Odd, Old News: The ‘Million Dollar Mill that Never Milled’

(Photo of Andersonia mill, courtesy of Diane Hawk, from A Glance Back, Northern Mendocino County History)

(Photo of Andersonia mill, courtesy of Diane Hawk, from A Glance Back, Northern Mendocino County History)

Nuggets of old news are served up by David Heller, one of our local historians.

Besides devastating San Francisco and many North Coast towns, the 1906 earthquake also changed the course of railroad and lumber company history in northern Mendocino County.

In anticipation of a railroad being built through Branscomb and then down the South Fork of Eel River, “Henry Neff ‘Pap’ Anderson, a wealthy Washington business man, bought out the Bear Harbor Lumber Company and its timber holdings and rail line. Anderson incorporated his company in 1903 with $500,000 dollars, and proceeded to build a large state-of-the-art lumber mill and a sizable mill town which he named Andersonia. Andersonia and its mill were located across the river from the future town of Piercy, near the mouth of Indian Creek where it enters into the South Fork of Eel River from the west.

Many Southern Humboldt men found employment constructing the mill, town, and holding pond dam. In the years preceding the mill’s opening, millions of board feet of old growth redwood logs had been harvested by the Southern Humboldt Lumber company from their extensive timber holdings between the Andersonia and the coast and were being stored in a holding pond behind a 30 foot high by 80 feet wide dam.

(Andersonia Dam Being Built, photo courtesy of Diane Hawk, A Glance Back, A Northern Mendocino County History)

Andersonia Dam being built. [Photo courtesy of Diane Hawk, A Glance Back, A Northern Mendocino County History]

Rather than duplicate our feature article’s telling of the tale, we will simply summarize and say that owner Henry Neff Anderson’s tragic death at his mill in late 1905, and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake dealt fatal blows to the mill’s opening and operating.

This week, Odd Old News will share a little known account of the history of the Andersonia Mill that was written in 1937 by longtime northern Mendocino county homesteader and school teacher, the remarkable Mrs. Minnie Lilley. She and her husband Bill were caretakers for the Andersonia mill site for many years and, at one time, lived in the house built for Mr. Anderson on the property. Her dates and estimates of the amount of old growth held in the log pond vary from most accounts, but Mrs. Lilley’s account has great value as it was written by one who lived the history. Her biography is a story in itself, she is best known as the owner of the iconic tourist stop, Lilley’s World Famous Tree House at the Lilley Redwood Park just south of the new Rosewarne bridge over the South Fork. We turn to her to tell the story of the “Million Dollar Mill that Never Milled”.

(Map of Railroad Route from Bear Harbor to Andersonia, R.Lee/Collins map courtesy of the Historical Society of Mendocino County and Diane Hawk)

Map of Railroad Route from Bear Harbor to Andersonia. [R.Lee/Collins map courtesy of the Historical Society of Mendocino County and Diane Hawk]

FATE PRESERVED REDWOODS OF EEL’S SOUTH FORK IN GARBERVILLE SECTION
THREE STACKS OF ANDERSONIA MILL BEAR MUTE EVIDENCE TO FAILURE OF MAN’S MACHINERY TO BITE INTO HUMBOLDT LOGS—FATAL ACCIDENT TO OWNER AND 1906 EARTHQUAKE BALK DESIRES TO LAY WASTE TO VIRGIN WATERSHED COVERAGE IN INTERESTS OF REAPING GOLDEN HARVEST.
(By Minnie S. Lilley in the Ukiah Redwood Journal)

As you travel north or south over the Redwood highway near the Humboldt line, you may look across the south fork of Eel river and see three tall smoke stacks outlined against the green of a virgin forest.
These smoke stacks mark the ruin of the old Andersonia mill.

Let us begin with the history of Andersonia, which dates from the organization of the old Bear Harbor Lumber company. Their operations began in the early nineties. Ties, posts and other split products, also tan bark, were their output. They had a wharf at Bear harbor where shipment was made and supplies obtained for the country around Garberville, and elsewhere. From Bear harbor, after climbing a steep incline, their railroad extended along the banks of Indian creek, as far as Moody, several miles inland.

At Moody a large warehouse was built, supplies were kept and bark weighed for shipment. Here mule teams came over the old Garberville-Moody road. The tinkle of the bells on the mules could be heard for miles. They were laden with wool for shipment and on return trips took much needed supplies to the country around Garberville, Briceland and elsewhere.

In 1903 the Bear Harbor Lumber company, whose principal owners were Stewart, Hunter and Cooper, sold to the Southern Humboldt Lumber company. Henry Neff Anderson was the president of this company and associated with him were George McPherson, J. A. McPherson and A. W. Middleton. Anderson was a mill man of wide experience, having operated mills in Pennsylvania and Aberdeen, Washington.

Vision Determined Site
Early in 1903 the site of the mill was chosen at the mouth of Indian creek. It was chosen here because the stockholders of the company believed that eventually the Western Pacific would build to Eureka along the banks of the south fork instead of the main Eel, and they planned shipping their lumber by rail as well as by boat, as Bear harbor is only a summer harbor. This dream was not to be realized because the survey of the road, maps and all data were lost during the fire and earthquake of 1906.

The survey of the road along the main Eel was preserved and many think that the engineers, rather than incur expense of another survey along the south fork, built along the main Eel, using data that had not been lost. The railroad from Bear harbor to Moody, about 12 miles distant from the ocean, was a standard gauge and Southern Humboldt Lumber company extended it to the site of their mill.

Timbers for the mill were sawed at Aberdeen, Washington, and brought in over the railroad. A small portable mill operated by Burt McKee sawed small stuff. This was used in construction of a large warehouse which invariably housed $lO,OOO worth of goods. Dwelling houses, cook house, bunk houses, blacksmith shop, etc. were built. The machinery of the mill was the finest that could be obtained and was brought to Andersonia by boat to Bear harbor, then by the railroad. When they went to install the carriages, they found that the plans were too narrow. This had to be remedied to make machinery fit.

Owner Fatally Injured
While the workmen were engaged in the work, Anderson visited the mill one morning. The workmen were hoisting a beam to support the timbers where others had been cut away to make machinery fit. The timbers were attached to a cable and hoisting done with a donkey engine. The beam remained suspended before placing and Anderson, not understanding cause of the delay, ordered workmen to proceed. The timber slipped from position and struck Anderson a glancing blow on the head. He was carried to the “big company house,” as it was called, across Indian creek. Drs. Lendrum and McCornack of Fort Bragg were called and they performed the operation of trepanning the skull. On the ninth day after the operation, October 23, 1905, Anderson died, as inflammation had set in. The blow affected his power of speech so that he never spoke after the injury.

His body was packed in ice, taken over railroad to Moody, thence by team to Fort Bragg. From there the long journey by rail began to Altoona, Pennsylvania, where the remains were interred at his old home. Anderson left a young wife, having been married only a short time to Cora Patterson who had nursed his first wife in her last illness. He also left a large family of grown sons and daughters.

Litigation soon developed and all work was suspended, never to be resumed.

Anderson’s sons had their homes and interests in Aberdeen, Washingon, and none of them cared to leave Washington to operate at Andersonia, Cruisers and prospective buyers were numerous for months after Anderson’s death.

Early in 1906 a man by the name of Trumbell was very much interested in securing the holdings for his son, Trumbell preferred a mill with a steel frame, but this obstacle was overcome and he went to San Francisco to complete arrangements for the purchase of the property. He experienced the fire and earthquake of 1906 and this so embittered him with California that he would have none of it.

The next prospective buyer was a man by the name of Hicks. The Hicks-Hauptman Lumber company operated in Oregon. Hicks and several associates visited the mill and their cruisers spent several weeks on the property. Hicks experienced some difficulty in obtaining funds with which to finance the proposition and, in a fit of despondency, committed suicide. As Hicks was the chief instigator, his associates were not interested enough to complete the deal.

<a href="https://digicoll.lib.berkeley.edu/record/16280?ln=en">Condition of the Southern Humboldt Lumber Company's sawmill at Andersonia, 1925</a> [Fritz-Metcalf photo collection, courtesy of University of California, Berkeley Library]

Condition of the Southern Humboldt Lumber Company’s sawmill at Andersonia, 1925 [Fritz-Metcalf photo collection, courtesy of University of California, Berkeley Library]

The Mill Today
How well I remember the night when the caretaker of long years, W. G. Lilley, and the wife who had shared the trust, wept tears of anguish when they heard the creaking and groaning of the timbers of the old mill, a last dying wail of an enterprise never to be. The storms of November, 1919, were unusually severe and on the night of November 19, 1919, the swollen waters of Eel river and Indian creek so undermined the structure that morning revealed the mill in a state of collapse.Prior to this the earthquake of 1906, storms, and ravages of time had all taken their toll of the once proud structure, whose output was to have been 150,000 feet of lumber per day. To feed its two big engines of 110 horsepower, 12,000 acres of virgin timber, estimated at more than a half million feet, formed the background. After the collapse of the mill, the half million dollars of machinery and engineering perfection were fast forgotten.The machinery was removed from the structure and remains housed on the property today, in a wonderful state of preservation. The boiler room is the most completely intact unit of the ruin. The boilers still lie in their brickwork bed, undisturbed by the ravages of time. A concrete base supports the immense flywheel which hangs between the twin engines. Trees over three feet in diameter have grown up on the property since the hum of activity at Andersonia ceased. You may find many large redwoods with its wreckage of iron, vines and whatnot, all in tangled confusion. The dam which held 1,000,000 feet of logs went out in 1924.
Today the bleaching ruins are an attraction for tourists of the Redwood highway, who stand awestruck when you tell them the story of the mill that never turned a wheel”(Healdsburg Tribune, Enterprise and Scimitar, 7/24/1939).

(Contrary to the date that Mrs. Lilley used, Mr. Anderson’s accident happened on the 28th of October resulting in his death on November 6th, 1905. Other estimates of how many board feet went out to sea when the dam broke in 1924 range from 6-15 million board feet).

Mrs. Lilley didn’t live long enough to see that the old growth forests that she loved did eventually get cut down. Around 1950, after a small scale reopening of the Andersonia mill by the Anderson family in the late 1930’s-‘40’s, Tom Dimmick leased the mill from the Andersonia Lumber Company and acquired its timber rights. Dimmick modernized the mill, operated it from 1950 to 1972, and created several hundred miles of timber haul roads between Andersonia and the coast. Other timber companies continued to harvest the vast forest until the formation of Redwood Forest Forest International in 1997 “by a group of community leaders who wanted to have a positive response to the timber wars, one that benefited the community. The original mission was to acquire large tracts of land that had been heavily logged over during the industrial timber years and bring it into community control”(Mendocino Beacon, 2019 ).

With some 50,000 acres having been purchased by 2007, RFFI began their mission of establishing community based forests for important biodiversity habitat through “stream-by-stream” watershed and forest restoration projects.
The 1906 earthquake that destroyed the tracks and trestles built by the Southern Humboldt Lumber Company stranded the Bear Harbor Lumber Company No. 1 “Gypsy” steam locomotive at the railroad depot at Moody.

In 1958, local timber operator Rogan Coombs, Grant Anderson, Jr. (grandson of H.N. Anderson), and other railroad enthusiasts rescued it, transporting it first to Andersonia, where it sat for some years before being donated the Ft. Humboldt Logging Museum.

Odd Old News thanks Diane Hawk and the Historical Society of Mendocino County for our use of photos and the map from A Glance Back, Northern Mendocino County History, by Margarite Cook and Diane Hawk.

Note: An earlier version of this post had gave an incorrect name for Henry Neff ‘Pap’ Anderson in the opening paragraphs. We fixed this and apologize for any confusion that may have occurred.
Earlier Odd and Old News:

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MaryAnn
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MaryAnn
2 years ago

In the early 1970s and group of friends and I almost lived at Andersonia. We talked to Rogan Coombs (I think but am not sure) about renting a grand old two story house. It was not in great condition but appealed to us nonetheless. We were given a tour, on our own, and found all kinds of interesting knicknacks left behind by previous tenants and picked out which room we wanted for our bedroom. For some reason the deal fell through. It would have been an adventure!

MaryAnn
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MaryAnn
2 years ago

1902 Southern Humboldt Lumber Company stock certificate signed by H. Anderson

1902.Southern Humboldt Lumber Company stock certificate.jpg
MaryAnn
Guest
MaryAnn
2 years ago

1905 order for postage from Andersonia Post Office

1905.Andersonia Post Office supply order.John McPherson.jpg
David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  MaryAnn

Cool editions Mary Ann, thanks… I lived a half mile downstream from the millsite for my first nine years in our area, and though I didn’t roam that property I have seen photos showing its entropy. There was a lot of old heavy metal equipment pushed to the west embankment of the river, presumably to stabilize the bank. Lots of clinker material washed downstream from the teepee burner that used to be there. People on the Remember When in Southern Humboldt facebook page have told stories about when they lived nearby during the Dimmick period, and how they used the footbridge that crossed Indian Creek.
Thanks again to Diane Hawk for her help, and of course, Kym for her time setting up the post with the pictures.

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  David Heller

additions, not editions, sigh… brain to coffee: “Hurry up and get here please” …

Dave Kirby
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Dave Kirby
2 years ago
Reply to  David Heller

Confusing story. Who is John Anderson? Story says he was the victim of the construction accident. Several other sources say it was Henry who got conked. Am I missing something?

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  Dave Kirby

Eggregious and embarrassing mistake. I’ll get Kym to change it…my tired ol’ brain is making too many mistakes lately, thanks for spotting my error Dave!, not that it explains anything, lol, but John Neff was a friend of mine in a place I used to live. sigh…

Dave Kirby
Guest
Dave Kirby
2 years ago
Reply to  David Heller

Just don’t let it happen again.

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  Dave Kirby

If I can go over the writing as many times as I did and not see the obvious, I make no promises…. but I will try.

MaryAnnD
Member
MaryAnn
2 years ago
Reply to  David Heller

I made the very same typo on a resume! No worries.

What is clinker material?

Do you know if the bridge over to “town” is still there?

Ernie Branscomb
Guest
Ernie Branscomb
2 years ago
Reply to  MaryAnn

Clinkers come from the teepee burners. The fire gets so hot that the ashes melt into a ceramic like material similar to pumice. My uncle who was a saw filer had his whole flower garden decorated with them. He made it very attractive.

MaryAnnD
Member
MaryAnn
2 years ago

Thanks Ernie. Love your recollections about working in the woods with the Petersons. (Love them all!)

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  MaryAnn

Those who know me, know that I ‘beclown’ myself often, I would just prefer not to do it to Kym’s wider audience in my “historian” role …lol.
I see that Ernie beat me to the definition of clinker…when I lived at Resting Oaks we would get up early in the morning in the rainy season and see what what new rocks and driftwood the river had brought us. One of the renters ‘specialized’ in collecting the clinker or slag and did what Ernie’s uncle did…he lined his walkways and garden areas.
On the Remember in Southern Humboldt When facebook page, folks who lived at Andersonia have shared their recollections of the footbridge across Indian creek they took from their housing to work(*as I recall) and its collapse. There was another such footbridge crossing the Southfork just downstream that was at your own risk usable in the earlier 1990’s, but the river took out the redwood on the Piercy side and it was down by 2000(*as I recall).

MaryAnnD
Member
MaryAnn
2 years ago
Reply to  David Heller

Thanks David. Clinker hunting sounds like fun. No doubt, had I found any, I would have been at a loss to identify.

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  MaryAnn

It’s volcanic look would have caught your attention and inspection Mary Ann–unlike any of the other river rocks.

Tim Renner
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Tim Renner
2 years ago
Reply to  Kym Kemp

I worked for the Anderson family in approximately 2012 as a contract logger. I logged on the property along the Eel River and down to the old mil site.
The Tee Pee burner was still standing at that time. I don’t remember the family member that was there but he asked me to tear down the tee pee burner which I did. He thought it was a liability left standing and wanted the metal for scrap.

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  MaryAnn

Very cool Mary Ann, that Post Office only operated from 1904-6 before mail service was moved to Moody.

canyon oak
Member
canyon oak
2 years ago

Crazy to think that loosing those railroad surveys in the fire may have been the reason the rail was built on the mainstem eel instead of the south fork as planned..

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  canyon oak

There was a tangled web of RR building proposals from the north and south as the big railroad corporations were competing for the route. There were those who probably liked the Eel River route from the start, but most news sources were talking about the route through the coastal redwood region at Branscomb and down the South Fork. Not only would the railroads profit from hauling the cut lumber, they would also have a steady supply of much needed railroad ties…millions of board feet of old growth redwood were taken just to make ties, not only for domestic use, they were shipped around the world.

Ernie Branscomb
Guest
Ernie Branscomb
2 years ago

I worked out in the Andersonia woods in the early sixties. I worked with Pete Peterson, Dane Peterson and Chris Ferrel’s father. We made redwood split-stuff, grape stakes, posts, paling, rails and shingle bolts. Whatever we could get the best product from the timber that we were working. Some wood splits clean, but other is brashy or had too much taper. There was a product that could be made from most everything. Our job was to salvage what couldn’t be put through the saws at the mill. We would find redwood the Old-Timer railroad tie-makers left behind. It was usually very good splitting because the tie-makers would chop into a tree and would test split the choppings. They would only fall a tree the had little taper and would split easily.

Grant Anderson was the Bull Buck (The timber owners representative) He would come by our split camps and sometimes had lunch with us. I was at the car accident where he was killed. We were on our way to work and came upon the wreck shortly after in happened. Piercy was not a lucky place for the Andersons. The wreck happened before the freeway was built. It was right above the place that David Heller lived in Piercy. (Resting Oak?)

One day I got a good log to work and made $75.00 before noon. I was so happy with myself that I couldn’t help but brag. My balloon was popped though when they told me that if I had made rails instead of paling I could have made $90.00. After that for quite a while the logs that I got to work were terrible splitters… Hummmm.

The town of Moody and the Moody Bar and Hotel were still standing (barely) when I worked out there. There was an old locomotive on the tracks. There was some old trellis and the damaged dam was there.

There was good trout fishing in Indian Creek. Some of the trout had eggs in them. I can’t say what kind of trout that they were, all that I can say is that they were tasty.

Many of the families mentioned in this post still live here.

Thanks again David and Kym, this post brought back more memories than I could ever write about here.

Last edited 2 years ago
David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  Kym Kemp

Ditto!

Sam Mason
Guest
Sam Mason
2 years ago

Ernie, as a kid growing up in Piercy in the 60’s (and with a family link to Sam Piercy) there probably wasn’t a rock we left unturned between the mouth of Indian Creek and Moody (and further west to the coast). Related to the McCush family and close to the Kirks and Eichins among earliest settlers of Piercy. I made my last hike out to the old Moody Hotel remains with a very good childhood Piercy friend 35+ years ago. The hotel was a crumbled mess of rotten wood, but as a kid it was still an upright derelict and we likened it to a ghost house. On this hike I remember finding a piece of pencil lead in the rotted foundation of the old schoolhouse and wondered of the child this belonged to. An old steam donkey was still there just a few feet from the school. The logging road was completely washed out but was once a wild thoroughfare for Shuster trucks hauling old growth to the sawmill log deck. The mile markers along that road were constantly used to let oncoming traffic know where there may be an oncoming, barreling truck on a blind turn. Whenever we were traveling these roads attention to the CB radio was a must. During the summer the dust on this road was so pulverized it turn to a fine powder so thick it was up just below your knee along some sections. Alot of timber came down those roads on the backs of those trucks.

We certainly did not appreciate it at the time but it really was a great time for kids and, yes, the trout fishing was awesome. The return of salmon was still excellent to this pristine spawning tributary. In some stretches of Indian Creek running 100 yards or more the salmon would be thick…sometimes 50 p!us fish returning to their beginnings for the first and final time. Simply phenomenal to witness such a sight a!ong many, many stretches. Hundreds of salmon returned annually.

I also remember the last stand of old growth redwood adjacent to Indian Creek just a couple miles up the creek from the Eel. I believe we referred to this location as Camp Nine. Just a beautiful grove of majesty remaining with everything around obliterated for miles. I could be wrong, but it was my recollection that one of the Anderson matriarchs insisted that this small grove (seemed like just a few acres) remain untouched. I remember this quiet touch of peace whenever we kids walked through…and we were pretty wild boys so peace was hard to come by. It’s as if there was a soft whisper of history bouncing around among those massive trunks and lofty limbs. Sad to see this grove gone when I returned on my last hike.

Another cool collection were the railroad spikes we picked up along the sections of railway where small tressels were constructed to cross gulches in the steep canyon where the logging road left the valley and rose towards Moody.

Again, a great time for rambunctious boys. No cell phones, and often a fishing pole or a .22 rifle for squirrels and cans, we were often gone from dawn to dusk with no checking in with parents…sometimes wildly rocking the 2 swinging bridges over raging flood waters or playing hide and seek with the mill night watchmen. Those really were some good times….appreciate it now!

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  Sam Mason

Beautifully written Sam. You took me on a hike that I never took when living so close by… and made my day! Thank you

Mack Sills
Guest
Mack Sills
2 years ago

What happened to Anderson is whats called –
Darwin’s evolutionary law of natural selection.
These days we call it –
The Darwin Awards

!

Knowledge
Guest
Knowledge
2 years ago

Down right amazing article. Wish it didn’t have the map. 👍

Marci
Guest
Marci
2 years ago

thanks David, Ernie, Kim and all.. Ernie, Alan ,I and our boys hiked the road from Piercy to the Coast probably about 40 years ago. Bridges were non existent and the creeks were pretty high as it was spring break at the schools. Sure wish we had had you along for history and her story ..

David Heller
Guest
David Heller
2 years ago
Reply to  Marci

Marci- Sam or Ernie would have been great guides.
33 years ago , we “Resting Oaksters” were discouraged from walking on that side as it was said to be patrolled by men on quads, dressed in camo and carrying weapons. Having been shot at near a mining operation in the Sierras, and having seen men bearing that description near the summer bridge, I squelched my fresh newcomer curiosity and never went over there. I don’t know how much was scare talk, and how much of a danger those growers were, but Piercy had a few such don’t-go areas.
I would have like to have taken both of the Dimmick built roads, the one near Indian Creek, and the one on the divide between Indian and Piercy creeks that went to the town of Kenny that was on the old coast road.

Last edited 2 years ago