large volumes of timber. "They built railroads everywhere. Klamath County was just covered with railroads," Bowden said. There's nothing left at Kirk now, but in the 20s it was a boom town, with all those logging lines connecting to get their timber to the mills near Klamath Falls. "There was Algoma Lumber Company. There was Pelican Bay Lumber Company. There was Lamm Lumber Company. There was Chiloquin Lumber Company. There was Modoc Lumber Company. Shaw-Bertram was a big one," Bowden said. Some of them dumped logs into Klamath Lake and floated them to their mills. Towns like Algoma, Modoc Point, and Pelican Bay sprung up and the basin boomed. And there were logging camps everywhere the timber was. But the logging lines were always moving, keeping up with the harvest of timber. "They just took it up and moved it into another area and laid it down again. And when they got done logging there they picked it up and moved it again," Bowden said. Most companies used the shay-style locomotive, with it's distinctive vertical side pistons and gear power. "They used to say they could take two sticks and draw two lines in the dirt and a shay could follow it. And that was one of the main reasons. They were powerful. They were slow but powerful. And they could go anywhere," Bowden said. And most of them were made in Oregon. Willamette Iron and Steel Works made some three dozen, mostly for Northwest logging operations where the terrain was steep and windy. Bowden, who published a 350 page book called "Railroad Logging in the Klamath Country" says unconventional locomotive power seemed to be the standard. Except for the Weyerhaeuser Company. "One of the early superintendents didn't like shays. And so the one they had, they got rid of and never replaced it," Bowden said. Weyerhaeuser's operations were probably the biggest, with lines running up the Klamath River near Keno and eastward to Bly and beyond. Much of that operation east was known as the 'Oregon, California & Eastern'. "The OC&E went from Klamath Falls to Bly, which was about 60 miles, I think. Then Weyerhaeuser had a line that ran off of the OC&E, at a place near Beatty. And they ran probably 40 or 50 miles north," Bowden said. Today the old line is a biking, hiking and walking trail from downtown Klamath Falls out to the east. It's still easy to see where the rails once brought timber to the basin mills that are also now gone. The Rogue Valley had only a few logging lines. By far the biggest was the Medco Railroad, which grew out of efforts to build an alternative freight and passenger route through Butte Falls to the Klamath Basin in the early 1900s. "At its maximum it had about 70 miles of line. But that counts all the spurs in the woods and stuff," said Tony Johnson with the Railroad Historical Society. When it became the Medco Line in the early 30s, the railroad tapped into some big timber that fed the company's mill in Medford. The last train load came out in the 60s and the rails were torn up. Today, the Railroad Historical Society is restoring Medco's Willamette Shay Number Four, and also has the diesel engine that was new in the early 50s. "Ultimately, we'd like to build our own three to six mile long tourist railroad. And we've got a couple of potential sites. But that process takes a long time, and besides, we're not ready anyway. We still have to finish rebuilding number four, and we're about half way done," Johnson said. There were a couple other small logging railroads in Jackson County, but little is known of them. "There is the Gold Hill Lumber and Railway Company, which ran for approximately, if I remember right, for about three years out of Gold Hill. We're still trying to figure out exactly where it did connect with the outside world. And the Bullis Lumber Company Railroad out of Jacksonville which ran for a few years," Johnson said. And that's pretty typical. Most ran until the timber ran out, then moved on to the next operation or died If you know of any photographs of these or other operations, contact KDRV or the Southern Oregon Chapter of Railroad Historical Society.
I'd never known K Falls was once known as Linkville. Any history on that previous name? Perhaps an eventual tourist operation can be accomplished on part of the old OC&E roadbed? Does Weyerhaeuser still own any of it? Boxcab E50
