Name/Title
Print, PhotographicEntry/Object ID
A2010.1Description
Photo of a sawmill, taken in either 1921 or 1922 by the donor. She wrote that she took the photo when her husband was fireguard for the Forest Service stationed at the Tunnel Ranger Station. At the same time she was operator of the Mountain Telephone Line. She points out that the phone line can be seen in front of the mill.
Donor says it is the Cottonwood Sawmill, but a visitor to the museum in 1976 identified it as the Mammoth Sawmill.
If it is the Cottonwood Sawmill, it was completed in 1873, and was built by Col. Sherman Stevens to furnish timber and charcoal for Cerro Gordo. A flume was built from the mill to the kilns on Owens Lake and charcoal was burned there. The timbers were loaded on the steamer the Molly Stevens, transported to Swansea, then loaded on big wagons and taken up the steep grade to the mines. The mill stood much as the picture shows mill after WWII. Carless campers left burning coals and the mill was burned down about 1948.
If it is the Mammoth Sawmill, it is the 10 stamp Doyle Mill.Collection
Clarice Tate Uhlmeyer Collection
