FORKS — So you want to be a logger?
According to Richard Halverson, this year’s Hickory Shirt/Heritage Days Pioneer Logger Award recipient, stand in a 50-degree shower for four hours, eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich — which you have had in your pocket — and then stand in the cold shower for another four hours. If you like that, then come back the next day and you, too, can be a logger.
Halverson, 74, was given the award by the West End Business & Professional Association on Wednesday.
The Hickory Shirt/Heritage Days festival continues through Sunday.
Halverson was born in Forks and, after graduating from high school, spent some time in the Army. His first job in the woods was with Edward’s and Rhyne Logging Co.
Halverson, who most people know as “Squat,” started out setting chokers, but while working in the cold rain, he noticed that the guys operating the machines had it way better.
So it wasn’t long before he learned to run a yarder and log loader.
His next job lasted 35 years with Dahlgren Logging of Forks.
Halverson said his most interesting experience of his logging career was when Dahlgren’s packed up and moved their operations to Mount St. Helens in 1981, soon after the mountain’s big eruption on May 18, 1980.
Halverson remembers the area like a moonscape on one side and the regular lush green forest on the other.
“We salvaged timber for about three years, working in the ash. We were there long enough to see the plants, like dandelions and other small weeds, start to come back. Even the elk started to return,” Halverson said.
Halverson has “retired” multiple times, the first time from Dahlgren’s in 2000. He then got a call from Dean Hurn of Hoh River Timber, and returned to loading logs for another 10 years. He most recently retired from working for Randy Parker, helping with road building and other tasks as needed.
The need for a new ankle finally retired him for good but it didn’t slow him down much.
Since his most recent retirement, Halverson has taken to volunteering as one of the Forks Chamber of Commerce’s Logging and Mill Tour guides.
Halverson has plenty of stories to share with those that take the long-running tours that tell the story of the timber and mill industry in the West End.
“I like to volunteer for the community. I get it from my mom. She was in everything,” Halverson said.
Halverson’s mother was “Halvey,” a long-time 4-H leader, active with the Clallam County Fair and with many other West End organizations.
Halverson said his late wife Andi also liked to volunteer. Halverson lost Andi just this past August.
Halverson was also a Clallam County District 1 fire commissioner for 20 years. He now also serves on the board for the Forks Timber Museum.
Museum director Linda Offutt said, “If we need new picnic tables, or signs at the museum, Richard is there to do it, bam. …We have new picnic tables. We appreciate his help so much.”
Halverson wore his hickory shirt when he recently attended a grandchild’s graduation ceremony at Western Washington University.
“I wanted to show I had graduated with a logging degree,” he said.
For a schedule of Hickory Shirt/Heritage Days activities through Sunday, see today’s Arts & Entertainment section in the Peninsula Daily News.
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Christi Baron is the editor of the Forks Forum, which is part of the Olympic Peninsula News Group, composed of Sound Publishing newspapers Peninsula Daily News, Sequim Gazette and Forks Forum. Reach her at cbaron@forksforum.com.
