ALLENTOWN
The following was taken from an article written by Clifton D. Cardin, Bossier Parish Historian:
Allentown was best described by the Shreveport Times, October 24, 1894.
"In the spring of 1891, Messrs. Allen Bros. & Watley, saw mill men of long experience, bought several thousand acres of land in Bossier Parish, and, three miles north of Haughton, they established one of the largest and most complete saw and planing mills in the state. This place is known as Allentown. It is one of the busiest places in America. From daylight until dark the hum of the saws and clattering of the planing mill knives furnish music by which every man and boy able to do duty, march. There are no drones or idlers at Allentown, and none are allowed to remain there - all must work or move on. From 120 to 140 men are kept constantly employed. The employees live within a short distance of the mill in houses which were built for their comfort and convenience by the company. While Allentown is not incorporated, yet the best of order and discipline is maintained. In a word, it is a model town. It has its own school house, church and Sunday school;, a resident physician, a large store which is stocked from one end to the other with general merchandize, and many other comforts and conveniences not often found in more pretentious towns. The average daily attendance at school is forty. Church services are held regularly once a month by Rev.J. B. Williams, a Methodist minister. Sunday school services are held regularly every Sabbath. Dr. W.J. Mobley is the resident physician. No whiskey or intoxicants of any knife are allowed to be sold or handled, and immediate discharge is the penalty for any employee, it matters not what position he occupies, who appears in Allentown drunk or under the influence of liquor. This is an inflexible rule of Mssrs. Allen Bros. & Wadley. The employees are paid off every evening at 6 o'clock.
THE MILL AND IT'S CAPACITY
The saw and planing mills are furnished throughout with the best and latest improved machinery, every piece of which is entirely new. All kinds of yellow and oak lumber are manufactured. the average daily output of lumber is about 70,000 feet and the monthly shipments range from sixty to ninety cars per month.This lumber is shipped principally to Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, North and South Dakota, Illinois, Missouri, Texas and the Indian Territory. The capacity of the planing mill is 100,000 feet per day, quite recently a Ketchum dry kiln with drying capacity of 40,000 feet per day, has been put up. There is on hand at present about 4,000,000 feet of lumber.
The shipping point of Allen Bros. & Wadley is Wadley's switch on
the Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad, three miles east of Haughton, while their
express office and telegraph office is at the latter place.
This firm owns nine miles of railroad, which they are gradually
extending due north, and will soon reach the Bodcau. One locomotive and twenty flat cars
are daily employed hauling logs from the interior to the mill. Allen Bros. & Wadley
own 6,000 or 7,000 acres of timber land and own the timber on thousands of acres of other
lands adjacent to their line of railroad. The railroad is not only indispensable to the
mill, but is of great service to the people living along or in close proximity to it. For
some time the farmers have been endeavoring to get their cotton hauled by rail to Wadley's
station, and Messr. Allen Bros. & Wadley, ever ready to do all in their power to
accommodate their friends, have entered into correspondence with the officials of the
Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad and as soon as satisfactory arrangements can be
made they will build a warehouse at Wadley station and begin to haul cotton and other
farms products to and from that station.
The population of Allentown is between 400 & 500 souls. It is
strictly a saw mill town, where everything is on the qui vive from sun rise to sun set. It
is a veritable human bee hive. There drones, idlers or tramps have no abode. Allentown is
a regular post office and has daily mail service."
A map from 1896 shows the location of the
Allentown station on the Vicksburg Shreveport and Pacific Railroad line between Doyle
Station (Doyline) and Haughton. It also shows the sawmill railroad running from the
Allentown station to Bellevue.
The sawmill operated in eastern Bossier Parish from 1891 until 1908.
Remains of the old sawmill still exist, outside the domain of the LAAP, but very close to
the Allentown Cemetery that is located inside the boundaries of LAAP.
There is only one marked grave in the cemetery. That headstone reads:
IN LOVING
MEMORY OF
OUR DEAR BABY
ROSSIE LEE
WIMBUSH
BORN NOV 13
1898
DIED MCH 13
1899
AGE 4 MTS
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