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The Fernridge Lumber Company was formed in 1909 to take over the Dominion Shingle and Lumber Manufacturing Company, including the shingle mill in Aldergrove. Early investors in the company included Charles William Tait, Clarence Hunter DeBeck, Edward A. Grant J. Stilwell Clute, George Martin, and Thomas S Annandale.

The Aldergrove mill was located on the west side of Bertrand Creek and serviced by the Great Northern railway. Logs would be hauled onto flat cars pulled along the tracks by horses and dumped into the creek. An electric generator ran the mill and provided power to the nearby Nascous, William’s and Hamres households.

Many people worked at the mill. Surviving time checks show some of the workers were Japanese, Hindu (likely Indian), and Chinese. According to one source employees with an Asian background were not allowed to work around the machinery. Instead, they would pile the lumber, build roads, railway lines and work on the log boom. They were paid in tokens that only worked at the company store.

Speaking to the Alder Grove Historical society some locals shared memories of the mill. Mary (Dediluke) Farris recalled the small train which brought logs to the conveyor, which cut them into six-foot lengths. Mr. Dediluke lived on site, in a camp set up to house the workers. He lived there all week, going home to visit his family on the weekends. He would lose two fingers at the mill in a workplace accident. Byron Smith’s daughter remembered that her father, who ran a general store nearby, would use his Model T car to drive injured workers to a doctor. The manager of the mill would blast the steam whistle a certain to summon the Model T.

The mill was destroyed by fire in August 1914. The company was already struggling at the time, impacted by the depression that World War One had triggered, and the fire ended the company.