Bill Jay is great, but the thread seems to have veered ... I had to walk through 15 miles of burning Wisconsin wilderness to get to the 1 room schoolhouse, and it was 16 miles back home, cause the planet had moved on, where I had to split the evenings wood with my bare hands, we couldn't afford those namby-pamby splitting wedges and sledges. Bunch a wooses.
On a slightly more factual note, cutting and splitting wood is greatly enhanced by the fact that the main heating system is gas, delivered as needed through a pipe, rendering the manly arts what they truely are, a hobby. One, I actually enjoy.
As to bears and indians, like a lot of art, depends on who was running the chain saw, or how lucky they were that day.