State Agricultural Society. 403 



thousand. This brings us to Russian Eiver. All the mills mentioned are 

 on or near the coast, and ship direct to San Francisco. There is, as we 

 said above, twenty thousand acres in this district, besides an inexhaust- 

 ible supply of picket, railroad, fuel, and fencing timber. It is the coast 

 face of the hills separating the valleys we have described from the 

 ocean. We now come to Ocean Township, and the timber on Russian 

 River, which those who have read the preceding description will 

 remember, flows through the valleys, and enters the coast hills, flowing 

 through them to the sea. Just at the mouth of the river, Duncan's mill 

 is situated. It has a capacity for twenty-five thousand feet a day, has 

 a steam railway leading from the mill to the logging camp, and from 

 mill to shipping point. A steam launch is being constructed to carry 

 the lumber of this mill exclusively to San Francisco. This is one of 

 the b' st appointed lumber manufactories in the county. It is twenty- 

 seven miles from Santa Rosa. South of Duncan's we come upon the 

 open country. 



We will now cross to the lumber district from which our local supply 

 is obtained. Russian River, after leaving the Santa Rosa plain, flows 

 through the finest of bottom land, which was heavily set with an enor- 

 mous growth of redwood. The hills north and south of the river are 

 covered with fine bodies of timber. These hills overlook the great val- 

 leys of Sonoma County, and are easy of access from them. For con- 

 venience we will divide this district into two sections; one south and 

 the other north of the river. South of the river it is estimated that 

 there are eight thousand acres of timber, which will cut, some portions, 

 as high as one hundred thousand feet to the acre, and others fifty thou- 

 sand and less. Those who know the country say that twenty thousand 

 would be an average all through. There is, besides, an inexhaustible 

 supply of oak, furnishing tan bark and fuel; also laurel, for fancy cabinet- 

 ware, and shoe-last and stave timber. The average distance of this dis- 

 trict from Santa Rosa is about sixteen miles. Following are the mills 

 in this section: Ben. Joy's, capacity twelve thousand feet a day; J. K. 

 Smith's, capacity twelve thousand; Meeker Bros., capacity twelve thou- 

 sand; Frank Gilford's mill, capacit} r about four thousand feet per day. 

 In this district is situated the Town of Forrestville and the chair factory 

 of S. S. Nowlin, for which all the material is procured in the vicinity. 

 North of Russian River the stirring lumber manufacturing town of 

 Guerneville is situated; it is about twenty miles from Santa Rosa, in 

 what was known as the Big Bottom of Russian River, a body of timber 

 as fine as any in the State. At the head of this valley are located the 

 quicksilver mines of which we have spoken. Heald & Guerne's mill is 

 at Guerneville; it is supplied with all the requisite machinery for turn- 

 ing out ornamental building material of the latest styles and patterns. 

 One of the owners, T. J. Heald, is an old pioneer, belonging to the 

 family from whom Healdsburg takes its name. The capacity of the 

 mill is twenty thousand feet of rough lumber a day. They make also 

 about three hundred thousand shingles a year. Close by is the mill of 

 Murphy Bros., with a capacity of twenty-five thousand a day. A writer 

 in the Country Gentleman, who visited this mill, writes as follows of the 

 timber, which had to be carefully felled to miss the buildings: 



" There were thirteen logs in a tree, each sixteen feet long. Another 

 tree measured two hundred and eighty-eight feet from the stump to the 

 end of the last sawlog. It had cut fifty-three thousand feet of boards; 

 the top was left at four feet diameter, and near one hundred feet in 



