Tony D. James, president of Tony D. James Logging, Inc., was named Logger of the Year by the Louisiana Loggers Association, during the annual membership banquet meeting of the Association and Self Insured Fund during opening of the annual Louis iana Forest Festival in Winnfield April 26.

The award was presented by Loggers Association representative Bobby Erskins, based on the James Logging operation' s outstanding operation during the past year. His was one of the group who also received special certificates for operating without any time-loss accidents during the 2001 year.

James' home and logging operation are based in the Gaar's Mill community east of Dodson, where he grew up. He began logging with his own skidder 16 years ago, and has been contracting for 14 years. James credits his crew, most of whom have been with him for most of his career as a contractor, with loyal service and praised them for their contribution to the safety record and successful business operations.

The James logging company works exclusively for Weyerhaeuser (formerly Willamette Industries), primarily on company forest lands in North Louisiana. The group operates with a six-m an woods crew, and five truck drivers. James' brother, Lynn, is a contract trucker who also hauls for the James corporation.

Tony has one son, Brent, 15. Tony's hobby, which he pursues on weekends, is dirt-track car racing. He competes on tracks at Chatha m, and at Champion Park Speedway in Minden. His racing is "mostly for recreation" Tony says, but he does win enough to pay expenses.

Proving that "the Boss" still knows how to handle the woods work, on Saturday during the Forest Festival, Tony entered the Scott Equipment Company loader contest. One of the early entries, he scored a time of 48 seconds, which was good enough to start out at first place, then dropped to second, then third, and finally out of the money at fourth, as operators kept coming and i mproving the time. About 30 other "also-rans" had times which went as high as three-plus minutes, for moving and stacking a pyramid pile of six logs, using the Prentice 280 loader.

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