66 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



iliis district. Cainji 22. lierc pictureil, is 

 .1110 of the best of its kind in the country, 

 i^leanliuess and neatness ]in\-ail in every 

 structure and surronndiiif^-i. 'I'lie men arc 

 well and comfortably liousc d ;iiiil fed. 



Tli(> (dlic'ers of Mitclicll Brothers Com- 

 liuiiy ar(j W. W. ilitche)), president and 

 treasurer; C. T. Mitchell, vice president; K. 

 Fitzgerald, secretary and general manager. 

 iVr. E. Thomas is sales iiiaiiager of this coni- 

 l»;niy also. 



MURFHY & DIGGINS. 



(Jne of the best-known lumber nianufac 

 luring houses in the state is that of Murphy 

 & Diggins. Tliis house lias extensive tini- 

 lier holding.s contiguous to tliose of the Ouni- 

 Mier-Diggins Company in Wexford county, 

 and conducts its logging operations in prac- 

 tically the same way as do the other large 

 .j])erators of the Cadillac district. The logs 

 ,ire transported to their Cadillac mill over 

 tlie railroad of the Cummer-Diggins Com- 

 pany. This firm manufactures hardwood 



a boot and shoe merchant at Cadillac, but 

 became convinced that timber and lumber 

 operations would offer him a wider tield, so 

 disjiosed of his business and commenced 

 buying timber. He started in a compara- 

 tively small way, and year by year in- 

 creased his timber holdings until he is now 

 one of the important operators of the state. 

 His band sawmill at South Boardman was 

 erected in 1902, and in 190.5 he added a baud 

 resaw and planing mill. He has since built 

 a railroad into his timber properties, on 

 which he employs several locomotives. In 

 his woods work he skids and loads with 

 steam, using the McGiffert system. 



In 1906 Mr. Anderson organized the Wex- 

 ford Lumber Company which owns a circular 

 mill at Buckley, and about 30,000,000 feet 

 of hardwood timber in that vicinity. Re- 

 cently he purchased a half interest in 700,- 

 000,000 feet of flr and cedar timber in What- 

 com county, Washington, which he will 

 eventually manufacture. 



company specializes in birdse.ye majile and 

 basswood. In its jianel factory it makes a 

 great variety of laminated work for the fur- 

 niture, car, piano and other trades. The 

 several pictures accompanying this article 

 give a general idea of the plant, with its 

 surrounding dry kilns, storage sheds and 

 warehouses, and the interior views depict 

 the method of ]iroiliiciiig veneers and mak- 

 ing panels. 



The officers of the company arc II. \V. 

 Ingersoll, of Elyria, Ohio, president; E. F. 

 Sawyer, vice president; and E. W. Benja- 

 min, secretary and treasurer. Charles 

 Thompson is the general manager and prac- 

 tical veneer manufacturer of the institu- 

 tion. 



CADILLAC HANDLE COMPANY. 



Another of Cadillac's great manufactur- 

 ing plants is that of the Cadillac Handle 

 Company, a combined sawmill and handle 

 factory, which is under the general direc- 

 tion of A. W. Newark. This company has 

 extensive timber holdings in Emmet county 



II UNA! K MITCIIELL-DIGGINS IRON OOMl'A.NY, CADILLAC. 



MAKING CAST AT NIGHT, MITCHELL-DIGGINS IRON COMPANY. 



iiid hemlock lumber and is still producing 

 ■^ome white pine. The pictures show that the 

 -iawmill enterprise and lumber operations 

 are far above the ordinary, both in ecpiip- 

 ment and extent. 



The house of Murphy A: Uiggins is made 

 up of Joseph Murphy and Fred A. Diggins. 

 Mr. Diggins is the cflficieut president of the 

 Michigan Hardwood Manufacturers' Assu- 

 ■ •iation, and secretary and assistant treas- 

 iiri'r of the Cummer-Diggins Company. 



OPERATIONS OF A. F. ANDERSON AND 

 THE WEXFORD LUMBER COMPANY. 



One of tlic foremost lumber operators of 

 I 'adillac is Aaron Frederick Anderson. Mr. 

 Anderson's enterprises are two in number: 

 one conducted under his name at South 

 Boardman, thirty-two miles north of Cadil- 

 lac, with timber holdings l.ving southeast 

 of that town; tlie secmid, known as the Wex- 

 ford Lumlier Coni)iaiiy, with seat of mill 

 operations at Buid<ley, on the line of the 

 Manistee and Xortheastern Eailroad, some 

 thirty-five mili's northwest of Cadillac. 



Mr. Anderson entered the lumber business 

 as late as 1901, and has been eminently suc- 

 cessful ill his vi'uture. He was originally 



The specialty of the Anderson houses is 

 the pro.duction of winter-sawed, end-piled 

 under sheds white maple lumber. Mr. An- 

 derson probably has more shed capacity and 

 jirodnces more strictly white maple than all 

 the other manufacturers in Michigan com- 

 bined. He has an estimated lumber cut of 

 4.5,000,000 feet remaining at South Board- 

 man. He is a tireless worker and has in- 

 domitable pluck, through which he has 

 forged to the front within a few years. 



The illustrations accompanying this ar- 

 ticle depict more fully than the text Mr. 

 .Vnderson's timber holdings and methods of 

 operation. Associated with Mr. Auderson 

 in the Wexford Lumber Company, of which 

 he is president, are Joseph S. Campbell, vice 

 president, and William F. Gustine, secretary 

 and treasurer. The business of both the 

 Anderson houses is conducted from general 

 offices in the Granite building, at Cadillac. 



CADILLAC VENEER COMPANY. 



An important Cadillac institution is that 

 of the Cadillac Veneer Company, which op- 

 erates a modern veneer-eittting institution, 

 as well as a panel factory. The principal 

 woods used in this institution, all manu- 

 factured by the rotary process, are hard 

 inapli', birch, elm, ash and basswood. The 



and others in the vicinity of Cadillac. The 

 logs come in over the Ann Arbor and Granfl 

 Rapids and Indiana Railways. About 20.- 

 000 feet of lumber and about 2.5,000 broom 

 handles are produced daily. The institution 

 is well equipped and splendidly organized 

 and has the reputation of turning out a 

 very high-class product. 



The process of broom handle manufacture 

 is very interesting. The logs are flitched on 

 the sawmill and by specially designed ma- 

 chinery cut to broom handle dimension stock 

 and turned by automatic lathes which work 

 with great rapidity. By the aid of carriers, 

 the green handles are forwarded to rotating 

 steam heated rattlers which both season the 

 pieces and polish them at one operation. 

 The handles are kept in these jierforated 

 cylinders for twenty-four hours, when they 

 are dumped out upon trucks and sorted and 

 bundled for shipment. 



The timber owned by the Cadillac Handle- 

 Company consists of the usual variety of 

 northern hardwoods and hemlock, and as 

 only high-class, straight-grained maple and 

 beech timber is used in the manufacture of 

 handles, the residue and all other varieties 

 of timber are manufactured into lumber. 

 The company has one of the best appointed 

 luniber vards in this ilisfrict and the stock 



