logger

1. 1. One who logs trees; a lumberjack.
   2. One engaged in the logging business.
2. A machine, such as a crane or tractor, that is used for hauling or loading logs.

The disappearance of America's virgin forests coincides with the appearance of the word logger and the attitude it implies: A tree is just a log waiting to be born. From the very first, the loggers who cut down trees had their critics. The first instance of logger, from 1732, is such a case: "Mr. Byfield's proceedings of which he complained, have so animated the loggers that more waste has been committed this last winter than for many years past." A century later, a character in James Fenimore Cooper's novel The Prairie (1827) complains, "It will not be long before an accursed band of choppers and loggers will be following."

A more charitable view of loggers is offered in a 1734 record from New Hampshire: "Many Towns raising a generall Contribution among the Logers for him."

Logs served many purposes in colonial America. They were the building material of choice for housing (Log Cabin 1770), fencing (log fence 1651, rail fence 1649), transportation (log canoe 1752), and general building (logwork 1721). And the importance of clearing logs for new settlement prompted Logrolling (1792).

One word that surprisingly has nothing to do with the American logger is the older English loggerhead, meaning "a slow-witted person," used by Shakespeare among others. In a thick-headed argument, people are said to be to loggerheads (1680) or at loggerheads (1831).

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: a lumberman who cuts trees into logs after the trees have been felled