South Fox logging and winter ice crossing in a 1964 local reminiscence

Summary

A Beaver Beacon reminiscence says timber was being cut on South Fox Island and recounts Johnny Malloy’s claimed winter crossing toward Beaver Island. It preserves local memory, not a contemporaneous event date.

Evidence and limits

The held source was published or indexed on 1964-01. It is the basis for this record; notices, retrospective columns, and schedules are not treated as proof of later outcomes.

the story is positive and points out the fact that love often times drives a man to action that under normal circumstances, he would never think of. Johnny Malloy was a big strapping lad in his early twenties and very much in love with an Island girl. Because of his size, Johnny had acquired the nickname of Johnny Buffalo. He was built like a pine stump and not an ounce of fat on him. He was a good man in the woods and timber was being cut on South Fox Island, so early in the fall, Johnny sailed to the Foxes to work. The work was hard and the days were long. On clear days he could easily see the head of Beaver Island, where his Irish lass was. A logging camp is a lonely place for a young lad and Johnny had made up his mind that when the ice made, he was going to bridge that gap. Winter was coming on with ice forming along the shore, and each day freezing out just a little further. Currents between t

Open questions

• Can an original agency, vessel, land, lighthouse, or personnel record confirm the details and identify unnamed people or equipment?
• Does another contemporaneous source establish an exact location, duration, or outcome beyond this report?

See also

• Beaver Island archipelago
• South Fox Island
• Lumbering
• Shipping and navigation