The Industrial Evolution of the Port Discovery Mill
A look at the transformation of a pioneer-era lumber mill into a massive industrial enterprise.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
While in Port Discovery recently, we were shown through the lumber mill at that point. Started in the fifties by S. L. and L. B. Mastick, brothers from California, the lumbering business at Port Discovery did not for many years more than foreshadow the magnificent industry now being carried on there. It was managed with energy and kept pace with similar mills on the Sound. Since those days, the lumbering business on the Sound has undergone wonderful changes. The Port Discovery mill then cut from 30,000 to 40,000 feet of lumber per day. Today, the splendid mill at that point, utilizing all the latest improvements in machinery, turns out from 110,000 to 120,000 feet per day. The magnificent property has passed into the hands of Moore and Smith. The old site is the same, but all the improvements are of a more extensive and substantial character.
“The large new mill building dwarfs its ancestor into comparative insignificance.”
This article documents the rapid industrialization of Washington's natural resources in the late 19th century. The transition from small family-run mills to massive corporate operations prefigures the long-standing economic tension in the Pacific Northwest between large-scale industrial extraction and local environmental preservation.
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