1.6.3 John Vance's Logging Train, Mad River, California
View of men and women standing beside and on top of a logging train in Humboldt County, California. A fence runs parallel to the logging train. View of fallen timber remains in the background. "H. and M. R. R." is printed on the side of the engine. The train is decorated with American flags.
Once railroad tracks were built in California, people used trains to carry the very heavy logs to the places where people would cut them up into usable pieces. Do you see the barn in the back of this photo? What is it made from?
The railroad in California caused rapid deforestation in many areas of the state, especially in the Sierra Nevada mountains near gold and silver mines and in the redwood forests of the northwest. People from around the country were in awe at the size of California’s coast redwood. Most mature coast redwoods are 200 to 300 feet tall. A large redwood trunk was once brought across the country on a train to display at a world’s fair in the late 1800s.
