Creswell tree-trimmer at the pinnacle.

Byline: Profile by The Register-Guard

Name: Max Mullikin, 30, Creswell.

Claim to fame: Mullikin, who runs a tree-trimming crew for the Emerald People's Utility District, has won first place, two years running, in the tree trimmer's overall competition at the Montana Lineman's Rodeo. He also took first place in the overall competition at the Pacific Northwest Lineman's Rodeo in Portland last summer. Competitors in the linemen's tree-trimmers contest face off in five events - inline swing, four-star swing, hurt man rescue, tree falling and a mystery event - with the best overall score taking first place.

"They were crazy": Working at a gas station in his hometown about a decade ago, the 1991 Creswell High School graduate had a regular customer who owned a utility tree service based in Eureka, Calif. The man hired him as a groundsman, and Mullikin was able to make twice the money. He would clean up brush, send saws and other tools up to the tree trimmers who were climbing utility poles and cutting away limbs from power lines. But he had no desire to become one of them. "I'd watch those guys swing around and I had no idea how much damage a power line could do." And he didn't want to find out. "I thought they were crazy," Mullikin says.

Your turn: About 18 months into the job, Mullikin's boss told him it was time to climb a tree and move up, literally, in the company. They chose an apple tree. "All I had to do was go up there and cut down a couple of limbs," Mullikin remembers. Might look easy, but it's not. Besides getting the hang of working the belt you wrap around and move up the tree, it takes some getting used to the special spurs linemen wear to climb a tree or a pole. Those spurs can lose their grip, causing a bad fall. "If your spurs don't go into the tree, it's called `kickin' out,' ' he said. "It can really ruin a guy's weekend." Mullikin made it up that apple tree about 10 feet, but couldn't get situated to cut the limbs off. So his boss quickly shimmied up and did it for him.

One of the best: After that humiliating experience, though, Mullikin quickly got the hang of it, and now he's one of the best, sometimes climbing up Douglas firs as far as 140 feet into the sky. And it doesn't hurt that he is now a hulk of a man. The kid who stood only 5-foot-1 and weighed 98 pounds when he tried out for wrestling his freshman year in high school, is now just a shade under 6-foot-2 and weighs 215 pounds. "I enjoy doing physical stuff so this is the perfect job for me," says Mullikin, who was hired by EPUD three years ago.

A new necklace? Besides a handsome plaque, Mullikin also received a beautiful silver belt buckle the size of a small kitchen appliance for his most recent championship in Montana. OK, it's not that large, but it would make a nice paperweight. "I was thinking of putting it on a gold chain and wearing it around my neck," he joked.

- Mark Baker

If you know someone who would make a great subject for a Register-Guard Profile, send it to Jim Murez at jmurez@ guardnet.com or P.O. Box 10188, Eugene OR 97440.

CAPTION(S):

Max Mulliken, a tree-trimmer for Emerald People's Utility District, was the overall champion at a lineman rodeo in Montana.