I am an ex Logger retired from the Pacific Northwest area of the states.We used the term muleskinner at the turn of the century to describe the many mule drivers which were used for the mule teams which skidded the logs from the woods to the landings. Since horse and Oxen logging is the oldest form of logging up to and into the industrial age, it became standard to call a mule driver a mule skinner. In logging terms an oxen herder was a bull whacker as they were the most docile and the most stubborn animal to work with. The loggers would sometimes have to get up on their backs and walk on them with their Caulked boots (cork Boots in logging terms) just to get them to move.

Over the many years I worked as a logger I was told I don't know how many times that the term Mule skinner came from the Pacific Northwest loggers and refered to the stringy bark which was drug off the Redwood and Cedar trees up here and became deposited in the skid roads. Because it looked so much like the hide of a mule, the mule herders, became known as Muleskinners.

The term Captain refers to the shift leader of a logging crew in the woods or in a mill. In logging there are variuos names for people which have been lost to history, among them River Pigs which was a name for the log raft and log herders on the large rivers here In the Pacific Northwest. They were ultamitly lead by a Hog Boss who suervised them.

Some where I read where someone said the term Mule skinner came from the term Cat Skinner which is a term we use to describe a Caterpillar Operator. The term Cat skinner came from Muleskinner when the Cats began to replace the horse drawn teams as skidders. I was a Cat Skinner in the woods and I go by the nick name muleskinner as I am a model builder of the equipment of the turn of the century logging industry.

Now heres the kicker, the term mule skinner came from the civil war when they used teams of horses and wagons to haul good which were nessasay to the war effort. The officer in charge was usually a CAPTAIN and that is where the term Captain came from. It is related to the Blacks because a number of these teams from the Northern Army usually had run away slaves or northern black inlistees driving these wagons. The officer was of course white and was addressed as Captain by the drovers , in accordance with military regulations, which they the drovers fell under, being in the military or not.