timber wheels n pl esp PA, MD hist Also called big wheels n pl, carry-log n 1, katydid n B5, log cart n, logging wheels n pl, sulky n 2, timber cart n Cf galamander n, high wheel n
A pair of large wheels connected by an axle under which a log or other heavy object can be suspended for hauling by a team of animals.
1744 PA Gaz. (Philadelphia) 26 Jan [4]/1, [Advt:] Red leather Chairs, large Cart-Boxes fit for Timber Wheels, New England Axes, Womens best Silk Stockings, and sundry other Things very cheap for Ready Money. 1767 Ibid 12 Nov [3]/3, [Advt:] To be sold, . . a new pair of timber wheels with a screw and chains. 1776 in 1912 NC Secy. of State NC Wills 47, Two yoak of Oxen, Two peare of Timber wheels [etc]. 1792 City Gaz. & Daily Advt. (Charleston SC) 23 Jan 1/4, [Advt:] Three pair of very strong timber wheels compleat with iron screws; also several carts, wagons [etc]. 1848 Boston Post (MA) [11 Mar 2]/3 (newspaperarchive.com), A railroad car, containing enormous castings from Reading, . . ran off the track in Philadelphia . . ; it was impossible to get it on the rails again, and the castings had to be placed upon a pair of timber wheels and hauled off to Dock street wharf. 1866 Cincinnati Daily Gaz. (OH) 19 Nov 1/6, The wheels, with the exception of the broad “timber wheels,” such as are used in carrying boilers and immense stones, will all run on iron tracks. 1877 Chester Daily Times (PA) 20 Oct 1/4, Thomas Sharpless of Edgmont was severely injured on Wednesday by being thrown from timber wheels. 1894 Scribner’s Mag. 15.561 LA, A man pressed close to the side of the halted buggy, to avoid a huge telegraph pole that came by quivering between two timber wheels. 1903 Denton Jrl. (MD) 24 Oct [2]/3 (newspaperarchive.com), [Advt:] Farm Machinery, &c. . . One pair of Timber Wheels. One pair of Front Wheels for Timber Cart. 1929 Ibid 26 Jan 5/1, He had loaded two logs on timber wheels . . , when his feet became entangled in some brush. 1938 Chester Times (PA) 15 Jan 17/2, [Advt:] Two pairs timber wheels, hay baler, spraying outfit [etc]. 1952 Denton Jrl. (MD) 4 Apr 9/5, [Advt:] Rope harness, chain harness, 1 set light timber wheels. 1983 ME Hist. Soc. Qrly. 24.199 (as of c1840), Timber rafts were brought ashore above the Aroostook Falls near the present boundary. They were loaded on timber wheels to be carried to the flats below the falls. There, at the sorting works, the rafts were reassembled and floated to Fredericton [New Brunswick].