Re: Converse Basin Redux

To conclude our story on Sanger Lumber Company, The Sequoia Railroad, and Converse Basin, here's a map of Millwood drawn by Don Devere and found in Hank Johnston's They Felled The Redwoods:


So what is left at Millwood? A little searching around in the area of the grade entering town and the company store turned up an old smoke jack:


Here's an old can and some asbestos packing above the can:

There was also some wire rope, but not much else to indicate a town once existed here.

Here's a view taken just below the railroad grade entering Millwood looking southwest at the area where the lumber stacks were located:


Amazingly, after all of the logging and destruction of the Giant Sequoia, the Sanger Lumber Company never made a profit. Eventually, the Hume-Bennett Lumber Company bought Sanger Lumber and, after a 1905 fire at the Converse Mill, all of the equipment was moved about three miles to the east where it became part of Hume-Bennett's new operation. A new sawmill and dam was built on Hume lake and a connection was made to the original Sanger Lumber flume. The Shays were standard gauged in 1914. Finally, the Hume-Bennett operation closed down in 1924 without ever making a profit. Both Shays were eventually scrapped along with the log cars.
One piece of surviving equipment is a Dolbeer Donkey pulled out of the Hume woods back in the 1974 and restored to operation. It is now on display at the Dunlap Forest Service office.

(A twin was also recovered and it is now at Turtle Bay in Redding and a large yarder (sans boiler) was left in the Hume woods).

It is not known when the Dolbeer was purchased, but it might be one of the original Sanger Lumber donkeys and may have been used in Converse Basin.
Although the destruction of the Converse Basin Sequoia is a sad event, the negative publicity of this act eventually led to protection of the remaining Sequoia groves...