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by Nils Rosdahl

My first summer out of high school (age 18) I worked for the Forest Service in Noxon. The job for our team was to work on building a trail over a mountain ridge into the wilderness area of Wanless Lake.

A crew of about 15 of us hiked into the lake area and set up a camp with tents and trail-working supplies. A designated cook would make the meals, but firewood had to be cut to cook them.

That was the job of my friend Bruce and I. We had a stack of 18-inch rounds cut from logs and 24-inch bases to set them on to vertically chop them with our axes into firewood pieces.

No one told me that when I got the axe stuck into the top part of a piece that it was dangerous to lift the axe with the piece stuck to it and slam it to the base.

Uh, oh. When I did swing it hard vertically, it went through the piece and into my foot. But it didn't hurt, and I continued to chop my pile until I noticed my boot was loose. I thought it had become untied.

But when I knelt down to it I saw my whole foot was covered with blood.

"Hey, Bruce. I think I cut my foot."

He looked at it and fainted. Really.

We had a medic-related guy on the team, and he checked my injured foot and said it was a very deep cut and had to be repaired soon.

They radioed for a helicopter to come get me and fly me to the hospital in Sandpoint. Ironically, at the same time another worker had a bad appendicitis and needed to be flown out also.

And, more ironically, his name was Neil Rose.

The receiver of the radio message heard the names and thought there was just one of us and sent a helicopter that just seated one person next to the pilot. When it arrived and landed and they saw there were two of us, they put Neil next to the pilot and put me to hang from a sling on the outside. But Neil started to puke in the helicopter cabin so they put me inside and him in the sling.

It was about a half-hour ride, and both of us were "fixed" at the hospital. My cut, in the instep of my left foot, was very deep and needed repair deep at the bone and on the surface with stitches in the skin. But I was okay.

Ironically, the next day a Forest Service guy stationed on a nearby lookout tower cut his hand badly and had to be helicoptered out. More ironically, his name was Nelson Rosenthal. That really confused the flight arrangers.

And, more ironically, many years later the three N.R.s all lived in Coeur d'Alene.

Now a footnote: pun intended.

Last week I was at The Porch restaurant in Hayden when Jack Beebe, a Realtor I have known 40 years, said that he first knew of me 58 years ago when I cut my foot, and his parents, John and Merle Beebe (he was the Forest Supervisor) felt sorry for me and had me stay at their house in Sandpoint.

Man, that was ironic timing to tell me that story.

Nils Rosdahl now lives in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.