Metal Detecting old sawmill tram tracks?

[Kevin75931]

In the early 1900s all across the southern united states sawmills cut the last of their timber and were abandoned. To get the timber from the woods to the sawmill, the mills would lay miles of tram tracks. Some people may call this narrow gauge track. It was about 1/3 the size of modern railroad tracks.

A few miles from where I live there is an old sawmill that burned down in 1925. The mill was not rebuilt and the tram tracks were pulled up after the mill burned.

If someone can find out where those tram tracks ran, they can provide a unique metal detecting area. Probably will not find any coins or anything of real value, but you should like small rail road spikes that were used to hold the tram tracks to the cross ties, and nuts and bolts that were used on the tracks.

Here is the special topic, when the tram got several miles from the sawmill, employees would set up temporary communities. These would be just a few wood houses. Employees would sleep and eat at these communities. Keep in mind they were probably just a couple of small one room houses. They were used so employees did not have to go all the way back to the sawmill to eat or sleep.

Those communities disappeared decades ago, but could provide a special bounty.

My grandfather were one such community was at, and I have permission to try and find its location this coming spring. The area is off in the woods and I will have to use an ATV to get to it.

 

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[G.A.P.metal]

Kevin
Sounds like a great place the mill and all alog the tram track...they must have had an outside eating areas and played poker and had fights,outhouses ... all activity's could have lost coins or script.

 

[sawmill man]

Sounds good, look for water supplys ,small towns and big towns they all needed fresh water . your on the right step.

 

[Kray Gelder]

Good luck! Sounds like a good prospect.

 

[Kevin75931]

Sounds good, look for water supplys ,small towns and big towns they all needed fresh water . your on the right step.

Kevin
Sounds like a great place the mill and all alog the tram track...they must have had an outside eating areas and played poker and had fights,outhouses ... all activity's could have lost coins or script.

Thank you.

My mistake in the opening post, they were not built along the way, they were box houses that were carried on the train, unloaded, people lived in the houses for a little while, then loaded and moved again. The small houses were not built along the way, they were portable housing. The steam loader that was used to load the timber was used to load and unload the box houses.

In the book "Nameless towns, Texas sawmill communities by Thad Sitton and James H. Conrad", on page 150, there is a picture of a boxcar house being unloaded from the tram. I just got finished reading the book.

My grandfather was born in 1928, just three years after the mill burned down. He saw a lot of the temporary housing that had been built in the area for the sawmill employees. Unfortunately, he did not write any of this stuff down. All I have is word of mouth from my grandfather to my parents.

Grandfather probably thought the houses were built along the way when he saw them as a child. There was a permanent community for the families to live in just a mile from the sawmill. That land still belongs to the timber company.

 

[luvsdux]

I've detected sites of this type. Be prepared for lots of iron junk along with the occasional tool or interesting relic, but few if any, coins.
luvsdux