News, Trout History, Part I, June 13, 2001, LaSalle Parish, La. ********************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ********************************************** Copied & Submitted by: Pat Ezell From the Jena Times - Olla Tullos Signal, Wednesday, June 13, 2001, Thank You to the Times -Signal for allowing the following to be added to the Archives. Grass Roots and Cockleburs A History of Trout, Louisiana Part I Trout, Louisiana is a mere umbra of its former years when it was the opulent, crown jewel of the Buchanan Lumbering Dynasty. It's location is west of Jena on a "dogleg" on US Highway 84, and is probably the only one of its kind found on the whole stretch of highway between Sacramento, California and its terminus at Augusta, Georgia. This particular section of the highway was built to dovetail with streets already laid out by the Buchanan engineer Mr. Herbert N.Tannehill in 1907. Though the original mill has been shut down for over 70 years, a good number of the old, identical, gray hued houses still dot the landscape. Around 1895, on horseback (there were no roads, only trails) William Buchanan had ridden in to what was then Catahoula Parish, scouting out a vast yellow pine forest he had heard about some years earlier. Prior to the invasion of the tracks of the Louisiana and Arkansas Railroad, several tribes of Native Americans occupied the area. One historic account states that two different chiefs ruled the tribes and that the two chiefs died on the same day. Buchanan was bent on expanding the empire he had begun in Stamps, Arkansas. He had started with the Bodcaw milling operation he had purchased from C.T. Crowell officially on January 14,1889. and expanded southward to Springhill, Louisiana (formerly Barefoot, La.) where he established the PineWoods Lumber Company in 1894. Then the next move was in 1901 some 30 miles south to the town of Minden, Louisiana. A year later his "logging line" chugged into Winnfield, Louisiana. On his way to Trout he took time out to absorb Grant Timber and Manufacturing Co. interests near Selma, Louisiana along the way. In the span of fourteen years he had established five major lumber mills across the Deep South. Two years later Good Pine mill would be built and eight years later, Tall Timber mill would be added to the fold. The main reason for locating a new mill in Trout, was the availability of water, the prime prerequisite for lumber milling operations; that and timber. Trout was located geographically in the center of a Mother Lode of virgin, longleaf pine timber. The mill name came from its location on the headwaters of Trout Creek. The stream had probably been so named by J.P. Ward when he stopped off and settled downstream at White Sulphur Springs around 1830. Construction on the mill started sometime in 1903.Buchanan, in making his initial long range plans, envisioned taking 70 years to "cut out" the virgin longleaf forests he had acquired, and accomplishing this venture from the Trout mill only. The best laid plans…all of this long range planning was nullified by the Louisiana Legislature in 1905. This legislative body decided to from extract something from the timber companies currently ravishing Louisiana's forests raw materials, and shipping the finished products out of state for huge profits. The imposition of ad valorem tax laws would necessitate the later construction of Good Pine and Tall Timber mills in1906 and 1912 respectively. The milling process had to be established first, because it had to be in operation to furnish lumber with which to build the businesses and houses necessary for the labor forces to function. Mr. Herbert N. Tannehll drove the first stake to initiate mill construction. He was on loan from the L.& A. Railroad, an operation totally owned by William Buchanan himself. He stayed until the planer operation was finished, doing all the engineering for the company. When the Trout Creek Lumber Company opened the company store/commissary, Ned Kiser was the store manager; Charley North was the office manager, a Swede from Wisconsin by the name of Babstubner was the mill foreman, and Ben Ezell was deputy sheriff. The Trout Post Office was established in the back of the store and a Miss Tucker was the Post Mistress. Dr. I.N. Adams was the first company doctor. Mr. W.S. Ellard moved to Trout from Stamps, Arkansas as log scalar. The first building erected in Trout was the train depot. It was necessary to have it as a staging area for mill equipment arriving by train daily. Some days three trips were made to and from Paxton, Louisiana at the juncture with the Southern Pacific line, where materials were offloaded from trains that ran from Kansas City to New Orleans. The mill proper was completed and ready to go on line in 1904.The first two carloads of mules were purchased in St. Louis, Missouri in December of 1904 for rail shipment to Trout. Two "flatheads" named Masters and Warner started logging operations in the spring of 1905, with the felling of the first tree. J. A. Buchanan of Texarkana was manager of the mill. William Buchanan, his valued brother-in-law W.T. Ferguson, his brother J. A., and the Brown brothers, Thomas and William, were the principle owners of the foundling lumbering empire. As of 1890 when the partnership was formed, William Buchanan was only 40 years old. The team now in 1905 were on the threshold of what William Buchanan had been laying the groundwork for, for some 15 years. Sam Finley and Jim Kitchens were brought on board to operate the mill. The Trout mill only sawed one log at a time and formed a single line of different phases until the end and the finished product. The most important pieces of equipment were the carriage and the band saw, which worked against the carriage and was called the "head rig" because they worked along side of each other to produce slabs that, would ultimately be converted to boards down the line. Immediate construction was started on the dry kilns and the planer operation. The kilns were huge concrete buildings with miles of switchback steam pipes. The lumber would come off the "green chain", be stacked upon a railway-type car, and rolled into the kiln where it would bake, sometimes for days. When it was deemed sufficiently dried, where it looked almost scorched, it would be rolled over to the planing operation. After four months of hard work the planer mill was completed and they began to manufacture and ship out lumber. The mill had enjoying its successes for about 15 months, when suddenly the mill burned to the ground on June 8th, 1906. It was hastily rebuilt on the original foundation, and in about four months, operations were begun anew. A turpentine distillery was constructed about a mile north of where the town would begin to materialize about a year later. The Buchanan interests operated it until about 1909 when it was deemed not economically feasible, shut down and dismantled. People residing on the north side of Trout during it's operation stated that when the wind was right, the fumes from the distillery would "curl the hair in your nose." Next Week : Mill Town Life Jack Morgan Willis