The Willamette steam donkey engine, called “a locomotive without wheels,” was fueled by wood or oil to generate steam that turned cable-spooled drums used in logging. Cables eight thousand to twelve thousand feet long were common, and because the choke setter, or choker, usually was not in sight of the operator, or donkey puncher, a line from the engine’s steam whistle was run to the choker’s vicinity, as far as one and a half miles away. A whistle punk, often a young lad, relayed the choker’s verbal instructions and warnings to the donkey puncher by yanking the whistle line in a simple code. Those shrill signals prompted the puncher to rewind the cable, skidding logs to the engine’s location. In 1958, this three-spool Willamette was skidded out from Hobo Creek, loaded onto a lowboy, and brought to town by Robinson Brothers Logging Company. At one time at least twenty donkeys worked in the Marble Creek country, and at least one still remains abandoned at Cornwall.