Fullerton – A Giant In The Woods
In 1906, a fella named Samuel Holmes Fullerton launched the Gulf Lumber Company, makin’ it the largest southern pine mill west of the Mississippi. The town of Fullerton grew and grew, ‘til it had things like a dentist office, café, post office, drugstore, barbershop, public telephones, bank, feed store, and even a Ford dealership.
Settlers used them pines for everythin’! Furniture, flatboats, firewood, bread bowls, barrel staves, sidewalks, cisterns, coffins – they was were all made from the tall pines. Well, a whole mess o’ railroads came about in the 1800s, and with ‘em came the timber rush. When timber towns started poppin’ up, the economy and population boomed. Heck, even after the last tree fell, Fullerton stayed alive by puttin’ up a lathe mill, planing mill, several dry kilns, and a turpentine distillery that produced 15 barrels of turpentine spirits and 45 barrels of rosin per day.