| History: | The Jefferson Lumber Company was reported to be cutting 40,000 feet daily in 1893 at its Jefferson plant and 50,000 feet daily at its Kildare plant. Reed reports that Jefferson Lumber had its own logging tram, the Kildare & Linden Railway Company, which operated from 1889 to 1901, when it was abandoned, according to Zlatkovich. It is logical to assume that both the
Kildare and Linden milling operations were or had been discontinued by the latter year.
A narrow-gauge logging tramroad, the Kildare & Linden was recognized as a common carrier by the Railroad Commission of Texas in 1891. The Commission justified including it in its first list because of the road's length. The road was abandoned in 1901.
The Kildare & Linden was sold to the Kildare Lumber Company in July, 1892, the company was in financial straits. Its ownership of W. B. Ward, Jno. H. Bemis, W. B. Chew, and Elijah Robinson ordered its Trustees, H. A. O'Neal and E. A. Allday, to sell the company to Kildare Lumber Company, W. B. Ward, President for $171,000. Property included the plants, the Kildare Mill and Mill No 2 and planing mills, at Kildare with the Kildare & Linden ( a locomotive, 24 logging cars, a box car, a passenger car, and twelve miles of tracks, with stations at both towns); and the sawmill and planing mill at Atlanta, with the Atlanta & Mt. Pleasant (two locomotives and). Robinson gave a quitclaim on Kildare Lumber Company on July 19, 1892.
On August 15, 1898, Ed Rand, A. C. Smith, and M. Jacobs conveyed to W. A. Rule the assets of the former Kildare Lumber Company, worth $25,000 of sawmills, planing mills, railroad stock, etc. Rule, as agent of the National Bank of Commerce could sell the property if the note was not met.
The Jefferson Lumber Company, according to Strapac, of Jefferson operated four locomotives over a 36-inch track tram road to Kildare during the later 1880s and early 1890s. |