page_title: L.N. Dantzler Lumber Company
section_title: Sawmills
hierarchical_section_title: L.N. Dantzler Lumber Company / History / Sawmills
caption_attribution_description: English: L.N. Dantzler Lumber Company sawmill in Moss Point, Mississippi
context_page_description: L.N. Dantzler Lumber Company began as a small sawmill owned by William Griffin in Moss Point, Mississippi. L.N. Danzler bought it in the 1870s and, with two sons, incorporated the business in 1888. Originally, the main business was the manufacture of lumber from southern yellow pine, but in 1949, the company switched to tree farming of southern pines and sold timber by selective cutting to yield a variety of wood products. The family-owned business prospered for 75 years but was sold to International Paper Company in 1966.
context_section_description: The sawmill's Moss Point location was well situated for receiving logs that were rafted down the Pascagoula and Escatawpa Rivers and their tributaries. But in order to access their inland timber-holdings, the company built a railroad from Vancleave, Mississippi, northwest into what would become Stone County.  Processed lumber from their sawmills was transported by rail, then loaded onto company ships for export through the Gulf of Mexico to Mexico, South America, the Caribbean Islands and Europe. By 1913, the company was the largest exporter of lumber in Mississippi. With the advent of World War I, demand for lumber from overseas countries declined as their economies shifted to the war effort.
  The company invested its profits from the Moss Point sawmill to purchase other existing sawmills and constructing new mills throughout south Mississippi. Their holdings once included the Bond Lumber Company (1915 to 1919), Cedar Lake Mill Company (1919 to 1927), Handsboro Lumber Company (1906 to 1914), Native Lumber Company (1899 to 1931), Ten Mile Lumber Company (1910 to 1922), and Vancleave Lumber Company (1903 to 1931).
caption: L.N. Dantzler Lumber Company sawmill at Moss Point, Mississippi (1909), courtesy of Special Collections Department, Mississippi State University Libraries
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