By Jack M. Willis
Journal Correspondent

For many years of the 20th Century one of the forerunners, as far as forest management goes, was a true man of vision in the person of L.C. "Lew" Ewing, who died August 19,2004.

We met with his son Randy at the original corporate offices located in North Hodge, LA to obtain a detailed biography of the man who contributed so much to the timber industry in years past.

We were sitting in Lew Ewing's office, in a building he had personally designed, when we noticed the pitted cypress paneling on the walls and inquired about it. Randy chuckled as he told how these particular resinous remnants of history came about. He said, "My dad used to walk a cypress foot log near his boyhood home and when he started construction on these offices he remembered this old log which was still in place across that creek. He sent a crew to retrieve it, and hauled it to Monroe to have it milled and transformed into the rugged pattern you see here, and when my Dad would be laboring here in this office he would occasionally stop and gaze fondly at the rustic wood designs as a form of reminiscence."

L.C. "Lew" Ewing was born near Chatham, LA in the year 1912, was one of eight children that were all reared on a small 100-acre farm. To make ends meet, and provide durable goods that couldn't be raised on the farm, his father was employed in the logging woods of Tremont Lumber Company. It fell the eight childrens' lot to consummate the bulk of the work on the farm, and it was during this time period that Lew Ewing exhibited a willingness to work, which would become his hallmark, and he would avidly demonstrate this trait for the rest of his life.

After graduating Chatham High School in 1929 he was employed in a road construction crew for a while and then enrolled at Louisiana Tech in Ruston.

Even though he was there on working scholarships and was employed both in the cafeteria and the college dairy, he still found time to participate in athletics and made the college basketball squad. It was while playing on the collegiate team that he set a high scoring total in one game of 48 points, this mark standing for several years. What made the feat more significant was that the points were scored in the era when a jump ball tip-off at mid-court was the rule after every field goal scored.

When the Great Depression hit in the fall of 1929 Lew lacked the money to stay in college so he returned home to Chatham to labor on the family farm, and it was also during this time that Huey P. Long was beginning his campaign for a seat in the U.S. Senate. Lew and several other boys happened to be downtown that day and he helped move a farm wagon into place from which Huey would make his stump speech. When the speech was over Huey asked the young men what they were doing and Lew told him, and also said he wanted to get his degree from college. This made a hit with Huey and he arranged for him to attend LSU and work on the college farm while sleeping in the gymnasium on campus.

Ewing graduated LSU in the depths of the depression and found work by enlisting in the Civilian Conservation Corps. It while he was in a CCC camp located at Arcadia, LA that he met a schoolteacher named Louise Williams, and they were married a couple of years later.

Like so many young men at this place in time, they were cognizant of the rumblings of war from Europe, so Lew joined the U.S. Army Air Corps, where he distinguished himself being discharged as a Second Lieutenant. After mustering out Lew Ewing returned to Jackson Parish where he held down two jobs. By day he was a timber cruiser, and at night he delivered motor fuels and lubricants for a local Esso bulk dealer, Walker McDonald. He also labored nights and weekends and any time he could to build a small house in Jonesboro, because by now the family included a small son and another on the way.

By 1950 Lew Ewing had secured a two-boxcar quota of short pulpwood from Brown Paper Company in West Monroe, and would purchase wood from local landowners in the area and then subcontract the harvesting and loading on the boxcars. This was before the open cars designed for short wood, which made the loading process faster and cheaper. Then Ewing enlarged his tent pegs and began to load out wood at several yards, sending wood to International Paper Company mills in Bastrop and Springhill, as well as to Southern Advance (now Smurfit-Stone) at Hodge. Ewing was very proficient at his trade and various companies came to know that they could depend upon him to supply raw materials for their milling operations.

Ewing's businesses were growing by leaps and bounds but his real love was for good land and the result of timber being grown thereon. He once told his sons that he had made two mistakes in transacting business and that was (1) not buying the land and (2) selling lands he already owned.

Nevertheless, he and his beloved Louise worked and put together a nice tree farm that served them well, and continues to serve the children and grandchildren of that union. Ewing firmly believed in being a good steward of the land that God has given us. Early in his career, he made efforts to conserve wetlands and wildlife areas, all the while maintaining that God intended that some of the land needed to be put in hardwood and used for other pursuits other that commercial tree farming. Anyone who ever made a jaunt into the woods with Lew Ewing could observe two significant traits: he walked fast and he truly loved the wonder of the forests, and he continually practiced good approved forestry practices and helped his fellow man to do the same. His credo, if he had one, was that anyone who planted trees was a firm believer in the future.

Lew Ewing's interest in land and timber and farming led him to be active in such issues as fair taxation and considerably reduced estate taxes, in order that families could pass on the family farms and tree farms so that their children would not have to sell a major portion, or all of the inherited property to pay the taxes on the transactions.

He was very active in the Louisiana Forestry Association, as well as the American Pulpwood Association, plus Forest Farmers as well as several business and civic associations.

L.C." Lew" Ewing's hobbies included his work, which he loved, duck hunting, bream fishing and enjoying his family. He and his wife of 63 years was a wonderfully compatible pair and shared their years together with a love and fullness appropriate with their generation. When Lew passed away the family received literally hundreds of donations in his memory and letters of condolence from people in all walks of life who had known him at some point in time. These consisted of old schoolmates, Army Air Corps buddies, business associates and neighbors from over the years. Lew's oft-quoted motto was "It is what you do when it would seem that there is nothing to do that will make you successful.

Apparently Lew Ewing had found something to do worthwhile with his time thru the years for many, many people.

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