RANGELEY — The Rangeley Lakes Region Logging Museum inducted Wendell Steward of Rangeley into the Logger’s Hall of Fame during the Logging Festival on July 27.

Begun in 1985, the Logger’s Hall of Fame honors people who have worked in the woods for a significant part of their lives and who have made valuable contributions to lumbering in the western Maine mountains.

“It’s one of the most important things we do,” said Museum President Emeritus and retired logger Rodney Richard Sr.

Steward joins a join a list of local woodsmen that includes Raymond Vallee, Edwin Lowell, Lewis Abbott, Clem Field, Bud Field, Robert Wilbur, William Spiller and Elijah White Jr.

Born in 1929, Steward began working in the woods as a 9-year-old, cutting white birch with his father, Richard, on their 80-acre Long Pond farm and selling it to the Brackley Wood Turning Mill in Strong.

Steward went on to hold many forest-related jobs. He began working for D.C. Morton in 1945 for 75 cents an hour and stayed for 24 years. From 1952 to 1954, Steward served in the U.S. Army in Germany, France and the Netherlands. Putting his woods skills to work, he ran heavy equipment, including D7 and D8 bulldozers, and taught other men to do the same.

When he returned to Rangeley and D.C. Morton’s, he started in on the same bulldozer he drove before he left. In 1958, he drove the first bulldozer up Saddleback Mountain, carrying supplies for the new forest tower roof and surprising those who said such a bulldozer trip couldn’t be done.

Using a crane, he loaded trucks at Tim Pond, John’s Pond, Dodge Pond, Loon Lake, and other places. One summer to winter season at Chain of Ponds, he loaded 19,000 cords.

For 15 years, he operated a bulldozer on the Dead River drives, pushing piles of pulp wood into the water. “Oh, I’d take my vacation and go down and run that bulldozer,” Steward said. “Every year! I had a lot of fun.”

For several years, he also went down the river picking up the rear: he pushed back into the water those logs that the river had pushed up onto the bank. His wife, Marylyn, packed his lunch, always sandwiches: “Lots of deer meat and fish,” Steward said.

“The drives did the fishing good,” he added, “because there’s worms in those trees. Bud Field, Bill Ross, and I went down to the Big Eddy two weeks after the drive was down at Flagstaff, and we’d catch some of the best fish I ever caught; 10 to 11 inches, too. And I’ve caught salmon out of that river, this side of Fansanger Falls.”

Careful woods work also trained Steward to notice the animal life around him. Like a naturalist, he can point out the foot-wide steam hole a hibernating bear makes in the snow, and he knows how to care for wild animals that need his help.

In addition to woods work, Steward bought his own P&H crane and, with Ray Magno of Farmington, he tore down buildings all over the region. He also put in water line in Phillips and did work on Saddleback.

Steward worked at the Redington Navy Base on nights and weekends for 23 years, then full-time for two years. For 20 years until his retirement in 1994, he served as road foreman for Rangeley.

Steward’s family includes seven living siblings; his wife, Marylyn; their children, Brad, Wendelyn, Melissa and Corey; and their grandson Cody.

The public is invited to view the Logger’s Hall of Fame plaque at the Rangeley Lakes Region Logging Museum, 221 Stratton Road, 864-3939, open 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays through Labor Day, or by appointment (864-5551). For more information, visit www.rlrlm.org.