Mud Bay Logging Company was a 20th-century logging company based in

Olympia, Washington Olympia is the capital of the U.S. state of Washington and the county seat and largest city of Thurston County. It is southwest of the state's most populous city, Seattle, and is a cultural center of the southern Puget Sound region. Europea ...

. The company was established in 1899 as Western Washington Logging Company by Mark Draham, who had previously established Mason County Logging Company. The name changed to Mud Bay Logging Company in 1910. The company was disestablished in 1941.

Operations

Operations were in the

Mud Bay, Thurston County, Washington Mud Bay is the southernmost reach of Puget Sound, at Eld Inlet just outside the city limits of Olympia, Washington. The name Eld Inlet was officially bestowed after a member of the U.S. Navy's Wilkes Expedition, but "Mud Bay" is a local, informa ...

area, harvesting timber from the

Black Hills The Black Hills ( lkt, Ȟe Sápa; chy, Moʼȯhta-voʼhonáaeva; hid, awaxaawi shiibisha) is an isolated mountain range rising from the Great Plains of North America in western South Dakota and extending into Wyoming, United States. Black Elk P ...

, hauling it out by

logging railroad A forest railway, forest tram, timber line, logging railway or logging railroad is a mode of railway transport which is used for forestry tasks, primarily the transportation of felled logs to sawmills or railway stations. In most cases this form ...

, and

rafting Rafting and whitewater rafting are recreational outdoor activities which use an inflatable raft to navigate a river or other body of water. This is often done on whitewater or different degrees of rough water. Dealing with risk is often a ...

the timber by water from a Mud Bay

log dump A log pond is a small natural lake or reservoir used for storage of wooden logs in readiness for milling at a sawmill. Although some mill ponds served this purpose for water-powered sawmills, steam-powered sawmills used log ponds for transportation ...

to mills on Puget Sound. The railroad ran west from Mud Bay to Summit Lake, about halfway to

McCleary, Washington McCleary () is a city in Grays Harbor County, Washington, United States. The population was 1,997 at the 2020 census. History Henry McCleary came to the land in 1897, building two sawmills and a door manufacturing company. He sold the land a ...

. By 1918, in the Black Hills, the line run as far south as section 20 or 27 of township 17 north, range 3 west—almost as far as Littlerock. The company was one of the last in the South Puget Sound area to use a logging railroad. Traces of the rail line can be easily seen across the greater Olympia area, now used as county roads and private driveways, a natural gas pipeline, and a nature trail. The company became one of the seven founding members of the State Log Patrol, incorporated in 1928 and given special quasi-law enforcement powers over timber piracy by the state legislature.

Equipment

A 2-6-6-2

steam powered A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be trans ...

Mallet locomotive The Mallet locomotive is a type of articulated steam railway locomotive, invented by the Swiss engineer Anatole Mallet (1837–1919). The front of the locomotive articulated on a bogie. The compound steam system fed steam at boiler pressur ...

, serial number 60412, was built in 1928 by Baldwin Locomotive Works for Mud Bay Logging Company. It became a

Weyerhaeuser Timber Company Weyerhaeuser () is an American timberland company which owns nearly of timberlands in the U.S., and manages an additional of timberlands under long-term licenses in Canada. The company also manufactures wood products. It operates as a real es ...

logging locomotive after Mud Bay dissolved, and was operated at

Klamath Falls, Oregon Klamath Falls ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Klamath County, Oregon, United States. The city was originally called ''Linkville'' when George Nurse founded the town in 1867. It was named after the Link River, on whose falls the city wa ...

. It was Weyerhaeuser's last steam locomotive. It was acquired by the

Northwest Railway Museum The Northwest Railway Museum (NRM) is a railroad museum in Snoqualmie, King County, Washington. It incorporates a heritage railway, historic depot, exhibit hall, library, and collection care center, and serves more than 130,000 visitors per year ...

at Snoqualmie, Washington, in 1965, and was last operated in 1974.

Legacy

The logging railroad has been converted to a

rail trail A rail trail is a shared-use path on railway right of way. Rail trails are typically constructed after a railway has been abandoned and the track has been removed, but may also share the right of way with active railways, light rail, or streetca ...

, now the McLane Creek Nature Trail. The timberlands worked by Mud Bay have become part of

Capitol State Forest The Capitol State Forest is a state forest in Thurston and Grays Harbor counties of the U.S. state of Washington. It includes part of the unusual Mima Mounds geologic feature. The Capitol State Forest is managed by Washington State Department ...

, a state-managed

protected area Protected areas or conservation areas are locations which receive protection because of their recognized natural, ecological or cultural values. There are several kinds of protected areas, which vary by level of protection depending on the ena ...

including multi-use forest where logging continues but with modern

forestry Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests, woodlands, and associated resources for human and environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands. ...

practices.

References

;Sources * * * * {{cite book , last=Hannum , first=James , title=Gone but not forgotten : abandoned railroads of Thurston County, Washington , chapter = Mud Bay Logging Company Railroad , pages=155–166, publisher=Hannum House Publications , location=Olympia, Wash , year=2002 , isbn=0-9679043-2-3

External links

Mud Bay Logging Company train
via Washington Secretary of State historical logging photographs Defunct companies based in Olympia, Washington History of Olympia, Washington 1899 establishments in Washington (state) 1941 disestablishments in Washington (state) Defunct forest products companies of the United States