STATE from a Small BOX to a Giant Complex

A BRUCE WALTON is a name shift, and takes its production from 4,500 acres of company-owned timberland. The mill is located 18 miles northeast of Nevada City. California and Robert Jacks is the-present Resident Manager.

.Cl.. well known in the Western Lumber Industry. Within the short span of just two decades, two A. B. Waltons, Senior and Junior, have built a thriving complex of nine corporations making up the State Box Company group.

America was still writhing in the throes of the depression in 1937 when A. B. Walton, Senior, had the courage to risk his meager capital on a dream. ft was in that year he pulled out from the security of a job with the Setzer Box Company to found his own boxshook manufacturing plant.

State Box Company was born that year on Walton capital and a small amount of monev borrowed from a few trusting friends. The plant was small at the beginning, but the Senior Walton had literally grown up in the lumber industry, and he knew how to make a little go a long way. He was born in Fall River Mills, in the heart of the California pine country, and grew up in Montague. He married the former Joyce E. Carpender, a native of Placerville, California.

Claude Gier, Senior, another former Setzer Box employee, joined the new firm as Plant Superintendent. He is still a member of the firm and serves as its Assistant Manager and as a Member of the Board of Directors.

When the State Box Company embarked in the box-shook manufacturing business, progress was rapid, and the firm began to grow. State Box entered into the first of several acquisitions by taking over the Tahoe Sugar Pine Company of Washington, Nevada County, in 1944.

The Tahoe sawmill has a production of 100,000 board feet per eight hour.

In 1945 the elder Walton acquired controlling interest in the Georgetown Lumber Company of Georgetown, California. This sawmill also has a production of 100,000 board feet per eight-hour shift. It is located 17 miles north of Placerville, California, and the property includes 10,000 acres of company-owned timberland. The Resident Manager of this mill is Fred Becker.

During the year of 1950 Mr. Walton bought an interest in El Dorado Forest Products Company, which has complete re-manufacturing facilities. The El Dorado has three planers, a re-saw, a rip saw, and can produce all types of pattern stock. ft processes 150,000 board feet per eight-hour shift.

Bruce Walton, Junior purchased the balance of the El Dorado Company in 1957. Following the purchase it became a division of the State Box Company group, and is now known as the State Box Company, Planing Mill Division. Herman Bauer is the Resident Manager.

\Malton, Junior joined State Box in the early 1940's, and was appointed Resident Manager of the Georgetown Mill in 1946. In 1948 he moved to Phoenix, Arizona to head the State Box shook-sales office. He formed his own privately owned concern, the Arcade Moulding Company, in Sacramento, during 1952, and took leave of the State Box Company to direct his own company's management. How- ever, when A. B. Waltoin, Senior passed away in 1955, Bruce, Junior returned to State Box to take over its direction.

The Lumber Sales Division of State Box was organized in April, 1959. At that time only a portion of the pine produced by the organization's mills was used in the manufacture of shook. The Sales Division was created to merchandise and market the entire production of the State Box Lumber Mills.

Henry Alsaker, formerly Western Sales Reoresentative for the Paine Lumber eompany, Ltd., was brought in to head up the Lumber Sales Division. He immediately set out to augment the production of the State Box Mills, so that the division's customers could be offered a complete line of the Western Pine species. The Sales Division buys from 23 sawmills, and sup- plies its customers all soft-textured western species. It markets between 5 and 6 million board feet per month.

The Sales Division specializes in dry white fir and green douglas fir studs, which are precision end-trimmed to any desired length. They are readied for unitized carloading, with green painted ends and are steelstrapped. The Division also sells and ships ponderosa pine, sugar pine, white fir, douglas fir, and cedar lumber, in addition to pine and fir mouldings and cut stock. Shipments are made by truck and trailer and by flat and box car. Rail shipments are made by the Southern Pacific.

Kenneth D. Gordon. a familiar name in Northern California lumber circles. handles most douglas fir sales, and specializes in the California market. William J. Clifton, with an extensive lumber background, primarily handles pine and specialty items. Donald E. Sames, now serving his apprenticeship in the Sales Division, had experience at the Georgetown operation and the Planing Mill Division. The combined experience of the sales force enables it to give alert service to all markets with any specie required.

Newest member of the State Box family is Oroville, which was completed in August, 1960. This is one of the firEt log-gang sawmills in California, and it produces 60,000 board feet per eight-hour shift. The mill is equipped with special machinery which permits it to process small logs that other mills cannot handle. This opens up a market for logs from cut-over timber or in thinning programs on mature stands. The unique machinery employs multiple saws and marks a