W. B. BARTON LUMBER COMPANY
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Josephine County - Cave Junction
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June 12, 1941: "Monday morning, W. B. Barton, who owns 18,000 acres of timber, cruising about 340 million feet, started construction of a saw mill on land leased from M. B. Rexford, just across the Illinois river bridge at Cave Junction. Barton leased the entire corner where the Takilma road comes into the Redwood highway.
Construction of the mill and its operation is under the management of B. H. Barton, brother of W. B. The mill was trucked from Washington and is practically all on the ground and a crew of men are putting up the necessary ground work and structure for the mill proper. There are seven men on the job at present. When the mill is completed, Mr. Barton said he would use nine men at each shift and would run two shifts a day if the necessary help could be procured.
The new mill will cut 20,000 feet a shift and most of the lumber will be 2x4's with some inch board from sugar pine. There is another mill going up for Mr. Barton near Kerby, about nine miles out and Mr. Roberts is the foreman on this job.
The lumber from the mill will be trucked to Grants Pass where the Clark & Barton Lumber company have erected a planing mill that is now all ready to operate and the lumber will be planed at this mill.
Mr. Barton plans to have five mills running in the valley before long." (Illinois Valley News)
Construction of the mill and its operation is under the management of B. H. Barton, brother of W. B. The mill was trucked from Washington and is practically all on the ground and a crew of men are putting up the necessary ground work and structure for the mill proper. There are seven men on the job at present. When the mill is completed, Mr. Barton said he would use nine men at each shift and would run two shifts a day if the necessary help could be procured.
The new mill will cut 20,000 feet a shift and most of the lumber will be 2x4's with some inch board from sugar pine. There is another mill going up for Mr. Barton near Kerby, about nine miles out and Mr. Roberts is the foreman on this job.
The lumber from the mill will be trucked to Grants Pass where the Clark & Barton Lumber company have erected a planing mill that is now all ready to operate and the lumber will be planed at this mill.
Mr. Barton plans to have five mills running in the valley before long." (Illinois Valley News)
October 30, 1941: "Starting last Monday night, the W. H. Barton Lumber company put on another shift and is now operating two crews on the mill across the Illinois Valley river near Cave Junction.
The new shift takes 12 additional men at the mill besides more logging equipment and men in the forests. This makes 25 men at work in Mill No. 1, 12 men at each shift and a night watchman, besides a large number in the forests and truck drivers.
Mill No. 1 is building a large derrick and B. H. Barton, superintendent at the mill, plans on stock piling enough logs to keep the mill busy this winter when logging operations will be shut down on account of the weather and roads. The derrick will pile the logs 30 feet high in a stock pile adjacent to the mill pond, where they can be taken from the stock pile and easily duped into the mill pond for use at the mill.
Mill No. 2 near O'Brien, put steam in the boilers for the first time this week, and they expect to start cutting lumber immediately for constructing the remainder of the shed over the mill, after which they will start on regular cutting of orders. The new mill will take an additional 10 or 12 men, and when the mill gets thoroughly broken in, the company plans on putting two shifts to work at this mill.
The Barton Lumber company is cutting their own timber and have enough to last several years." (Illinois Valley News)
The new shift takes 12 additional men at the mill besides more logging equipment and men in the forests. This makes 25 men at work in Mill No. 1, 12 men at each shift and a night watchman, besides a large number in the forests and truck drivers.
Mill No. 1 is building a large derrick and B. H. Barton, superintendent at the mill, plans on stock piling enough logs to keep the mill busy this winter when logging operations will be shut down on account of the weather and roads. The derrick will pile the logs 30 feet high in a stock pile adjacent to the mill pond, where they can be taken from the stock pile and easily duped into the mill pond for use at the mill.
Mill No. 2 near O'Brien, put steam in the boilers for the first time this week, and they expect to start cutting lumber immediately for constructing the remainder of the shed over the mill, after which they will start on regular cutting of orders. The new mill will take an additional 10 or 12 men, and when the mill gets thoroughly broken in, the company plans on putting two shifts to work at this mill.
The Barton Lumber company is cutting their own timber and have enough to last several years." (Illinois Valley News)
January 15, 1942: "With the important information given out that the Medford cantonment will be constructed immediately, came the ews that the lumber mills of the valley will start immediately on lumber orders for the government.
W. B. Barton Mill Bo. 1, has been in continuous production, and Mill No. 2 at O'Brien was scheduled to start this week. Mr. Barton has received a large order for the new cantonment. Mill No. 1 has had 13 men on the pay roll all the time, and by the first of February expect to start a second shift. Mill No. 2, when operating to capacity, will also put on a second shift, so we were informed." (Illinois Valley News)
W. B. Barton Mill Bo. 1, has been in continuous production, and Mill No. 2 at O'Brien was scheduled to start this week. Mr. Barton has received a large order for the new cantonment. Mill No. 1 has had 13 men on the pay roll all the time, and by the first of February expect to start a second shift. Mill No. 2, when operating to capacity, will also put on a second shift, so we were informed." (Illinois Valley News)
January 15, 1942: "B. H. Barton, superintendent of the Barton Lumber Mill No. 1, at Cave Junction, with Mr. and Mrs. R. Z. Tucker came home last Friday after spending a month visiting friends and relatives in Arkansas. Dwynne Fitzgerald was in charge of the mill during Mr. Barton's absence." (Illinois Valley News)
January 29, 1942: "B. H. Barton, superintendent of the Barton Mill No. 1 was taken down with an attack of the flu this week and is confined to his home in Kerby." (Illinois Valley News)
February 11, 1943: "Barton Mill No. 1 is about completely dismantled and is being erected near the Barton Mill No. 2, south of O'Brien. Mr. Barton is putting the mill in extra good shape and expects to have the mill operating about the first of March." (Illinois Valley News)
April 8, 1943: "W. C. Wieland was dismissed from the Josephine General hospital this week where he was taken several days ago due to a leg injury sustained while working at the Barton mill." (Illinois Valley News)
August 26, 1943: "Wednesday morning at 11:55, Lee J. Watson, a resident of Grants Pass, but since last January a member of the W. B. Barton Lumber company's logging crew, was instantly killed when the 'cat' he was driving on a steep hill, turned over and crushed him to death.
Art Kellert, logging superintendent for the Barton company, was just cleaning up the tract preparatory to moving, and Watson was on his last trip, when the accident happened. Mr. Kellert was not at the scene of the accident but was called and arrived a few minutes after. Viewing the scene of the tragedy, we believe the accident was a freak and probably would not happen again like it did in a hundred years.
Watson was coming down the hill with a drag of logs behind him. The boys who were at the bottom of the hill watching him come down say that the 'cat' turned sideways just a little enough to make it slide. Watson must have felt that the cat was going over, for it seemed he hesitated a second on which way to jump, then as the machine started to turn over, he elected to jump down hill, and the boys say he must have jumped 20 feet n the air trying to clear himself from the cat. He was picking himself up to jump again as the cat struck him and pinned him down and then pulled him on down the hill to the bottom where the cat rested right side up with the motor still running and Watson underneath the steel runners of the machine. He had put the machine out of gear before he jumped.
The scene of the accident was near the California state line, back in the woods about a mile and a half.
The boys who witnessed the accident were: Leslie Henry, Don L. Bearsdorf, Joe Brown and Joe solvers, who was hid choker setter, but the latter was up the hill and could not see as well as the boys at the bottom.
C. L.own of the Oregon State Accident Commission, safety department, had just completed an inspection of the camp Tuesday, and reported everything in excellent condition, complementing Superintendent Kellert for the condition of the material. After the accident he arrived there and again said the equipment was in first class condition, and there was no carelessness about the accident. It just happened.
Mr. Watson was a single man and lived with his father and mother on Route 3, Grants Pass, on the Redwood highway, about three miles out of the city. The men who worked with Mr. Watson said he was one of the finest boys in camp and spoke very highly of his ability as a cat driver and as a man among men." (Illinois Valley News)
Art Kellert, logging superintendent for the Barton company, was just cleaning up the tract preparatory to moving, and Watson was on his last trip, when the accident happened. Mr. Kellert was not at the scene of the accident but was called and arrived a few minutes after. Viewing the scene of the tragedy, we believe the accident was a freak and probably would not happen again like it did in a hundred years.
Watson was coming down the hill with a drag of logs behind him. The boys who were at the bottom of the hill watching him come down say that the 'cat' turned sideways just a little enough to make it slide. Watson must have felt that the cat was going over, for it seemed he hesitated a second on which way to jump, then as the machine started to turn over, he elected to jump down hill, and the boys say he must have jumped 20 feet n the air trying to clear himself from the cat. He was picking himself up to jump again as the cat struck him and pinned him down and then pulled him on down the hill to the bottom where the cat rested right side up with the motor still running and Watson underneath the steel runners of the machine. He had put the machine out of gear before he jumped.
The scene of the accident was near the California state line, back in the woods about a mile and a half.
The boys who witnessed the accident were: Leslie Henry, Don L. Bearsdorf, Joe Brown and Joe solvers, who was hid choker setter, but the latter was up the hill and could not see as well as the boys at the bottom.
C. L.own of the Oregon State Accident Commission, safety department, had just completed an inspection of the camp Tuesday, and reported everything in excellent condition, complementing Superintendent Kellert for the condition of the material. After the accident he arrived there and again said the equipment was in first class condition, and there was no carelessness about the accident. It just happened.
Mr. Watson was a single man and lived with his father and mother on Route 3, Grants Pass, on the Redwood highway, about three miles out of the city. The men who worked with Mr. Watson said he was one of the finest boys in camp and spoke very highly of his ability as a cat driver and as a man among men." (Illinois Valley News)
September 30, 1943: "Announcement was made this week by W. B. Barton, that the lumber company bearing his name was sold to Ralph T. Moore and Carl R. Moore, well known Oregon lumbermen of the Coos Bay district. Ralph T. Moore is president of the Moore Mill & Lumber company of Bandon, Oregon, and Carl R. Moore is president of the Cape Arago Lumber company of Empire, Oregon.
The Moore brothers come from an old family of lumbermen, their father, the late George W. Moore, was a prominent lumberman of Michigan, coming to Bandon in 1906 where he was one of the incorporators of the Cody Lumber Co.
In 1906 the Moore Mill and Lumber company was established at Bandon and is still in operation under the direction of Ralph T. Moore.
Since that time the brothers have acquired the McKinley Lumber company near Coquille, the Arago Lumber company, the Petaluma Box company and the Scott Lumber company at Burney, California, which plant has been disposed of.
They operated the Moore steamship line between Coos Bay and California points until the war started when the U. S. Army took over the line. The three coast mills produced 125 million board feet of lumber a year ago.
Ralph T. Moore, who is serving his first term as a state legislator, lives at Bandon. The old Moore home was lost in the big 1936 Bandon fire and has never been rebuilt.
Included in the sale are two sawmills just south of O'Brien, the Barton Mill No. 1 and Barton Mill No. 2; a planing mill located in Grants Pass, and 10,000 acres of timber located mostly in the valley. The lumber office is located in Grants Pass at Seventh and G. streets, which is included in the sale with all equipment and trucks belonging to the Barton Lumber company.
It is reported that the present personnel of the company, which numbers about 80 employes, will remain the same." (Illinois Valley News)
The Moore brothers come from an old family of lumbermen, their father, the late George W. Moore, was a prominent lumberman of Michigan, coming to Bandon in 1906 where he was one of the incorporators of the Cody Lumber Co.
In 1906 the Moore Mill and Lumber company was established at Bandon and is still in operation under the direction of Ralph T. Moore.
Since that time the brothers have acquired the McKinley Lumber company near Coquille, the Arago Lumber company, the Petaluma Box company and the Scott Lumber company at Burney, California, which plant has been disposed of.
They operated the Moore steamship line between Coos Bay and California points until the war started when the U. S. Army took over the line. The three coast mills produced 125 million board feet of lumber a year ago.
Ralph T. Moore, who is serving his first term as a state legislator, lives at Bandon. The old Moore home was lost in the big 1936 Bandon fire and has never been rebuilt.
Included in the sale are two sawmills just south of O'Brien, the Barton Mill No. 1 and Barton Mill No. 2; a planing mill located in Grants Pass, and 10,000 acres of timber located mostly in the valley. The lumber office is located in Grants Pass at Seventh and G. streets, which is included in the sale with all equipment and trucks belonging to the Barton Lumber company.
It is reported that the present personnel of the company, which numbers about 80 employes, will remain the same." (Illinois Valley News)