Demolition under way at Weyerhaeuser

Published 1:35 pm Thursday, December 11, 2008

By Kevin Hanson , The Courier-Herald

Enumclaw's long and proud relationship with the giant Weyerhaeuser timber company came to an official end last year, when the final logs rolled through the local sawmill. Now, the marriage between town and company has taken a symbolic hit, as work crews have started tearing down the mill.

Enumclaw's reputation as a mill town goes back to the 1890s, when logging began in earnest. The White River Lumber Company was purchased by Weyerhaeuser in 1949, and generations of local families owed their livelihoods to the trees harvested from area forests and milled at the operation just a couple of miles outside of town.

The death knell was sounded in 2002, when Federal Way-based Weyerhaeuser announced it was selling its area timberland and closing mills in Enumclaw and Snoqualmie. The final logs were cut in early 2003 and the last of the region's 260 employees drew their final paychecks.

Last week, crews from Staton Cos., a Eugene, Ore., firm, began the process of tearing down the lumber mill. Demolition isn't what it used to be, and Staton workers are salvaging as much as possible, hoping materials can be reused. Scrap metal is destined for recyclers, concrete can be ground up and used in aggregate and even old timbers have a new use. Huge timbers used in industrial buildings of another era are now being remilled and used in upscale homes; such beams simply can't be milled from trees harvested these days.

When Weyerhaeuser announced it would close the Enumclaw operation, the company said the administration building and a truck shop would remain on the site. No decision has been announced regarding the fate of those buildings.

Kevin Hanson can be reached at khanson@cmg-northwest2.go-vip.net/courierherald