Volunteers are needed in May to help with school tours at Holt and Balcom Logging Camp Museum in Lakewood.
These annual field trips provide fourth graders learning Wisconsin history with a unique hands-on visit to the oldest logging camp in America situated on its original site. Hosting school tours is a key mission for the museum, a historic site built in 1880.
Students from Oconto, Pembine, Suring and White Lake are already making plans to visit the camp. Already booked dates are May 17, May 24, May 28 and May 30. These tours, which enable the kids to live like a lumberjack for a day, begin at 9 a.m. and usually conclude by 11 a.m.
The morning starts with an introductory overview of logging in the Northwoods. Next, the students get an up-close glimpse of logging camp life via presentations in the cook shack and bunkhouse. Then they head outside where volunteer staff supervise hands-on lessons in using authentic tools to do essential tasks, such as stamping, cutting and moving logs.
Always a favorite is an activity that requires working in pairs to use a crosscut saw. Shouts of “pull” encourage each partner to draw the saw across the log in a steady rhythm. When chunks fall to the ground, shouts of “timber” ring out, followed by applause from classmates for a job well done.
There are always expressions of wonder as students, parent-chaperones and teachers leave the camp for their next stop at Cathedral Pines as they ask, how did these hardy men not only manage to tame the wilds of northern Oconto County during the late 19th and early 20th centuries but survive to tell about it?
For those unable to help, the logging camp will be open for summer tours from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. every Saturday from June 1 to Sept. 7. Holt and Balcom Logging Camp is east of Lakewood at 18301 Waubee Park Lane, off County Road F and adjacent to McCauslin Golf Course and Country Club. There are also openings for anyone willing to train as a paid camp guide on an occasional summer Saturday. Call Kathleen Marsh at 920-841-6235 for information.
Volunteers needed to bring logging history alive
