Who was Pat Bayle? And why was a forest named after him?

 

The Pat Bayle State Forest is a state forest located near the town of Grand Marais in Cook County, Minnesota. The forest falls within the limits of the Superior National Forest and is under the federal jurisdiction of the United States Forest Service.

Within the forest, one can find the highest point of elevation in the state of Minnesota, Eagle Mountain. In addition to hiking, winter outdoor recreational activities are popular, including snowmobiling, snowshoeing, dog sledding, and ice-fishing.

But who was Pat Bayle, better known locally as Paddy Bayle, to have a State Forest named after him?

Patrick J. Bayle was born in Newcastle, New Brunswick, of Irish ancestry, and died in 1954 at the age of 77 in Grand Marais. His first job was working in the “spool mills” of Newcastle, making spools that were used in Scotland’s spinning mills. According to an article in the August 5, 1940, Minneapolis Times-Tribune by Vivian Thorp, Paddy had worked for 10 years “from sawdust to supervisor” and it was an overstocked market that caused the mills in Newcastle to close down.

Without a job, he went to an uncle in Ontario who was a “walking boss” in the Miramichi Lumber Company and started working in the woods as an “undercutter”- the man who made the first cut, determining where the tree would fall. He earned just $15 per month! Paddy next found himself working on the railroad roundhouse in Superior, Wisconsin until he was injured. Next, he worked to deepen the St. Louis River and as a “white water man” who retrieved logs in the white-water rapids. “I liked it, and after I quit, my feet itched to get on a log for four summers. There’s nothing in the world so exciting as a log drive!” Paddy had two brothers, John and George, and George eventually joined him in Grand Marais.

In 1912 Paddy took the State of Minnesota Forest Service exam and was assigned the duties of the forest patrol (ranger) where he and one other made up the entire forestry patrol for what is now the Superior National Forest in Minnesota! Paddy served as a Forest Ranger for 27 years. Charlie Taylor was the first ranger and preceded Bayle into the service. Later on, Charlie also preceded Paddy as Sheriff of Cook County. At Charlie’s death, Paddy was drafted to succeed him as sheriff and remained in that position for 8 years.

The ranger job included opening up forestry trails, building lookout towers, and stringing telephone lines. The labors of both Paddy and Charlie made camping, canoeing, and hiking in the Superior National Forest a possibility.