The tale of White Pine Lumber Company

The Spokane Daily Chronicle reported the story on Aug. 31, 1905: “According to the advice received at the Great Northern Office, the fire which destroyed a large portion of the town of Priest River yesterday had its origin in the piling room (perhaps “filing room” was meant?) of the White Pine Lumber Company’s mills.

“The fire at one time threatened to wipe out the entire town, but a sudden shift of wind averted complete destruction. Besides the mill, about 25 small residences were destroyed. Loss to the lumber company is estimated in the neighborhood of $250,00.”

No story appeared in the Priest River Times about the fire or the lumber company that I have been able to find until Feb. 9, 1922, since the Times did not exist until 1914. A 1922 tidbit had the fire occurring a year too late — 1906 — but confirmed that it was very destructive. “Half of Priest River burned with it,’ the writer said.

The 1905 souvenir edition of the Northern Idaho News in Sandpoint, mere months before the fire, had described the town of approximately 600 souls as having “well stocked streets, and very pretty residences surrounded by gardens and lawns wherein berry bushes and fruit trees thrive and all varieties in wonderful luxuriance.”

The souvenir edition advertised that the White Pine mills in Priest River manufactured Idaho White Pine, Western White Pine, Cedar, Fir, and Larch products — finished stock for sash, doors, blinds, moldings and trimming and lathing. Every form of dressed kiln-dried lumber was said to be kept in stock for immediate shipment, and the company also manufactured “all forms of boxes, fruit cases, and merchandise packing cases” besides.

“While not of as great capacity as some in Kootenai County (Bonner County was a part of Kootenai County at the time) the mills of the White Pine Lumber company, Ltd., at Priest River are not excelled in arrangement, equipment and management, nor in the character of products by any in the state.”

In the overblown prose of the day, the main “sawing mill” was said to be a 12-inch band mill that cut 60,000 feet of lumber each 24 hours. Its “complete planing mill” was fully equipped with planers, resaws, rip and cut-off saws, matchers, molders and other apparatus and fixtures necessary for manufacturing sash, doors and blinds, plus moldings and trimmings for exterior and interior house and store finishing.

The company had a dry kiln with a capacity of 40,000 feet. This enabled it to “more speedily fill orders for dressed and seasoned lumber.”

Another advantage was that the mills, dry kilns, storage sheds and yards were situated on the Pend Oreille River bank and immediately adjoining the main line of the Great Northern Railway. A spur of the Great Northern connected with the storage sheds and yards. This all greatly facilitated the loading of lumber and lathing for shipping.

The company maintained extensive log booms on the Pend Oreille, which stored the logs until they were cut. Logs came down the Priest River, as well down the Pend Oreille and from Pend Oreille Lake.

That wasn’t all. The company had also recently constructed a complete box factory at the site. Fruit growing was expanding in the region, and packing cases and boxes were needed to ship it. Aside from boxes to ship all manner of fruit, berries and vegetables, the White Pine Company manufactured packing cases for goods and merchandise of all descriptions, and even took special orders, “at minimum cost.”

Moreover, the company was a large producer of high-grade cedar poles, posts and piling. A photo in the souvenir edition showed 5,000 cedar poles that had come down the Priest in the spring drive — said to be as fine a lot of poles as were ever produced in Kootenai County. The poles were on their way to the “far east.” (The story does not specify what was meant by “far east.” Surely not the distant far east in Asia.)

The local management of the company’s affairs were said to be in the hands of Austin Ready, the vice president, and C. F. Hogan, superintendent, both highly experienced, competent men. Clerical duties were handled by Bert R. West, a secretary of “exceptional ability.”

Two years earlier, the “1903 History of North Idaho,” now a valuable rare book, reported that the White Pine Company completed its mills in Priest River in 1902, and was cutting 75,000 to 100,000 board feet of lumber a day at that time. The publication prophesized that it would become one of the largest mills in the state. It owned 27,000 acres of timberland in eastern Washington and Idaho, and was composed mainly of “eastern capitalists”. It listed the local manager and secretary of the company as A. V. Brodrick, with Captain Thomas Down as president.

The fire must have been a devastating blow to Priest River, a town that has weathered a number of those in its time. The loss of the houses and stores would have been bad enough, the loss of the mills and their payrolls a disaster. Unfortunately, the company and the fire seem to have faded from history rather quickly.

The company never rebuilt, and the site sat vacant until Jurgens Brothers purchased it and built a sawmill on it in 1910. Within a few years Jurgens Brothers sold to Charles Beardmore, who went out of business in the Great Depression.

The Internet hasn’t been at all helpful in finding any information as to what happened to the White Pine Lumber Company. In the 1950s I know that a White Pine & Sash was in business in Spokane. I don’t know that there was any connection.