Fernwood Lumber Company had its beginning in the 1870s when John Fletcher Enochs and his son, Isaac Columbus Enochs, started a lumber business near Crystal Springs in

Copiah County, Mississippi Copiah County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 census, the population was 28,368. The county seat is Hazlehurst. With an eastern border formed by the Pearl River, Copiah County is part of the Jackson, MS Me ...

.James E. Fickle. 2001. Mississippi Forests and Forestry. University Press of Mississippi, Jackson
Retrieved 2013-08-17 Between 1880 and 1920, Fernwood Lumber Company became one of the largest lumber operations in south Mississippi with investments in timberland, lumber mills, and railroads.

History

By the mid-1880s, Isaac Enochs had brought two of his brothers, James Luther and Philip Henry, into the family lumber business and expanded their operations by purchasing timberland and constructing a sawmill between the towns of McComb and

Magnolia ''Magnolia'' is a large genus of about 210 to 340The number of species in the genus ''Magnolia'' depends on the taxonomic view that one takes up. Recent molecular and morphological research shows that former genera ''Talauma'', ''Dugandiodendro ...

in Pike County. The business was incorporated in 1884 as Fernwood Lumber Company, and the Enochs built the

company town A company town is a place where practically all stores and housing are owned by the one company that is also the main employer. Company towns are often planned with a suite of amenities such as stores, houses of worship, schools, markets and re ...

of Fernwood. That same year, Philip Henry Enochs became president of Fernwood Lumber Company,Guide to the Fernwood Collection, Mississippi State University
Retrieved 2013-08-17 and built a home in Fernwood. The Philip Enochs home is on the National Register of Historic Places in Pike County, Mississippi. The Fernwood Lumber Company continued to expand through the 1890s, adding planning mills, opening a retail lumber yard in

Jackson Jackson may refer to: People and fictional characters * Jackson (name), including a list of people and fictional characters with the surname or given name Places Australia * Jackson, Queensland, a town in the Maranoa Region * Jackson North, Q ...

, and acquiring timberland in

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

Oklahoma Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

, and

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

. By 1910, the company sawmill was processing 100,000

board feet The board foot or board-foot is a unit of measurement for the volume of lumber in the United States and Canada. It equals the volume of a length of a board, one foot wide and thick. Board foot can be abbreviated as FBM (for "foot, board measure" ...

of lumber daily. David S. Price. 1998. Tap Lines—The Fernwood, Columbia and Gulf Rail Road
Retrieved 2013-08-17 Once the virgin pines nearest the mill had been cut, the Enochs company built railroad spurs into more distant forests for bringing logs to the mill. Fernwood Lumber Company organized its logging railroad into a common carrier, the ''Fernwood & Gulf Railroad'', which was incorporated in 1906. In 1920, the Fernwood & Gulf Railroad became ''Fernwood, Columbia & Gulf Railroad'' with of track. The Fernwood railroad connected to the larger

Illinois Central Railroad The Illinois Central Railroad , sometimes called the Main Line of Mid-America, was a railroad in the Central United States, with its primary routes connecting Chicago, Illinois, with New Orleans, Louisiana, and Mobile, Alabama. A line also co ...

and the

New Orleans Great Northern Railroad New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz (South Korean band), The Boyz Albums and EPs * New (album), ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartn ...

. Retrieved 2013-08-17 Early in the 20th century, the Enochs traded some of their timberland for stock in the newly formed

Great Southern Lumber Company The Great Southern Lumber Company was chartered in 1902 to harvest and market the virgin longleaf pine (''Pinus palustris'' L.) forests in southeastern Louisiana and southwestern Mississippi. Bogalusa, Louisiana was developed from the ground up a ...

Bogalusa, Louisiana Bogalusa is a city in Washington Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 12,232 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census. In th2020 censusthe city, town, place equivalent reported a population of 10,659. It is the principal city ...

, and Isaac Enochs became a director in Great Southern. In 1913, a ruling by the

Interstate Commerce Commission The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a regulatory agency in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads (and later trucking) to ensure fair rates, to eliminat ...

resulted in dissolution of the Enochs brothers partnership so as to separate their lumber business from their railroad enterprises. Near Fernwood, the Enochs began farming and raised cattle and hogs on their cutover land to promote settlement. In 1914, the brothers established Enochs Farms, but it was sold in 1920. Fernwood Lumber Company continued operation into the late 1920s, but closed when the last of the virgin pines were cut. In the 1930s, the Enochs family established other wood product companies which became Fernwood Industries, with specialization in pressure treated timber.

References

{{Mississippi-stub Pike County, Mississippi Defunct companies based in Mississippi Defunct forest products companies of the United States