Held annually in conjunction with the Whidbey Island Fair, the Bunyon Busters Log Show on Sunday afternoon is steeped in the logging traditions of the Pacific Northwest.
J.T. Madsen brought the first log show to the fair with Albert Gabelein more than 30 years ago.
The event has been a hit ever since, regularly drawing large crowds eager to see lumberjacks and lumberjills climb 50-foot poles and hack away at logs as quickly as possible.
“This is a tradition for logging communities,” Jim Fox, a log show organizer said. “It originally started out in the Northwest when loggers started competing in someone’s pasture, then prize money started to get involved.”
Nearly 20 contestants, some from longtime South Whidbey families, stepped up to the plate this year to take on numerous logging tasks.
Contests draw on a number of skills, including log rolling, speed sawing, underhand chopping and even overhead axe-throwing. Organizers said the results for overall standings would be announced in September.
Not every aspect of the log show is a competition. Contestant and Sultan native Natalie Amber brought heavy duty toys from her vintage chainsaw business to show off to the crowd, including a two-man chainsaw from the 1940s and a V8 chainsaw she built.
The V8, which she calls the monster truck of chainsaws, uses a 1987 Land Rover engine to power it at high speeds.
The saw cuts through two-foot thick logs in less than 10 seconds.
Amber said the monster of a machine weighs 560 pounds, and needs two bulky people to lift it.
“There used to be rules for the V8 chainsaw that said it requires two men to lift it, but now the rules say that two people are needed to lift it,” Amber said in reference to her proving lumberjacks wrong about being able to lift it.
While Amber brings a nontraditional edge to an iconic contest steeped in culture, going to the fair is all about tradition for this year’s fair parade Grand Marshal Randy Bradley and his wife, co-Grand Marshal Myrna Bradley.
That’s the case for many Whidbey families that make an annual pit stop at the fair, Myrna Bradley said, and it’s part of the reason why fair organizers stick to their guns every year.
“Going to the fair is generational,” she said.
“Parents volunteer and carry it on and teach their kids to keep that tradition going,” she said.
“It was the same when we helped build Community Park — I learned from my parents, Randy learned from his, and I’ve handed that down to my children and I think that’s really important.”
