Early Texas Sawmill

The Handbook of Texas credits William Ward with building the first sawmill in Texas, around 1819 in what became San Augustine County, and names Lewis Holloway as builder of the second soon afterward. Early mills of this kind were sash mills, a single blade in a frame driven by water or animals, cutting roughly 500 to 1,200 board feet a day. Big mills waited for the railroad, which reached San Augustine in 1901. By the 1920s, the Handbook says, the lumber companies had exhausted the timber and gone.

What the plaque says

Early Texas Sawmill One-fourth mile north to site of Early Texas Sawmill Texas' first million-dollar industry - lumbering - was born to recorded history with the building of two sawmills in 1819. One, located on Ironosa Creek in present San Augustine County, was run by pioneer Wm. Ward; the other was in Nacogdoches. In 1825 yet another mill (one-fourth mi. N) was turning out about 500 board feet of lumber a day. Wm. Quirk was miller. In these times, trees were felled using an ax and a wedge. Then one end of each huge log was slung under a heavy cart and dragged to a stream or road. At the mill the logs were often stored in a mill pond, to keep them from rotting, and then they were sawed by various methods. Two primitive ones -- soon abandoned -- were pit sawing (a slow, exhausting two-man process) and the muley-mill, powered by animals. A later improvement was the sash saw, which was so nearly effortless that one old-timer claimed the attendant "could read the Bible or the ' Galveston News' while the saw was cutting". In the mid-19th century, logging served as a pivot-point for dozens of subsidiary industries; railroad building and lumbering had a strong mutual influence and the gusto of loggers' lore is still alive in the rich heritage of the Piney Woods. (1969)

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• San Augustine — steps away
• Jerusalem Memorial Christian Methodist Episcopal Church — 0.2 mi
• Site of the "Red Lander" Office — 0.4 mi
• Sam Houston in San Augustine — 0.4 mi