By JACK M. WILLIS
Correspondent

Three current management employees at the former Tremont Lumber Company sawmill at Joyce, added their personal recollections to the story of the final 27 years of history of Tremont Lumber Company and subsequent owners. Together, their years of experience around sawmills and plywood production total over 100 years. They all went to work when the company was still operating under the Tremont banner, and remain under the new ownership of West Fraser South, Inc. (See separate story, West Fraser operates Plum Creek mills).

Wayne Hagan, Sawmill Superintendent, was employed in 1965. He started off working around the dry kilns and worked his way up to Foreman and ultimately to the position he now holds.

Wilford "Red" Thompson, is Sawmill Foreman on the day shift. Tremont employed him in 1964 as an worker in the planner mill.

And the other person involved in our history forum, Grover Lafollette began his career in the three different forestry districts operated by the company in 1961. He transferred to plywood production in 1967. When plywood production ceased, Grover transferred to quality control in the sawmill, the position he holds today. Our thanks to these gentlemen for their patience and amazing ability to recall major events that shaped Tremont and other Company owner's destinies.

When Crown Zellerbach purchased the holdings of Tremont in 1973, little did they know what was about to befall them in just a matter of days. The Tremont Lumber Company had already lost the flooring mill to that dreaded nemesis of all sawmills and like facilities--Fire! This happened in the 50s, but in the summer of 1973, the new owners, Crown Zellerbach lost the entire plywood plant to fire also.

Wilford ``Red'' Thompson: It was the dangdest fire you ever saw! Why, they had fire trucks from everywhere fighting that big blaze. It burned all night and most of the next day.

Units from Winnfield, Natchitoches, Jena, Jonesboro, Pineville, Alexandria and even Monroe came in to help. Out of all the equipment necessary to facilitate production in the plywood plant, the only instrument salvaged was the turning lathe. It took Crown Zellerbach over a year to rebuild, but while they were at it they decided to expand the saw mill operations also.

First of all, they took out the ``gainer'' saw, which had been in service since 1971, and installed a Mark 5 chipping saw, so that all sawdust and log residue went into the plywood division at a even faster and more voluminous rate.

Grover Lafollette: Until the fire we had been producing about 80,000,000 MSF per year. Management decided to install four dryers instead of two. They went from a gas dryer system to steam with the addition of a 100,000-lb. dryer. This kicked plywood output up to about 175,000,000 MSF per year, a huge increase in production.

Crown Zellerbach continued to operate the sawmill and plywood plant for the next eight years until Manville Forest Products bought them out in 1981. Then the new management felt the need for modernization and upgrading of the mill's machinery.

Wayne Hagan: They totally rebuilt the head rig, and replaced the old carriage in the sawmill, which had come over from the Rochelle mill.

The new owners also installed a 12-inch gang saw. They continued to produce both lumber and plywood. A further innovation was going from conventional drying to high temperature drying. The major changes in this renovation of the mill proper were in the areas of drying and sorting. They went from drop-sorting to sling-sorting.

The mill and plywood plant continued to operate as was for the next two years . In 1993 the complex was sold to Riverwood International. This company continued the same operations policy until Plum Creek bought the plant and mill in October of 1996.

Grover Lafollette: In the spring of 1997 Plum creek decided they weren't making any money with the plywood operation, so they did away with it. And for the first time since June 1961, we weren't producing any plywood.

Plum Creek's work force moved over to the side of the old sawmill and started building a brand new sawmill. It featured all new state-of-the-arts equipment--all high-speed processing that was computerized. There was no more manual input in the mill operations. Manville and Plum Creek both maintained a nursery to raise their own seedlings for reforestation of their recently cut over lands.

Wilford ``Red'' Thompson: The old sawmill kept running until the company brought the new mil on line in January of 1999.

They took the old head rig out of the old mill and installed it in the new mill. It is still in operation till this day, even though the new mill features such refinements as being totally computerized with fiber optic scanners.

The mill was sold again on December 15, 2000 to West Fraser South, Inc., a division of West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd. of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

The mill continues to operate solely as a sawmill to this date, and they utilize just as many logs as they did when they manufactured lumber and plywood.

In retrospect, the operations today are a far cry from the vision Robert H. Jenks had, when he organized Tremont Lumber Company in 1901, and built his first mill at Tremont, Louisiana. But, a century later, the present owners are carrying on the tradition Jenks started--they're still producing lumber!