Gentlemen of the Woods
Manhood, Myth, and the American Lumberjack
by Willa Hammitt Brown
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Pub Date Feb 18 2025 | Archive Date Oct 15 2024
University of Minnesota Press | Univ Of Minnesota Press
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Description
Lumberjacks: the men, the myth, and the making of an American legend
The folk hero Paul Bunyan, burly, bearded, wielding his big ax, stands astride the story of the upper Midwest—a manly symbol of the labor that cleared the vast north woods for the march of industrialization while somehow also maintaining an aura of pristine nature. This idea, celebrated in popular culture with songs and folktales, receives a long overdue and thoroughly revealing correction in Gentlemen of the Woods, a cultural history of the life and lore of the real lumberjack and his true place in American history.
Now recalled as heroes of wilderness and masculinity, lumberjacks in their own time were despised as amoral transients. Willa Hammitt Brown shows that nineteenth-century jacks defined their communities of itinerant workers by metrics of manhood that were abhorrent to the residents of the nearby Northwoods boomtowns, valuing risk-taking and skill rather than restraint and control. Reviewing songs, stories, and firsthand accounts from loggers, Brown brings to life the activities and experiences of the lumberjacks as they moved from camp to camp. She contrasts this view with the popular image cultivated by retreating lumber companies that had to sell off utterly barren land. This mythologized image glorified the lumberjack and evoked a kindly, flannel-wearing, naturalist hero.
Along with its portrait of lumberjack life and its analysis of the creation of lumberjack myth, Gentlemen of the Woods offers new insight into the intersections of race and social class in the logging enterprise, considering the actual and perceived roles of outsider lumberjacks and Native inhabitants of the northern forests. Anchored in the dual forces of capitalism and colonization, this lively and compulsively readable account offers a new way to understand a myth and history that has long captured our collective imagination.
Advance Praise
"You’ll never think about lumberjacks the same way thanks to Willa Hammitt Brown’s Gentlemen of the Woods. From their complicated and hidden narratives to their significant historical impact and larger-than-life lore, the restless ghosts of the North Woods are finally getting their due." —Susan Marks, author of Finding Betty Crocker: The Secret Life of America’s First Lady of Food
"From go-devils to road monkeys to agropelters, Willa Hammit Brown shows us the vast Northwoods workscape of America's lumberjacks. Were itinerant 'jacks' heroes or villains? Neither, says Brown, but understanding their dangerous work lives, diverse backgrounds, and colorful saloons helps us see the Gilded Age at its brutal cutting edge. Filled with first-person narratives and legends, this beautifully written book breaks new paths in labor, gender, and environmental history, and the history of capitalism." —Scott Reynolds Nelson, author of Steel Drivin’ Man: John Henry, the Untold Story of an American Legend
"In this nuanced and insightful work, Willa Hammitt Brown deftly weaves together cultural history and memory studies to give an intimate and revealing portrait of the Northwoods lumberjack, an American icon shrouded in layers of folklore. Gentlemen of the Woods takes the reader on a fascinating journey beyond the legend of Paul Bunyan to understand life in a logging camp—with all its discomfort and danger—and the process of mythmaking in American popular culture." —Eric Rutkow, author of The Longest Line on the Map: The United States, the Pan-American Highway, and the Quest to Link the Americas
"The story of the lumberjack is the story of America. It’s a story of road monkeys, bull cooks, and river pigs. It’s a story of capitalism, conquest, and controversy. Willa Hammitt Brown’s Gentlemen of the Woods interrogates the lumberjack’s many identities: Was he a dignified, mythic strongman? Was he an exploited itinerant tramp? Was he a degenerate, violent outcast? At last we have a book that pulls the lumberjack from the mists of memory and vividly paints him in his true, wild, filthy glory." —Mark Cecil, author of Bunyan and Henry and host of The Thoughtful Bro podcast
Available Editions
| EDITION | Hardcover |
| ISBN | 9781517912451 |
| PRICE | $29.95 (USD) |
| PAGES | 368 |
