Paul Bunyan, U.P. Lumberjack

Dear George,

Growing up on the Menominee River, we were well aware of the lore of the nineteenth century logging industry in our region.  The best-known legends, of course, were about Paul Bunyan who roamed Northern Michigan and Wisconsin.  Here are some of the Paul Bunyan tales, set to poetry.

Love,

Dave

The Ballad of Paul Bunyan

The most famous figure in my home town

Was Paul Bunyan, the North’s lumberjack

He dug the Menominee River

He could level ten pines with one whack

Paul Bunyan was born in Menominee County

He weighed over two hundred pounds 

It took eight storks to deliver him

Six wet-nurses made daily rounds

Each time baby Paul rolled over in his sleep

He would flatten an acre of trees

His parents built a raft in the midst of Green Bay

But Oconto would flood when he’d sneeze

As a child Paul Bunyan was not only strong

He was faster than a lightning arc

He could turn off his light and leap into bed

Before his room even got dark

Paul found a blue ox in a snowdrift

Took him home and young Babe grew so fast

A crow took an hour to fly twixt Babe’s horns

When he burped, buildings crumbled from the blast

Babe could pull anything Paul asked of him

For example, their crooked logging road

Babe pulled on that road till it straightened out

And that new road carried ten times the load

Babe was in need of a watering hole

Paul Bunyan dug a hole with his axe

Today it’s the Lake called Superior

Pictured Rocks were formed by Babe’s tracks

Paul and Babe took a hike through Minnesota

Their footprints in the earth were so big

Those depressions became the 10,000 lakes

And Babe drank them up in one swig

A log jam blocked the Menominee River

Paul poked Babe’s derriere with a spear

Babe swished his tail and broke up the jam 

And the river stayed clear for a year

The axe men in Paul’s camp were seven feet tall

And each had the same name of Sven

When Paul called out “Sven” the whole crew came running

Dragging sled-loads of logs from the glen

Sourdough Sam made pancakes at their camp 

His griddle covered thirteen full acres

Twenty-five men with bacon on their feet

Greased that griddle to help out the bakers

Paul Bunyan enjoyed a pipe after dinner

And he blew his smoke far away

It floated westward over the hills

Creating the smog in L.A.  

The winter of ’07 was so brutally cold

The axe men’s words froze in mid-air 

Those words remained frozen until the spring thaw

Then they heard melting chatter everywhere

No one is certain where Paul is today

Some think he is at the North Pole
They say he returns to the U.P. each May

Bringing Babe for a leisurely stroll