By Michael D. Wynne
This columnist just loves going to the Southern Forest Heritage Museum and Research Center (SFHM)! This place is not as much a “museum” as we traditionally think of museums, but a massive old sawmill complex that one can not only get a lot of good old exercise at, but even ride a train!
The SFHM is the most complete early 20th century sawmill in our nation and it is in our backyard! It represents the “GOLDEN AGE OF LOGGING/LUMBERING,” from the late 1870s to the 1950s, and also the transition into the “GOLDEN AGE OF FORESTRY.”
Let’s start from the beginning. This sawmill was created in 1896 by the Crowell Lumber Company and the sawmill operated until 1969, a total of seventy years. This length of time for its existence was quite unusual for a sawmill town, as the local area forests were depleted of lumber in about twenty years. Although the Crowell Company was more conservative in their lumber usage, in 1969, the front gates were padlocked and the grounds were abandoned for 25 years.
In 1994, the Crowell family donated the grounds for the creation of a museum. The grounds by then were completely grown up and many of the buildings were crumbling. Through money from the U. S. Forest Service and other sources, the buildings were stabilized and a strategic plan for the facility was created.
There is so many wonderful things to say about the SFHM that this columnist can only touch on a few. The Civilian Conservation Corps Museum, the Henry Hardtner House, the Camp Claiborne Museum, and the World War II “Home Front” Museum have all been spoken about in my other columns. But the sawmill complex itself is the focus of this column.
One of the many fascinating buildings there is the machine shop. This gigantic shop is run not on electric, but by a belt-driven system. It is likely the only old-time, working belt-driven system left in all of Louisiana and has to be seen to be believed.
The whole complex requires many more buildings than just for cutting wood. The pine timber has to be hauled there by trains, loaded into saws to be cut, with the sawdust transported to another building to be burnt. The newly-cut lumber has to be stored and eventually loaded back onto train cars to be taken to the big cities to be sold.
Some of the buildings at SFHM are so large that they must have been the largest buildings in central Louisiana outside of Alexandria at their peak.
And did I mention the wonderful train! It is the only place that I know of locally to see a big, old-fashion train in CenLa, or maybe anywhere else in North Louisiana for that matter. There is also a rare surviving steam-powered skidder and log-loading train
cars. Although the big train engine is still to be restored for use, there is a smaller two-car train that you and your family can ride when you come visit. This little train can take you around the whole complex instead of the long walk if you choose.
The buildings also host, meetings, parties, family get-togethers, even is a wedding venue.
So, if you and your family one weekend want to learn, have fun, gets some exercise in, or any combination thereof, come out to the Southern Forest Heritage Museum for a great day!
