The Lumber Barons Eye the Snake River
President of the Weyerhaeuser Lumber Company tours the Snake River to scout a site for a massive new sawmill.
The story, cleaned up
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John P. Weyerhaeuser, of St. Paul, president of the Weyerhaeuser Lumber company, accompanied by Mr. McCoy, Idaho manager of the company, and P. A. Devers, of the Pasco Reclamation company, made an automobile trip along the Snake river inspecting possible sites for a mammoth mill which the Weyerhaeuser interests intend to construct either on the Snake river or the Columbia below the mouth of the Snake. One of the sites investigated by Mr. Weyerhaeuser today was about five miles from the mouth of the Snake river, which, if power from Five Mile Rapids could be made available, would be more than adequate to run the machinery of the mill. It is the plan of the company to float logs down the Clearwater and Snake rivers from their holdings in Idaho to the site of the proposed sawmill.
“Mr. Weyerhaeuser today was about five miles from the mouth of the Snake river... would be more than adequate to run the machinery of the mill.”
This visit captures the moment heavy industrial extraction moved into the confluence of the Snake and Columbia rivers. The Weyerhaeuser reach into Washington reshaped the state's economy for the rest of the century.
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