San Joaquin Lumber Company’s hundred years of operations – with a yard in Manteca and a mill in Stockton – is being celebrated Thursday.
It is part of the Manteca Historical Society meeting taking place at the museum, 600 W. Yosemite Ave.
Longtime manager of the Manteca facility, Tony Martin, will be on hand to greet his countless past customers who traded with him from 1956 until he retired in 1995. Tony’s wife Dorothy worked at the West Yosemite Avenue location for 21 years as bookkeeper. She retired a year behind her husband in 1996.
A veteran of 22 years with San Joaquin Lumber and current manager Dale Ramon will also be at the celebration as will the company’s corporate officer Jeff French. The lumber company’s main office remains in Stockton. The Tracy operation was closed several years ago.
Martin remembers all of his customers who bought building supplies from him over the years including the Raymus team along with Bob Steves and Atherton-Kirk.
“We did very well in those days,” he recalled.
Three of his four children worked part time at the yard with Janice assisting her mother in the bookkeeping duties for four years. Son Tony worked for his dad some two years when he was out of school from San Jose State. Eddie, the youngest, has been at the lumber yard for 21 years – now 46 years old.
Martin raised the larger English variety of parakeets in an aviary behind his home for over 20 years, having as many as 200 birds at any given time. He traveled to Hawaii and around the country showing his birds having hundreds of trophies representing his successes. Now since his retirement he has been farming 40 acres of almonds.
Aside from the birds during his tenure at San Joaquin Lumber, Martin was quite the fisherman – known as “Striper King” to his friends. He remembers fishing all night in a 12-foot aluminum boat – fishing for cat fish until he had his limit of 40 fish.
It will be 100 years on Nov. 14. The company was incorporated in 1910 by Newton Rutherford and Robert Inglis – whose grandson is still a director – and attorney Charles L. Neumiller.
Two weeks later the fledgling lumber company purchased Gardner Lumber and its lumber stock, trucks, wagons, horses and mules. The purchase price was nearly $36,000 and included the oats and hay for the animals.
In a quick moving succession of events, the Charles A. Smith Lumber of Tacoma Washington purchased the majority interest in the company on Dec. 5, 1910. Smith had been lauded as one of Oregon’s most powerful lumbermen with mills in Oregon employing over 600 workers, producing more than 600,000 board feet of lumber per day.
In January 1919 Smith went broke, and his creditors reorganized the company with its shares being acquired by the Coos Bay Lumber Company.
In August of 1925 the Robert Dollar Logging and Steamship Line took over the struggling Pacific States Logging inheriting the San Joaquin Lumber Company. The entire board of directors reportedly resigned and was replaced by Robert Dollar and Charles King. Dollar was a lumber and steamship line tycoon, shipping lumber and travelers all over the world.
In January 1928 the lumber brokerage firm of Wendling-Nathan purchased San Joaquin Lumber from Robert Dollar. Wendling-Nathan was owned by Roy Hills and Maurice Euphrat. Their grandsons continue as owners and directors to this day.
For years from 1920 to 1941 lumber arrived by rail and barge to a wooden dock on the south bank of the Mormon Slough where the Stockton yard is still located. Horses and mules pulled narrow gauge railroad carts of lumber up and down the bank and to the sheds on the property.
Occasionally a barge of coal would be unloaded at the facility and hauled into town.
In 1933 the schooner S.S. Daisy Gray was the first ocean going ship to dock at the new Port of Stockton – loaded with some 700,000 board feet of lumber destined for delivery to the San Joaquin Lumber Company.
In March of 1946 the lumber company purchased property on Yosemite Avenue from James and Teresa Baulina for $7,500. Four days later the mill in Stockton was destroyed by fire. And in December of that year $30,000 was allocated to build a store and sheds at the Manteca site.
In 1948 a lot on Willow Street – across from the new Manteca location – was purchased from J. Frank Jessee for $1,500.
It is part of the Manteca Historical Society meeting taking place at the museum, 600 W. Yosemite Ave.
Longtime manager of the Manteca facility, Tony Martin, will be on hand to greet his countless past customers who traded with him from 1956 until he retired in 1995. Tony’s wife Dorothy worked at the West Yosemite Avenue location for 21 years as bookkeeper. She retired a year behind her husband in 1996.
A veteran of 22 years with San Joaquin Lumber and current manager Dale Ramon will also be at the celebration as will the company’s corporate officer Jeff French. The lumber company’s main office remains in Stockton. The Tracy operation was closed several years ago.
Martin remembers all of his customers who bought building supplies from him over the years including the Raymus team along with Bob Steves and Atherton-Kirk.
“We did very well in those days,” he recalled.
Three of his four children worked part time at the yard with Janice assisting her mother in the bookkeeping duties for four years. Son Tony worked for his dad some two years when he was out of school from San Jose State. Eddie, the youngest, has been at the lumber yard for 21 years – now 46 years old.
Martin raised the larger English variety of parakeets in an aviary behind his home for over 20 years, having as many as 200 birds at any given time. He traveled to Hawaii and around the country showing his birds having hundreds of trophies representing his successes. Now since his retirement he has been farming 40 acres of almonds.
Aside from the birds during his tenure at San Joaquin Lumber, Martin was quite the fisherman – known as “Striper King” to his friends. He remembers fishing all night in a 12-foot aluminum boat – fishing for cat fish until he had his limit of 40 fish.
It will be 100 years on Nov. 14. The company was incorporated in 1910 by Newton Rutherford and Robert Inglis – whose grandson is still a director – and attorney Charles L. Neumiller.
Two weeks later the fledgling lumber company purchased Gardner Lumber and its lumber stock, trucks, wagons, horses and mules. The purchase price was nearly $36,000 and included the oats and hay for the animals.
In a quick moving succession of events, the Charles A. Smith Lumber of Tacoma Washington purchased the majority interest in the company on Dec. 5, 1910. Smith had been lauded as one of Oregon’s most powerful lumbermen with mills in Oregon employing over 600 workers, producing more than 600,000 board feet of lumber per day.
In January 1919 Smith went broke, and his creditors reorganized the company with its shares being acquired by the Coos Bay Lumber Company.
In August of 1925 the Robert Dollar Logging and Steamship Line took over the struggling Pacific States Logging inheriting the San Joaquin Lumber Company. The entire board of directors reportedly resigned and was replaced by Robert Dollar and Charles King. Dollar was a lumber and steamship line tycoon, shipping lumber and travelers all over the world.
In January 1928 the lumber brokerage firm of Wendling-Nathan purchased San Joaquin Lumber from Robert Dollar. Wendling-Nathan was owned by Roy Hills and Maurice Euphrat. Their grandsons continue as owners and directors to this day.
For years from 1920 to 1941 lumber arrived by rail and barge to a wooden dock on the south bank of the Mormon Slough where the Stockton yard is still located. Horses and mules pulled narrow gauge railroad carts of lumber up and down the bank and to the sheds on the property.
Occasionally a barge of coal would be unloaded at the facility and hauled into town.
In 1933 the schooner S.S. Daisy Gray was the first ocean going ship to dock at the new Port of Stockton – loaded with some 700,000 board feet of lumber destined for delivery to the San Joaquin Lumber Company.
In March of 1946 the lumber company purchased property on Yosemite Avenue from James and Teresa Baulina for $7,500. Four days later the mill in Stockton was destroyed by fire. And in December of that year $30,000 was allocated to build a store and sheds at the Manteca site.
In 1948 a lot on Willow Street – across from the new Manteca location – was purchased from J. Frank Jessee for $1,500.
