Loggers at Supper, photograph by Isaac Simpson, ca. 1910. Maine State Museum. Gift of Jim Thompson, 2017.24.683.
Loggers at Supper, photograph by Isaac Simpson, ca. 1910. Maine State Museum. Gift of Jim Thompson, 2017.24.683.
In early logging camps, cooks served some pork, but mostly beans, biscuits, and molasses. From this experience came the logger's saying, "beans twenty-one times a week."
By 1910 cooks obtained much of their food from lumber company-owned farms. The companies established farms in the midst of their operations to more efficiently feed the lumbermen. Company farms grew vegetables and raised meat for the camps.
Cooks served breakfast an hour before sunrise and brought dinner to the men in the woods. The men ate supper after the sun went down when they were back in camp. Cooks ruled the camps and often demanded silence while eating. The men ate at long benches under kerosene lamps, as seen in this photograph.