Seboomook Lake and Saint John Railroad
The Seboomook Lake and Saint John Railroad was a forest railway built to transfer pulpwood between drainage basins in the Maine North Woods. The railroad was built slowly in preparation for anticipated pulpwood harvesting, but onset of the Great Depression caused the railroad to be dismantled when harvesting plans were delayed. History Spruce forests of the Maine North Woods were a source of pulpwood through the 20th century. Trees were bucked into lengths and loaded onto sleds towed by draft animals or log haulers to the nearest river or lake. Log drives would float the pulpwood logs to a downstream paper mill when the snow and ice melted. Pulpwood growing in the upper Saint John River drainage was destined for Great Northern Paper Company's Millinocket mill on the West Branch Penobscot River. The problem was getting the pulpwood out of the north-flowing Saint John River into the east-flowing Penobscot River. An rail route from Fifth Saint John Pond to the Penobscot River at Seboomook Lake was surveyed in 1910 after Great Northern Paper Company acquired forest lands along the Baker Branch Saint John River. Construction delayed by World War I began in the summer of 1919. of right of way