Vintage work crew photos

[MeJasonT]

I have it on good authority that these photos are genuine. President Trump has said that they are not fake news but are the realest ever, he personally knows those people in the photos.

[Ralphxyz]

That is White Pine not Balsa, The Ann River Logging Co.

[MeJasonT]

Hey Ralph
That's an impressive old photo

[Ralphxyz]

All of them have been impressive!

[Frank S]

That is White Pine not Balsa, The Ann River Logging Co.

Could just as easily been northern white cedar only 2.33lbs per board foot or 28lbs per cubic foot

[Ronj]

Could just as easily been northern white cedar only 2.33lbs per board foot or 28lbs per cubic foot

I agree with you and Balsa grows in Central and South America.

[Ralphxyz]

Frank if you read the post about the Ann River Logging Co it said they logged "white pine" in Minnesota. Not northern white cedar.

Ralph

[Toolmaker51]

I am constantly amazed at the things our forefathers, and foremothers were able to accomplish. Things had to be done, they figured out how to do them.

Unfortunately, we need to view some of the things we see today with a bit of skepticism. However, also have to be sure not to diminish what they were able to do, just because we cannot comprehend how hard they worked.

Hear Hear. That precisely is the case. Our imaginations are hampered somewhat, analyzing what means in the past accomplished different tasks. Egyptian pyramids a perfect example, though I know the most creative, as yet unheralded method.
They didn't build them per se; they sculpted them and hauled off excess sand.

[Frank S]

Frank if you read the post about the Ann River Logging Co it said they logged "white pine" in Minnesota. Not northern white cedar.

Ralph

only a max of .6 lbs heavier per bf. or 8lbs per cf. but if dead they could have been lighter only 26Lbs per cf.
Hickory and white oak are what loggers nightmares are made of at 5.25 lb bf or 63 lb cf

[MeJasonT]

Good job its not English Oak or Holly - they are a real pain to split with an axe.
I still think you could stack 70 trees of balsa and tow it easier than white cedar (tugging at Ralph's leg).

On a more serious note, the next couple of generations are not really going to leave much of a legacy (good word). The information technology age or legacy software and architecture has all but been superseded the only thing you could honestly say is we all still have computers and the internet. The surge to build faster computers has slowed down to a snails pace 64 bit has been around now for 18 years - no 128 bit desktop PCs yet (if you ignore Coda and super fast video cards which now share the processing load of the main processor). Can we actually do any more on a PC than we used to - mine is definitely getting slower with at least 3 updates from Fairysoft every two days.

Digital consumption is going to be the addiction of the future if its not already, apparently we all want new tech and we are feeding the Microsoft and Apple frenzy - no we are just too stupid to stop buying crap. I'm hoping 'im amongst friends here, i want to spend life looking at old images of mans achievements and building tools, not trying to understand the far end of a fart about my mobile phone - can i phone people on it, when i say hello does it talk back to me, great that's all i want from a phone.

We look at Apollo and the moon landings the tech in that rocket (thanks to Turin and Babage for creating computers) and realise that it could all have been run on a 1990s WEP Phone (has internet). We now have PLC's running factory automation and robotics which barely run at more than 10% of their capacity. The Apollo Design and construction is a thing to be admired - if indeed it actually went to the moon (wait for it, bound to get a bite).

I have just started to build a furnace and very quickly learning a whole heap of stuff, from the past i might add. Things like the terms and techniques used to cast. When you look at these old photos at machine castings etc. you realise what an achievement our forefathers made, with limited resources and no chance of making a mistake they were making castings two or three story's high. Things like the Titanic's engine castings or the A frames holding the props.

I can honestly say AI and software written today will be gone in ten years time and very few programmers will have had even the smallest of mentions as being a great inventor. We might hark back to the old photos but the legacy of them is the hopes ambitions and imagination of generations which has stood the test of time and encouraged many of us to choose a thankless, underpaid and sometimes impossible career in engineering. We are still Pioneers working against all the odds.

At least three times a year I end up referring to books in my library on Victorian mechanisms, Its kind of like music being made up of notes, mechanisms also have a modular construct which goes back to the very days these old photos represent.

In the next 10 years every one will be using their sub conscious to operate there home via an implanted chip, walk the dog without even leaving the house and work even harder from home outside of paid work hours. That's until there is a massive power cut, the greens have their way and switch of all consumption or it becomes so expensive for every one to pay and live in an AI future that only the rich can afford it - the rest of us will end up terminated (pun intended).

The skills shortage is starting to show the difference between those from the past with skills that can make things and the "O Beast" kids stuck on their computers.
If the consumers stop being interested in frivolous technology just so that they can switch on a light without leaving their chair, then this stupidity will continue.
Living off grid and harking back to the good old days is good, gentlemen don't feel old - upskilling and maintaining skills is still the future.

Even if Ralph still has a box filled with airbrushed and digitally altered photos from the 1880's still in their original doctored state, as if that were even possible. lol.

Still cant get over a recent image I saw of Neil Armstrong's space boot foot print and the ones apparently left on the moon, he must have used is spare pare that day - both were very different ?