Redwood Firms Announce Merger

A. B. Flammond Vill Head Production New Concern with 6001000 Feet Daily of Redwood Lumber

dConsummation of a merger of the Redwood interests of the Hammond Lumber Company and the entire interests of The Little River Redwood Company was announced in San Francisco, February 19.

A new company, now in process of formation, lvill be called the Hammond & Little River Redwood Co., Ltd'

A. B. Hammond will head this organization u'hich rvill be made up from the personnel of the constituent companies. All the present stockholders of the old companies carry over and retain their interest in thi nerv organization.

The merger will give the nerv company more than 100,000 acres of Redwood timberland, comolete railwav system and logging equipment, the Hammond Lumber Company's mill at Samoa, Humboldt County, Calif., with a oneshift capacity of 375,000 feet per day, and The I-ittle River Redwood Cornpany's plant at Crannell, Humboldt County, Calif., with a one-shift capacity of 200.000 feet, making an aggregate capacity of approximately 600,000 feet per dar'.

In addition the Hamrnond Lumber Companv's plant at Samoa has a planing mill, sash and cloor factory, coreboard factory, cut-up plant for the reworking of lumber into frames, Linderman stock and cut stock of every description, as well as balusters, ,columns and turned stock. The plant of The Little River Redwood Company includes a planing mill and reworking facilities, a large tank and continuous stave pipe plant, ancl special rnachinerl' for turning out cooling towers.

Included in the timber consolidation is the famous Big Lagoon tract, conceded by lumbermen to be the finest stand of commercial timber in existence. In addition there is the Redrvood Creek and Prairie Creek timber adjoining the Big Lagoon block, making the largest solid single stand of timber owned by one cornpany in the entire Redwood belt. There is also one large tract on the Van Duzen River and another at Carnp Grant on the main Eel River.

The timber holdings of the new companl' rvill furnish logs for their sawmills for the next 50 to 6O years, and rnost of the tirnber is sufficiently distant from the highway that logging operations will not impair the scenic beauty of the lledwood Empire route.

It is interesting to note here that the companies involved in this merger have donated to the State for its Park System land and tirnber through which the highrvay pasie. for miles, ancl a park site on the south fork of tht: Eel River.

The storage capacity of the combined plants is approximltely 200,000,000 feet, and a large stock of thoroughly air dried lumber will be kept on hand. The air-drying ficiiities will be supplemented by the kiln drying equipment at the Samoa and Crannell plants, which at present have a capacity of 5O,000,000 feet a year, and whiih can be increased as business warrants.

The sales forces of the Hammond Lumber Company and The Little River Redwood Company will be combined to cover more intensively the area bt ifteir solicitation. The Chicago oftice and plant of the Hammond Lumber Com- pany, Inc., rvhich is in,cluded in the merger. will supervise operations in the vicinity of Chicago, and the Neu. York office of the two companies will be combined to soli,cit and serve the trade in New England and the Atlantic Coast. Redwood sales will be supplemented by the sale of Douglas fir from the plants of the Hammond Lumber Company in Oregon, located at Garibaldi and Mill City. These plants and the timberlands supplying them, together with the large wholesale yard of the Hammond Lumber Company at Terminal fsland, Calif., and its distributing and rnillwork plants in Los Angeles and numerous lumber vards throughout Southern California. are not includecl in this merger.

The export business of the two concerns u,ill be combined. A lumber yard in llavana and agency connections in Porto Rico, Jamaica and in every one of the Central and South American countries, Holland. Germany, Spain. Switzerland, Morocco, South Africa, the Straits Settlements, East lndies, India, Persia and Mesopotamia, gives an idea of the varied markets already opened up by the trvo companies. These pioneering exportation activities are in addition to the business done by each of the companies through the Redwood Export Company. The peculiar qualities of Redwood which make it termite and fire resistant have given it a particular value for use in tropical countries, and business in those countries will be vigorous- ly solicited.

The new company will take over the stearners of the Little River Company and one of the large steel steamers of the Hammond Compan.v. It will also have available for coastwise, intercoastal and foreign business the remainder of the fine fleet of steel steamers olned and operated bv the Hammond Lumber Cornpany.

Transcontinental rail connections at each plant to all parts of the United States, Canada and Mexico, and deep tidewater wharves at Samoa and Fairhaven on Humboldt Bay enable the company to serve both American and foreign markets in a most efficient way.

Harnmond Lumber Company, which retains its interest in the consolidated company, was organized at the beginning of this century by Mr. A. B. Hammond, who then. with his family, became a resident of San Francisco after having spent a life of varied and colorful activity in the northwest, particularly in Montana and Oregon. In western Montana, with headquarters at Missoula, he was engaged in the construction of the Northern Pacific Railroad and in the public utility, bank, general mercantile and lumber business.

Extending his operations to Oregon in the 9O's, he was the associate of Collis P. Huntington, the Mark'Hopkins Estate, and John Claflin of New York in the building, ownership and management of the railroad connecting Astoria with Portland, and in the acquisition and reconstruction of the railroad from Yaquina Bay through Corvallis and Albany to Mill City, where one of the fir mills of Hammond lumber Company is located. These gentlemen identified themselves also with Hammond Lumber Company, which acquired timberlands in Oregon and embarked in lumber manufacturing in that State as well as entering the Redwood lumber business. The latter step was accomplished.through the formation of the Vance Redwood Lumber Company, which took over the plant at Samoa, Humboldt Bay, and timberlands of Edgar H. Vance and his brother, whose father, John Vance, hid there conducted one of the earliest Redwood operations in California. The Vance family still retain their interest in these augmented Redwood operations now refle.cted in them as stockholders of Hammond Lumber Company, rvhich later succeeded the Vance Redwood l-umber Companv.

To Mr. Ifammond mainly belongs the credit for the modernization of the Redwood industry. He it was who introduced large steel steamers which norv have so nearly supplanted the small wooden-built lumber carriers. But what is even of more importance in the up-building of the State of California was his development of the praitice of manufacturing at the mill, highly finished Redwood products, such as sash, doors, etc.. which theretofore had been carried on in the locality of the consumption of such productS outside California. In this way local communities in California have been built up and local payrolls expanded.

Mr. Hammond is justly regarded aJ the dean-of the Redwood industry. He is still intensely active in the management of Hammond Lumber Company properties,,in which he is aided by his son, Leonard C. Hammond, whose re'cord in the Air Service of the United States during the World War, in which he qualified as an Ace with more than the necessary number of enemy planes to his credit, gave him national distinction. His is also a record of which Californians can be proud, for he has been identified with California from boyhood and completed his education at Stanford University.

As stockholders of Hammond Lumber Company, the Claflin family of New York retain their originaf anh pro- portionatelv increased inteiest as the operations of -the loTpaly have extended. The same is true of the original Collis -P. Huntington interest, which was augmented by his widow, the late Arabella D. Huntington, and his nephew, the late Henry E. Huntington. Thi-s interest now resides in the Huntington heirs, with the exception of a substantial block of stock whi,ch in his lifetime Henry E. Huntington gave, with other property, for the endowment gf th9 Henry E. Huntington Library and Art Gallery near Pasadena.

Other stockholders of national prominence are the Estate of E. H. Harriman and the heirs of the late Francis H. Leggett of New York.

Among the prin,cipal stockholders of The Little River Redwood_Company are members of the Bronson family of Ottawa, Canada, the Weston and DeGraff families of North Tonawanda, N. Y., and the Dusenbury and Wheeler families of Olean, N. Y., and Forest County, Pa. The original purchase of the Redwood holdings of the company on-Lit- tle River, flumboldt County, was made in 1890 by the late Hon. E. H. Bronson and Abiiah Weston. who'were then engaged in lumbering operations in Canada under the firm name of Bronson & Weston.

^f)evelopment of this Redwood property was begun in 1909 under the management of Harry W. Cole, who has continuously carried it on. His standing in the industry is attested by the fact that for ten years he was President of the Associated Mills of Humboldt Countv. In 1907 the I)usenbury,and Wheeler interests, which have been oper- ating in Western New York and Pennsylvania continuously since 1834, under the firm name of Wheeler & Dusenbury, together with the Weston interests and other assocjate_s,. purchased the so-called Big Lagoon tract adjoining the L;ittle River holdings, and in 1925 the two propertiei were consolidated under the name The Little Rivei Red-

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