Edge Card: sawdust in his veins

By Julie Druker

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Edge Card of Card Lumber with the mill he designed, built and patented.

Recently, 87-year-old Caleb Edgerton Card spent five happy hours milling butternut lumber at Card Lumber, located at 2156 Highway 38 near Kingston. Edge Card built the business from the ground up with a sawmill he designed, built by hand and patented many years ago now.

Lumber has been in the Card family for generations and Edge happily states, “Most people have blood in their veins but the Cards have sawdust in theirs.”

Born in Alberta in 1921, Card left the prairies, where he recalled, ’”Nobody had any money, none at all. People used old apple boxes for chairs and tables.”

Edge had a number of jobs before he finally settled into the lumber trade.

His first job was washing airplanes at Fleet Aircraft in Fort Erie, ON. He recalled, “I had enough instinct to know that I had to pick up a trade of some sort.” So he took up welding and for 2 years built Fleet 16s, a small biplane used for training men going off to war.

Next and “for no particular good reason” Card joined the Royal Air Force in Montreal,

where he ultimately worked as a radio engineer. He also had the chance to work on Winston Churchill’s airplane when he was there.

When WW2 ended Edge recalled, “That was it, I just walked off the job; I’d had enough. They really worked us hard there.”

Edge ended up in this part of Ontario at the end of the war and settled into the family business, the lumber trade. He rented his first mill and then set up and worked in a number of mills in the Lanark and Frontenac counties.

“The family had been making lumber for generations so I just naturally fell into it.”

The first sawmill Edge built and ran was a smaller version but similar in design to the one that now exists at Card Lumber.

The first version was located in Snow Road Station and Edge ran it for 15 years. But when the old Kingston/Pembroke railway quit running and when Highway 509 was rerouted away from the Snow Road mill, his business was negatively affected, so Edge decided he had no choice but to relocate. He recalled, “I was like a needle lost in a haystack.”

He moved south to where Card Lumber now resides at 2156 Highway 38 between Harrowsmith and Kingston.

It was at this new location that Edge elaborated on the principles of the Snow Road sawmill. The seeds of innovation had long ago been planted in his mind by his father, who also worked in the lumber business.

Edge applied the same innovative ideas, design features and practical applications to the Card Lumber sawmill, which allowed him to saw lumber more efficiently and with less waste.

Within a year, and with the help of John Schonauer, the Card Lumber sawmill was built. Its principal design has since been patented both in the United States and Canada.

Edge explains in layman’s terms the basic innovations of this very impressive and imposing machine.

The first innovation is in the blade used to cut boards from the log. It is not the usual circular saw blade but a much thinner, enormous band saw blade that saves 20% of the wood being cut - wood that otherwise would be wasted in sawdust.

The second innovation is in the system of conveyor belts, a closed loop system that automatically sends the cut log back to the blade to be re-cut.

The conveyor system, together with the angle of the rollers, enables the mill to cut logs continuously rather than intermittently, as is the case in circular saw mills.

Located in the large building behind the main office at Card Lumber, the sawmill is a sight to behold. It has the look and feel of a time gone by: an ancient, roller coaster-like contraption, consisting of heavy darkened wood, huge metal rollers, systems of chains and pulleys and one huge metal blade glinting in the sun that creeps through the small, low windows and casts Rembrandtesque light on this aged man and this incredible machine, born first from his mind and made by his own hands.

Edge and his son-in-law Peter decided to start up the mill to give me a first hand look at how the mill operates. They passed a number of logs through the system, demonstrating its innovative workings.

The mill impresses even more when it’s in motion and one can instantly see the results as it precisely and efficiently cuts logs into perfect boards one after another.

Edge’s daughter Norma and her husband Peter have been running the business now for a number of years. Peter was new to the lumber trade before taking over the business and admits, “Edge has taught me everything I know.”

Edge and I continue the tour of the mill and the last place we visit is the kiln shed where towers of boards are stacked 40 ft high and the air is infused with moisture and the pleasant smell of lumber.

Back at Edge’s home he tries to relocate the cat he has recently been given by one of his granddaughters. Edge’s wife of 67 years, Edith, recently passed away this October after a battle with cancer and the freshness of his loss is evident.

Edge states, “I haven’t named the cat yet, but she has quite a personality”. She is not the only one. A good match for Edge.