PAUL BUNYAN’S
KIDS SHANTY
One of the only known photographs of Paul
Bunyan taken the fall before the Round River Drive. Digitally colorized,
modified and enhanced.
Who is Paul Bunyan? Why, Paul Bunyan was only the biggest, bravest and boldest lumberjack whoever was that's who! Why, Paul Bunyan, he would work so hard and for so long, he used to meet himself going to bed on his way to work in the morning. Not to mention, Paul Bunyan was so tough, he would cross water that could tear a normal person in two just for drinking it!
Don't believe me? It is the truth, I tell you!
That isn't all either. Paul stood seven feet tall with seven feet between each step he took. When he talked branches sometimes fell off of trees and the ground often shook.
Instead of a dinner horn, in Paul's logging camp, he just blew through a hollow tree. One time Paul did so and accidentally blew down a whole forest; another time he caused a tornado. I remember once, way back when, Paul Bunyan was moose hunting. Well, during that hunt, Paul had some free time, so he decided to following the moose's tracks backwards. Paul followed those tracks until he reached the place where the moose had been born. He sure did!
Yup, there isn't anyone quite like Paul Bunyan. Oh, and I haven't even got to his big, blue ox yet.
See, Paul Bunyan had many great adventures logging all across the continent, and he became very famous. Now, Paul Bunyan cut down all the forests in North and South Dakota, which is why when you visit them today there is nothing there but plains. It was during one awful cold winter. In fact, it got so cold the snow turned blue. You heard right! It turned blue, and that's the winter of the blue snow, you see? During the winter of the blue snow, the fire would freeze and when someone spoke their words would freeze too! To keep themselves warm, the lumberjacks would grow beards down to their feet. Some of them, even knitted the ends of their beards into socks to keep their toes warm.
It was also on that very cold winter, when Paul Bunyan came across a great big ox trapped under the snow. The strange thing is when Paul dug the ox out, shucks, all the blue snow turned the ox blue too.
Well, Paul he put the ox to work. In a logging camp, lumberjacks chop down trees in winter. They did so in the wintertime, because that is when tree sap gets hard. If the tree sap is soft it makes their axes and saws too gooey, and they keep getting stuck. Anyway, after the trees get chopped down, the logs are put in a huge pile, sometimes twenty feet high, on top of a logging sled. It was the big, blue ox that pulled these sleds down to the river. After the logs get into the river, the lumberjacks wait until spring for the ice to melt. Once the ice is melted, the logs are floated down to the saw mill to get cut into boards.
Now, Paul's big, blue ox had a mighty powerful appetite. He sure did. Paul's big, blue ox would drink three barrels of water each meal. What did it eat? Why, often it was bales of hay with the wire still attached. But the ox's favorite food was pancakes and pickles. This animal was very huge. The ox was seven feet and a tin can between the horns, and to see its feet you needed a pair of binoculars.
Now, Paul's logging camp was the biggest in the world. The kitchen was so big when someone went down to the end, it was their grandchildren that came back. The pan for cooking pancakes was so big that lumberjacks had to skate on it with hams on their feet to get it greased up. Now, batter for the pancakes, that was something else too. It had to be mixed in cement mixers. Yes, feeding all those hungry lumberjacks was sure quite the job. I remember one time a lumberjack was bringing a wagon-load full of peas and accidentally spilled them into a lake. Lucky for him, the lake was a hot spring. Well, Paul, he just threw in some salt and pepper a made enough pea soup to last all winter.
Oh, I almost forgot to mention about the Round River Drive. Well, Paul Bunyan and his crew once chopped down all the trees from a huge hill. The strange thing was the was in the shape of a pyramid. This hill was called the Pyramid Forty because it was exactly as big as forty acres. On that single forty acres was one-hundred million feet of wood, which was quite a lot for forty acres.
Well, once the logs were cut down the logs were placed in the river so they could be floated down to a saw mill. Just like I told you before. But when Paul Bunyan and his crew went to float the logs down the river, they kept passing a camp that looked just like their camp. This happened many times. Afterwards, Paul Bunyan learned that the river was round, and there was no way out! Yup, Paul Bunyan found out that the river was actually a lake and the Pyramid Forty was an island in the middle. Paul Bunyan didn't know what in the world to do. So, he thought about it and got a wonderful idea.
So, Paul Bunyan went and bought a giant cow. Paul Bunyan then hooked a plow to the cow and created a big ditched from the lake to a river. Afterwards, the ditched filled with water making a canal. Finally, Paul Bunyan was able to take all the logs through the canal and off to the saw mill.
Now, that was a Paul Bunyan problem that needed a Paul Bunyan solution. Just as a you problem requires a you solution.
The moral to the story is that if in life you find yourself going in circles, sometimes you cannot find a way out because there isn't one yet. And the only way out is the way you make for yourself. You may need some help. But the first step is yours, and nobody can take that first step for you but you.
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[ DISCLOSURE: THE FOLLOWING IS REAL!—believe me—READER INDISCRETION IS ADVISED! ]
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