TURNERS FALLS.

Gang of Loggers Arrive.

A gang of loggers from the Mt. Tom camp arrived in town Tuesday, to string the booms and make ready for the annual drive which will probably reach here in about 10 days. They brought their powerful launch "Van Dyke" with them to assist in the work and are able to save much time by the use of it. The boat is equipped with a 24-horse power engine of the automobile type and the canoes are very wary of it as the wake it leaves is about twice as large as that of any of the regular launches on the river. The sluice at the dam is being put in proper shape and it is thought that everything will be in readiness for an immediate sluicing as soon as the logs begin to arrive.
(c) Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, Deerfield MA. All rights reserved.
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The annual log drive on the Connecticut River often tied up the river for weeks at a time as hundreds of thousands of hundred foot-logs floated to the mills at Turners Falls and at the base of Mt. Tom in Holyoke. To prevent damage from stray logs and to keep the majority of the trees in the channel, long log booms were strung along the river. The gang described here arrived in their launch, the "Van Dyke," named for George Van Dyke, the owner of the Connecticut Valley Lumber Company and the Mt. Tom mill. The sluice they are installing is used to route logs over the dam and further downstream.

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