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Herman Talley operates a saw at the mill, located in Spotsylvania County.
Billy Hatfield stacks freshly cut boards at the Lake Anna Lumber Company. Family-owned mills are not as common locally due to increased costs of doing business as well as competition from much larger operations. |
A light breeze blows sawdust in the air like snow flurries at Lake Anna Lumber Co. in Spotsylvania County.
Piles of wooden planks sit alongside the planing mill, which takes rough wood and smooths it down.
The recent rain made the driveway pretty muddy, but it also dampened the pungent aroma of fresh-cut hardwood.
Under a rusted tin roof, seven employees keep a steady stream of stiff boards flowing on a belt like a factory line.
This wood will soon be shipped out to Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania or New Jersey to be used for pallet manufacturing.
Sixty years ago, many communities had mills like this.
There was a time when planing mills, sawmills and lumberyards were a vital part of the local economy.
Families ran them.
Fathers passed them on to their sons.
And the risk involved was accepted as just a part of doing business. Safety measures weren't enforced by government agencies, but by individuals who knew their best protection was to be careful.
These days, the lumber industry has changed. Mills have gotten bigger and are no longer a booming business for the small, family businessman.
People in the industry say there were about 165 mills in the region in the 1940s. Nearly 30 are located in the area now.
Several reasons are cited for the decline in family-owned sites.
Bobby Edenton, vice president of Lake Anna Lumber Co., said the population growth of the area and the size of mills are partly to blame.
"The average sawmill in Spotsylvania in the 1960s used to cut about 8 [thousand] to 10,000 feet of lumber a day," Edenton said. "We have lumber companies now that cut 70,000 feet a day. That takes the place of seven mills."
His company, which cuts about 18,000 feet of lumber a day, has about 14 employees.
Charlie Beck, of the Virginia Department of Forestry, said the larger mills make for tough competition.
"A lot of it has been that mills have gotten more efficient and larger, and a lot of the smaller mills can't compete with the newer, efficient mills," he said.
In the Fredericksburg area, growth has impacted the lumber industry because less timber is available.
Subdivisions are being built where trees were once harvested, said Randy Bush, president of the Virginia Forest Products Association. That cuts into the supply, which pushes prices higher.
There are also a lot of costs associated with operating a mill, owners say.
The No. 1 cost is timber, which can be as much as $200 per thousand feet, compared with $40 two decades ago. Daily operations costs--which include fuel and equipment maintenance--also are high.
Those costs are transferred to the consumer through increased prices for furniture, cabinetry and flooring.
Not controlling those expenses can push both large and small mills out of business.
"Your big mills today are on the edge to close or continue," said Rudy Duke, president of Lake Anna Lumber. "The small mill that can keep his costs down is ahead of the bigger mill that can't."
For example, Tradewinds of Virginia was a large planing and sawmill in Mineral that folded in 2003 due to expenses, he said.
That's why, he said, mills sell everything they can, including the leftover scraps. His firm sells wood shavings that are planed off of planks to companies that use them in nurseries or to line horse stalls.
His company took over one of the many family-run mills in the area that closed. Dickinson Bros. Lumber Co., which operated in Spotsylvania from 1959 to 1994, sold the business once the brothers retired.
The sale of another family-owned yard lured one of the state's biggest lumber mills to the area.
J.W. Masters Inc., one of the oldest businesses in the city, was bought by Petersburg-based Roper Brothers Lumber Co. in 1988, according to its CEO, John Farrar.
It was started by John W. Masters in 1890 at 601 Caroline St. before moving to the current location on Alum Springs Road in 1972.
Brooks Lumber Co., a family mill that operated in Bowling Green, shut down after the owner died in 2002.
While some of the small family-owned mills have closed, some are still around.
Hairfield Lumber Corp. in Louisa County has been in business since 1963.
Cathy Hairfield-Green and her brother, Jeffrey, took over the business from their father, who bought the machinery from a sawmill owned by his father.
Hairfield-Green said one reason many family sawmills haven't survived is because it isn't a job that appeals to younger people.
"The generation that opened up the sawmills is not the generation that is coming up," she said. "It's hard work and it's not a lot of return unless you are in ownership. It's in our blood. We were raised in it, and we love it."
She said she expects to transfer her ownership to her children, who have already shown interest.
To reach PORTSIA SMITH: 540/374-5419 psmith@freelancestar.com
