In northern Wisconsin, the railroad’s advance in the 1870s opened deep forests to harvest, allowing hardwoods such as maple, oak, spruce, cedar, balsam, birch, and aspen to be cut and shipped more efficiently by rail than by water. This expansion required more men to cut and move timber to the rail lines, and camps grew larger as lumberjacks worked year round. Life in the woods was constantly busy: men rose at 4 o’clock in the morning, readied equipment, horses, and tools, hurried through breakfast, and were in the woods by daylight, with lunch brought out by cook’s helpers before they returned to camp after dark. After a hearty meal and a pipe of tobacco, the day ended in bunkhouses full of tired, snoring loggers. In camp, the cook ranked just behind the foreman in importance, because tasty food in large quantities kept men from grumbling and refusing to work, and a good cook attracted good lumberjacks. Food mattered more to them than money, and although no talking was allowed at the table, men ate as much as they wanted, quickly, creating a deafening clatter as more than 100 men used tin utensils on tin plates and finished their meals in fifteen minutes.