A lot of shook was shipped by rail to Southern California. Northern
California and the Pacific Northwest were the main sources for this
wood. To a very small extent, the local Brookings Lumber and Box
Company, which operated in the Lake Arrowhead area, also supplied
lumber to their box shook mill in Riverside.

Sunkist had a dedicated subsidiary, Fruit Growers Supply, to provide
pre-cut box shook to members of the cooperative. The mills were
located at Hilt and near Susanville, California.

Shipments of shook typically came in at the rate of one box car for
every ten reefers of shipped produce. This traffic lasted until wood
box making ended in the mid-1950s and packing houses switched over
to cardboard boxes.

Bob Chaparro
Moderator
Citrus Industry Modeling Group

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Bob,



You're analogy of shook to box is what I have always understood the industry to be and I have seen photos of box mills from the east coast as well as the west coast, on you might add to your list is Nalbandian Sales, Inc, in Lamont, CA who produced?boxes for the Di Georgio ?Family and their grapes crops as well as their citrus. Good wine was shipped in wooden boxes as well, even some perceived good wines ended up in boxes as well, but that didn't make it good wine... 3^)



But let's think beyond the citrus?industry alone?and not forget the boxes created for companies that provided all those soft/soda pop companies of the day and many, if in good condition, pull down a pretty penny including the micro-mini boxes of tinnie winnie bottles.



I won't say a sawmill wouldn't have a cutting plant to create boxes from shook, but it doesn't seem as likely when your pushing "footage" through a mill, at least going forward through the WWII years. It is much easier to cut stock to grade and let someone else do the remanufacturing into a specific box size for multiple uses. If I were the mill foreman I would much rather have the sales guys sell the shook in bundles of 3-foot to 6-foot random width and length and stuff it into a boxcar car than to hand stack string tied boxes from shook into a car. And if shipped assembled there would be a lot of air in that boxcar. Let's not forget that after WWII this?entire industry began to wane. A grower could?use his cheap labor to create boxes near the products being boxed and I?am willing to bet it was a lot cheaper labor than that found at the sawmill. ?



Greg Martin