252 



CONDITIOXS BY COUNTIES. 



by James Cain, who began to operate it about 2 miles sontli of 

 Tunnelton in 1854; the second was put in operation in 1865 by 

 Maj. U. N. Orr about 2 miles east of Newburg; and 2 years 

 later the third was brought in and stationed near Austin by 

 Martin L. Shaffer. Soon after this — ^beginning about 1870 — 

 portable steam mills began to scatter into all parts of the county. 



A. A. Perry and Company operated a gaag saw mill and 

 stave factory at Eowlesburg from about 1870 to 1879. This 

 mill was largely su.pplied with logs that were floated down the 

 Cheat. 



Hinkle and Company did an extensive business vith a 

 circular mill at Rowlesburg from 1885 to 1895. 



The stave industry was begun at Independence in 1853, the 

 next year after the Baltimore and Ohio railroad was completed 

 to that station. A company of Philadelphia lumbermen bought 

 a large number of excellent white oak trees in that section and 

 used and wasted them in this industry. Xearl^^ all the portable 

 saw mills used their slabs and small timber in the manufacture 

 of staves, in this way showing themselves less wasteful than 

 many of the present operators. 



The tan-bark industry has been carried on from 1876 to 

 the present. Chestnut oaks have been peeled in almost every 

 section and the bark hauled in wagons to the Baltimore and 

 Ohio railroad. 



There have been no operations larger than the gang saw 

 operation at Eowlesburg; and practically all the timber cut in 

 the county has been sawed on small portable mills, of which 

 there are about 100 still in operation. 



Present Forest Conditions. 



There are scattered tracts of virgin timber in the county 

 which aggregate about 30,000 acres. These lie almost entirely 

 along the Cheat river and on Eoaring creek. Big Sandy creek 

 and Laurel run. The narrow belt of margin timber lying along 

 the steep bluffs of the . Cheat and lower course of Big Sandy 

 creek is not good in quality nor easily accessible. The tracts 

 lying on land which is not so steep, however, contain excellent 

 stands of timber. The cut-over forest lands, aggregating about 



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