Chasing the Cat 9 Traditional Cache

In this series, you will join me in my journey of "Chasing the Cat", to see many of the "Catfaced" trees I have discovered in Gulf State Park.  The caches themselves should be pretty easy to find, however the terrain ratings for these caches will very.  Many of them will be easily accessed, however a few will require you to get your feet wet.  Please enjoy the brief history of Catfaced Trees and their purpose below.   If you happen to come across any Cat Faced Trees in the Park that are not on the list, and greater that 520ft from the nearest cache, I would appreciate you sending me a coordinate so I can add it to the series.

Do you see the kitty cat?

In the early decades of the twentieth century, the longleaf pine region was responsible for producing 70 percent of the world's supply of naval stores – the collective name for products such as tar, pitch, spirits of turpentine and rosinobtained from the pine tree.  A century earlier, the dominance of North Carolina in the production of turpentine earned it the title of the Tarheel State (for the black gummy tar that would accumulate on the bare feet of workers).  It was the highly resinous wood (often called fatwood or lightwood) of the longleaf pine tree that made it so desirable and sparked the naval stores industry throughout much of the south.  The term naval stores was originally applied to the pitch and tar needed for caulking wooden ship planks and waterproofing canvas sails of the seagoing vessels of the Royal British Navy in the seventeenth century.  As the industry evolved, the distillation of fatwood shifted to the processing of pine gum (oleoresin) extracted from the living pine tree.  Around 1850, the production of gum turpentine peaked in North Carolina and began to spread southward through the longleaf pine belt as northerly forest were exhausted.  In fact, the movement of many families in the South can be traced the naval stores industry.

An old postcard showing the making of Catfaced Trees.

Gum from the pine tree was distilled into rosin and spirits of turpentine in what has been described by many as an "oversized liquor still".  The collection and processing of pine gum was a year round ordeal and often required a large work force.  Laborers would work their way from tree to tree chipping shallow gutters (called streaks) into the fresh wood of the tree face with a tool called a hack.  This cut face and aluminum gutters nailed to the tree would direct the gum down into a "box" that was notched at the bottom of the tree by a broad axe.  However, these boxes were often very destructive – essentially girdling the tree at its base.  In the early years of the twentieth century, technology improvements allowed gum to be collected in clay or metal cups hung from the tree by a nail.  I have found the remains of several of the metal boxes near some of the cat faced trees in this series of caches. If you find one of these boxes, please do not touch it as they are VERY fragile. The cut faces were sometimes called "catfaces."

The remains of this Catfaced Tree is near
Twin Bridges Trail.  Notice the metal "box"
on the ground below it.

A squad of workers traveled from tree to tree dipping gum from the cups or scraping the gum from the tree face (called scrape) and depositing it into barrels.  When a worker finished his task on a tree, he would sing out a particular name he had chosen for himself.  A talleyman would record this song with a dot.  The number of dots determined a worker's pay.  Barrels of gum were hauled to a nearby distillery and refined.  All operations were overseen by the mounted "wood's rider."

I haven't found any evidence that clay cups like these were use in Gulf State Park.

Key Words and Concepts:

Box Cut:  A term from the turpentine industry.  A cut that was notched into the bottom of a pine tree where gum draining down the tree face collected.

Catface:  A term used by the turpentine industry.  The chevron marks slashed into a tree during the collection of resin (gum, oleoresin) using a tool called a hack.  The slashes resemble cat whiskers and help direct the flow of resin downward.  Bark is removed during the slashing processes creating an open "face" (or wound) on the tree's side.

Caulking:  The process of stuffing material like tar into the cracks of wooden ship planks to stop water leaks.  Caulking essentially "waterproofs" a wooden ship.

Dipping:  A term used by the turpentine industry.  The process whereby, resin (gum) is scraped out of pots affixed to the tree's side or scooped out the box cut at the base of the tree.

Distilling:  A term used by the turpentine industry.  Cooking down gum to yield various products.  Mainly cooking down of gum to yield solid rosin and liquid spirits of turpentine (also called gum spirits).  Distilling is done at a distillery.

Fatwood:  The resin laden wood of longleaf pine.  Known also as lightwood or lighterwood due to the ease it takes to catch on fire.  Used a lot as kindling.

Hack:  A term used by the turpentine industry.  A tool which was used to cut into the inner bark of pine trees, wound the tree and stimulate resin flow (the tree’s defense to the wounding).

Lightwood:  Commonly called fatwood or lighter wood.

Naval stores:  Substances (such as pitch and tar) derived from pine resin that was historically used to waterproof ships and ropes in the British Royal Navy, hence the name.  Later came to be associated with all pine resin products, including turpentine and gum spirits.

Rosin:  Dried resin.  Used for many purposes ranging from cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, paper coatings and even baseball player "stickum".  In country singer, Charlie Daniel's song "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" the character Johnny rosined up his bow in preparation to play his fiddle hard.

Scrape:  The crystallized gum that has collected on the face of a pine tree.  The dried gum was scraped off into a bucket, dumped into a large wooden barrel, transported to a distillery and cooked down.  Sometimes referred to as gum (because of its gummy feel).

Spirits of Turpentine:  see Turpentine

Tally Man:  A term used in the turpentine industry to describe the man in charge of keeping a tally on the number of trees boxed or streaked by each worker.  The number of tallies accrued by a worker was directly related to the money they'd get paid.

Tar:  A term used by the turpentine industry.  The heavier portion produced in the distillation of resin.  When fatwood limbs were cooked down in a fire kiln this was usually produced.  Although tar had a variety of uses, it was most often used in the waterproofing of ships.  Tar was an early product of the naval stores industry.

Turpentine:  A product of the naval stores industry.  A lighter fraction than rosin and is usually vaporized during the distillation process.  Cooling the turpentine steam yields a liquid which is used primarily as a cleaner and paint thinner.  Also called spirits of turpentine.

Wood's Rider:  A term used by the turpentine industry to describe the field superintendent.  This individual usually rode a horse and reported directly to the manager of a turpentine operation.

Reference: http://www.longleafalliance.org/lesson16.html 

I hope you have enjoyed all the geocaches we have placed in Gulf State Park, along with the rest of your experience here  Please consider giving us some feedback here.  We would appreciate it if you would include something about your geocaching experience.  We hope to show the bosses in Montgomery how many people geocache, in hopes that they will encourage other Parks to invest in it like we have, here at Gulf State Park.  Thanks, Dothenumbers.