Research: Sawmill Database

Alpha-Numeric Key: BO-17
Corporate Name: Charles E. Stewart. E. A. Stewart
Local Name: The Rosborough Mill
Owner Name: Charles E. Stewart, president, 1966. E. A. Stewart, 1930's to 1966. Thomas Whitaker Rosborough.
Location: Texarkana
County: Bowie
Years in Operation: 19 years
Start Year: 1948
End Year: 1966
Decades: 1940-1949,1950-1959,1960-1969
Period of Operation: 1948 to at least 1966
Town: Texarkana
Company Town: 1
Peak Town Size: Unknown
Mill Pond:
Type of Mill: 1947: oak flooring, car stock, hardwood dimension. Later, forest products, hardwoods
Sawmill Pine Sawmill Hardwood Sawmill Cypress Sawmill
Planer Planer Only Shingle Paper
Plywood Cotton Grist Unknown
Other
Power Source: Steam
Horse Mule Oxen Water
Water Overshot Water Turbine Diesel Unknown
Pit Steam Steam Circular Steam Band
Gas Electricity Other
Maximum Capacity: 90000: 1955
Capacity Comments: 90,000 to 100,000 feet daily
Produced:
Rough Lumber Planed Lumber Crossties Timbers
Lathe Ceiling Unknown Beading
Flooring Paper Plywood Particle Board
Treated Other
Equipment: Sawmill with a double band, resaw
Company Tram:
Associated Railroads: Unknown
Historicial Development: E. A. Stewart, of Dallas, had extensive sawmilling in Arkansas and Texas sawmilling, operating mills in and north of Texarkana, and in the Texas counties of Houston, Anderson, Titus, Red River, Morris, and Bowie. Several of the Red River County mills were small, portable operations, thus they will be noted only here. Consolidating his holdings in 1946, Stewart established the E. A. Stewart Hardwood Lumber Company, with offices at Texarkana. When Stewart acquired this mill, in 1948, he acquired some of the holdings as well as the mill of T. W. Roseborough on the western limits of Texarkana. His son, Charles E. Stewart, superintended the sawmill. The Texarkana business appeared in the 1957 edition of Nelson Samson's Directory of Wood-Using and Related Industries in East Texas as the E. A. Stewart Lumber Company. E. A. Stewart Lumber Company did not appear in the 1966 Directory of the Forest Products Industry, but an entry for Stewart's son, Charles E., did. The original E. A. Stewart mill at Texarkana suffered a grievous fire loss in 1947, when more than $500,000 damage was done. More than three million feet of lumber were saved. Late in the 1950s, feeling the strain of decades in the business, Stewart sold his mills in Texarkana and some timberlands. In 1966, he sold 7,600 acres, located in Red River and Cass counties in Texas and Miller County in Arkansas, to International Paper Company. The lumberman continued to direct a small lumber yard in northern Dallas until his death in 1977. Charles E. Stewart Lumber Company appears the same year that E. A. Stewart retired. Ms. Edith Post and Jo Anne Smith, the daughters of E. A. Stewart, state that Charles bought the Roseborough mill. The Newtown mill was dismantled. Stewart later sold the Roseborough mill to a box factory. At his death he was the superintendent of the Reed Lumber Company, at Monroe, Louisiana. The Roseborough mill had four to six small apartments in one building adjacent to the mill for tenant housing.
Research Date: MCJ 04-22-96
Prepared By: M. Johnson