The Big Wheels
These "big wheels" made Michigan logging
a year-round industry.
 Michigan's rough, wet forest terrain made logging
a winter industry in its early years. Loggers used frozen ground and ice roads to skid the
huge logs from the forests to river banks. In spring they slid the logs from those banking
grounds into the rivers for the log drive to the sawmills. Silas C. Overpack made logging
possible in all four seasons when he began manufacturing "big wheels" in his Manistee carriage shop. Big wheels could haul logs without the
need for icy ground.
Overpack sold three sizes of big wheels: nine feet high, nine and one-half feet high
and ten feet high. Unlike a wagon that carries a load above its axle, big wheels carried
logs chained beneath the axle. Big wheels could carry logs from 12 to 100 feet in length
and enough logs to total 1,000 to 2,000 board feet of lumber in a single load. The axles
were manufactured from hard maple, and the 16-foot tongues were made of ironwood. To
protect them from gouging by stumps or trees, the wheels had iron rims, and rings of iron
guarded the spokes. Genuine Overpack wheels were always painted red. (See big wheels at
work in a historic photograph from the
Archives of Michigan.)
Overpack exhibited his big wheels at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. He
shipped them via railroad to other states and foreign countries. The U.S. Army Forestry
Department took several pairs to France during World War I. In Michigan at least 65
different lumber companies used them. The big wheels were part of Michigan logging history
from 1875, when Overpack made his first set, until 1920.
Big wheels were also known as logging wheels, Michigan wheels and bummer carts; one
writer remembered that some loggers called them "katydids." Visitors to the
museum's gallery see a set of big wheels that is 10 feet high. Visitors can also try
pulling a smaller scale model of the big wheels. Big wheels can also be seen at the
Hartwick Pines
Logging Museum near Grayling.
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