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Otto Oja Tells
The Tales Of The Woods In Song
By Jim LeMonds
(Originally
published in The Daily Astorian, Cathlamet, Washington, and re-published with
the author’s permission.)
Otto
Oja was 52 when he wrote his first logging song. He’s continued to tell
loggers’ stories in lyrics and poems for 38 years.
A veteran woodsman with no musical training, Oja started writing because no
one else seemed to be paying attention to the role loggers played in the history
and mythology of the West. “I realized that there were all kinds of songs
and poems about cowboys. I thought, ‘Why not loggers?”’
Even at 90, the angular Oja appears fit enough to crank up his power saw and
cut timber. He admits to having difficulty recalling details, but his mind
is working well enough to take on new challenges. His tiny house in Cathlamet
is dominated by a new HP computer he is still learning to operate. He uses
e-mail to stay in touch with friends and scans photos for Finnish magazines.
Born in Mayger, Oregon in 1913, Oja remembers his hometown as a bustling logging
community. Its location on the Columbia River, about midway between Portland
and Astoria, provided commerce and energy. “Seven trains a day came through
town, and a mail boat ran back and forth across the river between Mayger and
Stella.”
Oja followed the footsteps of his father and brothers, all of whom earned
a living in the woods. For 40 years, he worked as a chokersetter, bucker,
and timber faller at camps along the Lower Columbia River.
“Loggers had a funny pride back in the early days,” Oja said. “You
could have all sorts of experience, but you weren’t considered a real
logger unless you’d worked in one of the big camps like Wilson, Big Creek,
Crown Zellerbach, or Crown-Willamette.”
He was drafted during World War II and sent to Camp Roberts in California
for training. An offhand remark landed him in the l0th Mountain Division.
“They interviewed you to figure out where best to send you. One question
was ‘What is your favorite sport?’ I thought it would be funny to
say, ‘Skiing.” That response resulted in Oja’s transfer to
the 37th Infantry Scout Dog Platoon. The 37th was later attached to the l0th
Mountain Division, which helped spearhead the Allied push to drive the Germans
out of the Apennines and up the Po Valley. He was wounded at San Benedetto
Pu.
By the time he’d recovered, the Italian campaign was finished. After
the war, Oja returned to the Northwest and continued his logging career.
He took his first stab at writing lyrics in a poem titled “Ballad of
the St. Helens Ape Man,” which was published in Chainsaw Age in 1965.
Oja’s ape man was no benign Sasquatch.
Somewhere up in St. Helens’ crags,
Up where the thunder rolls, There dwelt a monster ape man
Who gathered loggers’ souls.
In the ballad, every logger in the vicinity turned tail and ran, except for a faller named Big One-Eyed Jim and a bucker known as Slabwood Bill. As the ape man closed in, Jim cranked up his chainsaw and went to work on an old-growth fir.
His chainsaw screamed as ninety tons
Of timber shook the land.
The tall fir struck the mountain
Where they’ d seen the ape man stand.
They saw, when the dust was settled down,
The tree had found its mark.
There, stretched out, lay the fearsome thing
A kicking up the bark.
Oja’s friend
Clarice Staats later set the words to music, and his career as a logger musician
was launched. He’d played the harmonica as a boy and decided it was time
to teach himself to play the guitar.”
A folklorist got ahold of the song about the ape man,” Oja said. “He
was looking for loggers who were poets. I told him that if he was going to
call me a poet I’d have to do some more writing.”
Other than “The Ballad of the St. Helens Ape Man,” all of Oja’s
songs are about the gritty lives of loggers. “I didn’t write about
superintendents and foremen. I championed the guys who did the work.”
Songs like “The Crosscut Bucker” describe the hardship and pride
of working in the woods.
Some might say there’s a better way
Where danger’s not so high.
But I’m made to buck with skill and luck
As a raven’s made to fly.
Timber bind and pitch as well -
What I can’t buck
It ain’t been fell.
Another asks
the inevitable question: Why did men submit to such brutal and dangerous work?
In the great Northwest,
I logged with the best
And camped with the bad ones too
Why anyone stayed with the logging trade
I don’t think anyone knew.
Oja’s
lyrics also provide the answer. He writes of the freedom of the transient
lifestyle, the joy of dressing in a high-dollar suit and spending Saturday
afternoons and evenings wandering downtown Portland, the exclusivity of a
shared language, the pride in knowing that this was work that most men weren’t
capable of doing. After checking out the Burnside hiring halls, loggers congregated
at bars like Erickson’s, Cabbage’s, the Valhalla, and the Alaska,
where they were sure to connect with old acquaintances.
Hey, there’s Scrap Iron Pete!
I see Hemlock Joe!
And the Finn has come to fly!Belly up to the bar and let the beer flow!
We’ll drink the Valhalla dry!
The advent of
the internal combustion engine changed the logging life as Oja had known it.
Fast-moving trucks and crew buses replaced steam-powered trains, making the
logging railway obsolete. Men, logs and equipment could be moved quickly from
place to place. By the late 1950s, the logging camps were gone.
The head rigger’s yell and the railroad bell
They break the ‘till no more.
The old logging tramp has broke his last camp
And ended his last tour.
During the 1980s
and 1990s, Oja performed at logging shows and community celebrations. His
songwriting earned him the Washington Governor’s Heritage Award. A fellow
recipient, historian Irene Martin, who has written several books about the
Lower Columbia including Reach of Heaven and another about Lewis and Clark
in Wahkiakum County, appeared with him at the River Life Interpretive Center
in Skamokawa, Washington, as part of a retrospective program featuring recipients
of the award.
“A gentle man, still passionate about life, about logging, about writing,
still exploring new ideas and fascinated with the old ways,” she says
when asked to describe him.
“He still retains his connections with his Finnish roots and with logging
history. It was a privilege to appear at the same event with him.”
Oja no longer does much songwriting, but he still accepts invitations to speak
at local schools and enjoys sharing what he knows. “The kids are really
interested in hearing about logging history,” he said.
The passing of the Northwest’s best known purveyors of logging lore -
singer Buzz Martin and poet Woody Gifford - have left a void that Oja knows
will be difficult to fill.
“It seems like there’s nobody left to speak for the working man
anymore”.
Freelance writer Jim LeMonds of Castle Rock, Washington, is a retired Longview teacher. He is the author of “South of Seattle, “ a collection of memoirs of small town life, (Mountain Press Publishing, 1997) and “Deadfall, “ a logging history and memoir book ( Mountain Press Publishing, 2000). Above photo by Jens Lund.