When daddy was a shanty boy: The role of gender in the organization of the logging industry in highland West Virginia

Abstract

Literature and oral history of late 19th- and early 20th-century logging camps are replete with stories about lusty loggers who lived rigorous lives in the woods. Photo documentation in many of the logging histories supports the idea that logging was a single-gender, masculine activity. However, it is clear from recent work at the Monongahela National Forest and elsewhere in the East that women and children were present in some logging contexts. This article looks at the historic logging industry in West Virginia using gender as an organizing principle.