Lumbering operations of the F.B. Williams Cypress Co. Ltd. Patterson, La.

THNOC's founder L. Kemper Williams and his family ran a cypress business in Patterson, Louisiana. This 1920s video shows the operations of the company. Kemper's father Frank B. Williams ran the successful cypress lumber business in the swamps of southern Louisiana, using his experience in the railroad industry to make labor-intensive work more efficient with technology. The F. B. Williams Cypress Lumber Company grew to become one of the largest lumber firms in the country, and Mr. Williams became known as the “Cypress King.”

[@ABetterShreveport]

Louisiana loved the illusion of unending abundance in our forests.
Sweet memories of life down de bayou. But painful in the inevitable abuse of the ancient forest.

[@jamieseach8911]

Interesting video

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Sad still going on

[@JimWinBR]

This type of operation (clear cutting old growth cypress) is not ongoing in Louisiana, maybe elsewhere in the world. Some people are harvesting old sinker cypress logs that were cut in the 1920 and sporadically up to 1960, but these forest are protected.