Local and state-wide newspapers reported that Joe Clevenger entered the lumber business about 1898. His original mill was located about two miles west of Nacogdoches about 1899. Nacogdoches County Deed Records note transactions beginning as early as 1888 and extending to 1910 in which Clevenger was buying and selling land two to three and a half miles west of Nacogdoches. Much of the land is north of Durst Road and along the east bank of Moral Bayou. The sawmill was probably located in the Juan de Acosta grant.
When he cutout the timber, Clevenger moved in 1901 eight miles east of town, then moved to the final location on the Texas and New Orleans Railway in 1902.
Galloway & Wright Lumber Company bought the Joe P. Clevenger Mill and reported it was temporarily closing the plant down in April, 1900. The paper reported on February 27, 1901 that Joe Clevenger sold his lumber on the mill yard to C. C. Galloway and would begin tearing up his machinery in a few days and moving it Dorr Creek on the Texas & New Orleans Railroad, where he would put in a much larger mill and proceed to cut some fine pine timber.
The local newspaper mentioned March 6, 1901, that Joe Clevenger moved his sawmill machinery from west of town to a location about eight miles east of town on the new railroad. The great machinery passed through the town “yesterday.” Clevenger had cut up almost all the standing timber at the old mill, where he had been for about two years, and had to move to “tall timber.”