The genesis of the Nacogdoches County Lumber Company is revealed in the county deed records. E. B. Tucker and Jesse Summers in August 1938 bought property on Old Tyler Road west of the Houston East and West Texas and Banita Bayou for “sawmill purposes.” In 1939 and 1940, Tilford was buying land east of of Nacogdoches for timber. The Nacogdoches County Lumber Company was organized in 1939, with E. B. Tucker, president; T. Gillette Tilford, vice president and sales manager; and Jesse Summers, secretary and production manager. Lacy H. Hunt served as vice-president during part of the 1940s. By 1950, T. G. Tilford managed and operated the mill, making almost all the executive decisions. Fire damaged the lumber facility on September 28, 1948, according to The Gulf Coast Lumberman, beginning in the fuel house and spread to the blowpipes and two dry kilns, destroying 300,000 feet of lumber and damaging sawmill itself. The estimated damages were about $75,000, of which seventy-five percent was covered by insurance. New sheds and Moore cross-circulation dry kilns were soon added. In 1951, the sawmill plant was reconstructed and modernized under the direction of Jesse W. Summers. In 1957, the sawmill was renovated with a gas-operated conveyor system, a 62-inch McConough resaw, an edger, a Crosby 10-saw trimmer, and a Cambio debarker and chipper, which produced 190 pounds of pulpwood chips from a daily cut of 50,000 board feet. In 1958, assets included seven horses, two tractors, seven company trucks, eleven contract trucks, and twelve power saws. From 1958 to 1966, Nacogdoches County Lumber Company did and contracted logging, employing about 100 loggers and mill men.
The company operated a commissary and provided some tenant houses, some still extant, on Old Tyler Road.
The mill closed in 1969, partly because of problems with the financial aspect of controlling air pollution.