306 



CONDITIONS BY COUNTIES. 



tance above Webster Springs to the western line and floated 

 them to its mill at Charleston. The Woodruffs were succeeded 

 by Smith and Gillighan and they, in turn, were succeeded by 

 the Moulton Lumber Company, both of which continued the 

 floating of poplar logs. 



J. R. Huffman, with band mills at Charleston, floated logs 

 from Webster on the Elk and Gauley rivers for several years 

 foUowmg 1880. 



From 1892 to 1905 a large number of logs were floated on 

 the Elk to supply the band mill of Pardee and Curtin Lumber 

 Company at Sutton in Braxton county. 



About 20 years ago Burns Brothers and Huffman, with 

 logger's headquarters at Cleveland, cut and floated an immense 

 quantit}^ of valuable poplar and other timber from the Back 

 Fork of Little Kanawha. The logs were 'taken to their mill at 

 Elizabeth in Wirt county. 



Almost at the beginning of the saw milling in the county 

 a large band mill was hauled on wagons from Kanawha Falls 

 in Fayette county up the Gauley river a distance of 50 miles or 

 more and stationed at Camden-on-Gauley. The expense of 

 moving the heavy machinery in this way was very great and the 

 enterprise proved less profitable than it would have done under 

 more favorable circumstances. After running for several years 

 the plant went into the hands of the Baltimore and Ohio rail- 

 road company. Recently this company disposed of it to the 

 Cherry River Boom and Lumber Company. 



Two band saw mills that operated in the county about 15 

 years ago were the Hardwood Lumber Company and the Web- 

 ster Lumber Company, both located on Laurel creek betwetn 

 Cowen and Centralia. 



For the past 18 or 20 years a number of portable mills have 

 been cutting lumber along the railroads and throughout the 

 northern and western sections. The Smoot Lumber Company, 

 of Cowen, has led in this phase of the lumber industry for sev- 

 eral years. 



The timber of the county is now being rapidly cut by 4 

 band mills and by about 15 smaller mills located at different 

 points. Large areas in the mountainous sections are being en- 



