[ALW Hiker]

We visited Sunday Lake yesterday for the first time - fun trip! On the way back we noticed the old logging (or mining) camp just south of the creek ford. Not sure how we missed it on the way in, as all the rusting barrels are like 15' off the trail. Anyway, there is a lot of old stuff there but these two vehicles seemed pretty interesting to me. Can anyone provide a positive identification? This appears to be a tracked trailer of some sort. It has a hitch on the back and a trailer tongue on the front.

This one appears to be a pickup truck or utility truck. It has a fold-down front windshield and apparently mounts for spare tires behind the front doors on both sides.

[catsp]

Athey Truss Wheel Company Crawler Wagon

[catsp]

1941 Dodge WC-6 Command Car Though not the exact model. Dash board matches up on this one: 1942 Dodge WC-23 Command Car

[Seventy2002]

The utility vehicle looks like a Dodge WC-6 or variant.

[Dick B]

Good catch on the command car. The spare tire location seems to be a giveaway. Also the posted speed on the dash would likely make it a military vehicle. I drove a 3/4 Dodge truck for a mortar squad in Germany in the late 50s/early 60s. I seem to remember that the posted speed for that vehicle was 35 MPH, Imagine driving on the autobahn at that speed. Most of the travels were in multivehicle convoys so no big deal. Sure took a long time to get from A to B tho. I also got to drive a jeep for the platoon leader and company commander toward the end of my tour. That was more fun except in the cold and rain since they were never covered. That was not much fun.

[ALW Hiker]

Awesome info, thanks everyone! It's really fun to see pictures of what the vehicles would have looked like in proper working condition. I learned two new terms - "crawler wagon" and "command car". They certainly seem like good vehicles to have on poor roads in the middle of the forest. We figured both vehicles were probably WWII surplus.

[Waterman]

The most I ever find is old logging cables and rusty metal. Way cool find.

[hunterofelke]

My guess that equipment was left at the timber sale site over the winter and the bridge washed out. When that happened I don't know, maybe the '50's. Funny thing I found on the King County Assessor site was a planned route for the Sunday Creek road and it went all the way to the logging roads on Rooster.

[ALW Hiker]

It's pretty bizarre that the King County GIS still has the entire Sunday Creek road in the system going up and over to Quartz Creek, even though it wasn't actually built. If you look closely, the route where they show the road passing over the ridge makes no sense - it goes straight up a steep talus slope on the south side of Rooster Mountain, and then straight down cliffs on the north face with nary a switchback to be seen. In their Alpine Lakes Wilderness guide, Barnes & Barnes say that the Sunday Lake Trail existed at least as far back as the 1920s but only went to the north end of the lake. Then in 1953, a mining claim was filed south of the lake called the "Loch Katrine Lodes", and extended the trail south of the lake to near the location of the cabin discussed earlier in this thread. The guide also says some roads were built around the same time (1950s), and the loggers came in afterwards. No firm detail is provided about exactly how far the roads went or where they were located, though it is implied they did go up to that confluence area where the cabin is located. I sure didn't see anything along the west side of the lake, or south of it that looked like a road cut, so I'm a bit skeptical. The 1960 and 1980 Forest Service maps show the trail going to the cabin but don't show any roads past the current creek ford. However, the 1980 map says "4WD" on the trail south of the ford, so presumably the bridge over the creek was still in then, or there was a passable road ford. There is a lot of interesting history out there, it's fun to try and dig through it. I found this 1953 map of the Loch Katrine Lodes (among others). When I have a chance I might try to overlay it onto a current map - it shows some roads and a bunkhouse, among other things.