2. Union of Makers 32 Black Bear Brand
My Grandfather, Robert
Benson, was born in
1910 in the Swedish Dairy
farming community of Cedardale. The farm
ground, east of present-day Interstate-5, ran
parallel with a mountain range in the area be-
tween Mount Vernon and Conway in Wash-
ington State. Having been raised at the base of
these mountains, he witnessed the operations
of the English Lumber Co., which was the area’s
largest player in the logging industry. In 1914
the English Co. began construction of a bridge
along what was known as the
“English Logging Railroad.”
The bridge, which the com-
pany claimed to be the tallest of its type in the
United States, spanned Sandy Creek at a height
of 119 feet. As a boy, my Grandfather watched
the locomotives transporting Fir and Cedar
across the trestle from the Mount Vernon area.
The sights and the sounds of this magnificent
era must have made quite an impression on my
Grandfather who, at the age of nineteen, de-
cided to become a railroad logger for English.
U N E A R T H E D
A B l a c k B e a r S t o r y
b y F l i n t B e n s o n
A n I n d e s t r u c t i b l e L e g a c y
L e f t i n t h e F o o t s t e p s o f
o u r F a t h e r s
3. Union of Makers 54 Black Bear Brand
The Great Depression made getting a job with English a
stiff competition. Loggers were expected to work hard, because if
they didn’t, there were about two hundred other men ready to take
their place. My Grandfather often spoke of his first day at work.
...The foreman took me out to a railroad grade, as we rounded the
corner I saw five men pitching gravel at a frightening pace. The
Foreman handed me a shovel and said, ‘get to it, boy!’
He joined the men and matched their effort. Ten minutes later,
sweaty and near collapsing with exhaustion, the men threw down
their shovels and shared a hearty laugh. Grandpa explained to me
that they were testing his work ethic along with his sense of humor,
because to work that hard, you needed both.
My Father was born in 1948 and spent his youth explor-
ing the same mountains where his father was raised. He sometimes
recalls having lunch with my Grandfather on what remained of
the old trestle bridge. He never forgot the stories my Grandfather
told of an old English Logging camp where 14 bunkhouses had
been destroyed in a fire sometime during 1913. Grandpa also men-
tioned a cousin, Uncle Edgar, who used to hike up to these camps
in search of colored bottles. As a young man, my Father used the
old Railroad grades in the area of the old camps to access higher
elevation while deer hunting. One day on a deer hunt my father
spotted the signs of a bottles dig high on the mountain side and
quickly realized that he had found the old burned down camp.
I was born in 1979 and grew up in a mountain house built
roughly 200 yards from the old trestle bridge that the English Co.
had constructed over Sandy Creek. Only one piling remains of the
bridge which, like the mountains, hadn’t experienced much indus-
try following the glory days of the English Logging Company. That
all changed when the Scott Paper Co. came to town and reignited
the logging industry. After nearly 70 years the mountain roared
back to life with the whistle blows of the log yarders and the con-
stant flow of Fir and Cedar down its side. Eventually, the clear-cut
land came for sale in 40 acre parcels. My Father thought that we
could buy some acreage if we supplemented the cost by cutting
and selling firewood from the slash piles. We cut hundreds of cords
over the next two years to make ends meet. I remember cutting
on a new logging road when my father pointed out the location of
the old English Logging camp. He explained to me how the trains
brought the buildings in and took the buildings out, all except for
those 14 bunkhouses had burned down long ago.
“THEY WERE TESTING
HIS WORK ETHIC ALONG
WITH HIS SENSE OF
HUMOR, BECAUSE TO
WORK THAT HARD, YOU
NEEDED BOTH.”
4. Union of Makers 76 Black Bear Brand
My grandfather passed away in 2007, he was 97 years
old. The last years of his life the family took turns caring for
him in his home on the mountain across Sandy Creek Canyon. I
found that the book, “Logging Railroads in Skagit County” took
him to a place where he could recall with confidence the stories
he treasured the most.
In the following year, I found myself as a self-em-
ployed Tile setter in a struggling economy. In my spare time
I was drawn to the woods much as I had been as a child. My
yellow lab and I wandered the mountain and creeks looking for
antler sheds or an arrowhead, while unsuccessful on the latter,
the times coming home empty handed taught me patience. I
learned the native flora and fauna and hunted the black-tailed
deer and migratory waterfowl. I walked the old railroad grades
like my fore-fathers and, with a new appreciation for the moun-
tain, I slowly became drawn to the logging camp.
In 2011, armed with a metal detector and my yellow lab, I
entered the alder flat that would consume me for the next 3 years.
I started finding parts to wood stoves and bed frames, within the
first week I felt I had the footprint of the fourteen burned bunk-
houses...a 30’x200’ sea of nails. I was still learning the metal detec-
tor when I got the surprise of a lifetime, out of the ground came a
Winchester model 1896 saddle ring carbine! I decided that with
the large amount of nails in the ground I would need to set up 5’x5’
areas and pull each and every nail, one handful of dirt at a time.
The first finds to come were mostly all clothing related. The most
common find among the nails were metal buttons from work pants
6. Union of Makers 1110 Black Bear Brand
and coats. I was delighted to find the but-
tons were stamped with the name of the
manufacturer. A set of ten buttons were
usually accompanied by a set of suspend-
er buckles. I remember the buckles and
buttons to be far more ornate than I had
ever imagined. The designs were classy
and well made. Traces of gold gilding or
nickel plating still remained in places in-
side the buckle and within the recessed
stamped designs and lettering. With each
new brand discovery a new opportunity
arose to research the brand’s history. The
closest company to my hometown was
the “Black Manufacturing Company”
in Seattle. They produced garments us-
ing the “Black Bear Brand” as their line
of work wear. A search of their history
provided a picture of a massive painted
mural advertisement preserved on the
side of a brick building in Seattle. I had
seen that sign before!
The most thrilling day for me
was April 12th, 2012. While digging
under a rotten stump I hit a pocket of
buttons. It seemed every handful of
dirt produced at least one button. “Buf-
falo Brand,” “Rose City,” “Chester Make,”
“Capitol Make,” 45 buttons and four
suspender buckle sets came out of the
ground. I recorded my first coin, a 1906
Liberty Head Nickel and a “Good for
five cents” trade token from the “Viaduct
Saloon” in Everett, Wash. The follow-
ing year I learned that early plastic was
prized among loggers; combs, smoking
pipe mouth pieces, and even a men’s ring
was found from materials ranging from
Baleen, Celluloid, Bakelite, and hard rub-
ber. The next two years produced a total
of sixteen manufacturers of work clothes
and suspenders of thirty different designs
from at least a dozen suspender makers.
In March of this year, my fiancé
and I were walking up our creek, about a
half mile from Sandy Creek. We had been
finding antique fire brick on our journeys
up the creek and this particular day lead us
to the source, a large fire brick lined kiln.
On the next trip up we found a patch of
daffodils and a wrought iron bed frame. A
week ago I took the dogs back up the site
and below the bed frame I started digging.
To my surprise a couple of buttons came out
of the ground, but they were rusted beyond
recognition. The best find of the day was a
“Black Bear Brand” button, I instantly knew
what it was. With excitement about the find
in a new location I continued to dig. Some
15 minutes later I heard a grunt, I looked up
to see a full grown black bear 20 yards away
walking towards me on the railroad grade. I
stood up, and the dogs ran the bear off, but
I remember thinking the coincidence was
more than astounding. The events of the
day lead me to research Black Bear Brand
again, and that is when I saw the brand had
been revived. I was impressed with how
much research had been done, and that the
company honored the late clothing manu-
facturer in preserving its story, history, and
the designs of the old workwear and but-
tons. I sent an email to the company to in-
form them that I had 4 different designs of
“Black Bear Brand” buttons found in a 1912
logging camp. My email was answered im-
mediately and within a week I was meeting
with brand curator, Josh Sirlin, and photog-
rapher Chad Lyons at my home in Mount
Vernon. We visited and drove up to the log-
ging camp. I was very pleased to see a com-
pany take so much interest, Josh and I share
a passion for early 20th century workwear
and while I was never able to share these
finds with my Grandfather I am so pleased
for this opportunity to tell his story.
Photography by Chad Lyons
