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RAMSEY COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY

CREX Workcamps 

List of American Grass Twine employees, 1903 List of American Grass Twine Women Employees 1918 Crex Furniture and Rugs Photos of Harvest Camp near Forest Lake Crex Online Exhibit Home The cover story of the Winter 2006 issue of “Ramsey County History” features: 'The Greatest Single Industry?' Crex: Created Out of Nothing  Below are a few of the many photos that were not in the magazine article.

Everything began in peat bog country near St. Paul. Harvest season started in early July, as carex stricta reached maturity and the bogs began to dry in the summer heat. Harvest crews of transient laborers, supplemented by local men, women, boys and girls, gathered in camps run first by the company and later by independent contractors. They cut the wire grass, dried it in the fields (a job that required all the sheaves to be turned over by workers called “rubberbacks”), piled it, baled it, and hauled it to warehouses where it awaited the call from St. Paul. The following photos are courtesy of Ray Bergerson (unless noted) "Rubberbacks" turning the "flops" of grass Image from Creating New Industries, Minnesota Historical Society   Image from Creating New Industries, Minnesota Historical Society