Hollyburn Mountain

     Around the turn of the century, number of logging operations had sprung up in the forests of West Vancouver, including small ones in Horeshoe Day and Dundarave. The largest of all though was that of the McNair Fraser Lumber Co., an operation logging in the Hollyburn area. The trees were taken from the logging area down to the foot of 16^th St., where they were subsequently taken to the mill. One of the major challenges was the steep grade of the land, which made the transportation of logs extremely difficult. Originally, horse drawn sleds were used to carry the fallen logs. Yet, work on building a railway began in 1907 and the horse quickly became replaced by the mechanical convenience of the "iron horse". While the conventional train that was originally used would have been fine on flatlands, the steep grades proved to be problem that caused derailment. Reassessing the situation, a solution was devised in the form of a powerful new locomotive design. This train, called the "Walking Dudley", differed from others in the way it pulled itself along the rails on a pair of cables. Yet, while it was more stable than the other trains, it was still a 35-ton machine and was not immune to suffering the indignity of derailment. Eventually, the McNair Fraser Lumber Co. logging operation closed down in late 1917.