The Cow Creek Tram Company was originally organized by Dennis Call and George Adams in Orange in 1890 to build and operate railroad tram lines for the purpose of harvesting logs for the Orange sawmills. Dennis Call built the Call mill in 1894, when John Henry Kirby's Gulf Beaumont and Kansas City railway penetrated the Cow Creek territory. Construction began in January 1896 near the tracks; by November, the mill was cutting 85,000 feet.
A large export company, Industrial Lumber Company of Beaumont leased the mill in 1898, presumably because of poor Texas market conditions due to overproduction. The mill burned in June 1899; only the planing mill was saved. The mill was soon rebuilt, and the Industrial Lumber Company continued the lease until 1901, when Cow Creek Lumber Company sold the mill to the newly organized Kirby Lumber Company.
Kirby Lumber added Prescott band head rig to the circular headrig in 1904 increased capacity to about 160,000-feet per day. The sawmill was appraised at $148,000 in 1904 and at $433,000 in 1911. The Call sawmill was one of Kirby's best producing mills. The mill operated until it was destroyed by fire in 1924. Lufkin Foundry and Machine Company rebuilt it as a hardwood mill, “probably the largest hardwood mill that has ever been built.” All modern improvements and conveniences were added, including concrete ground floors. The reconstruction of the Voth plant and the inclusion of the other hardwood mills at Call, Texas, and Merryville, Louisiana, gave Kirby Lumber Company four hardwood mills capable of producing 350,000 feet of lumber daily. Kirby Lumber company announced in November 1930 that it was going to close all its mills with the exception of three pine mills until further notice because of the effects of the Depression. The mill reopened in 1932 after having been closed for more than a year. The Call sawmill was closed in 1953, and its operations were consolidated into the new Silsbee plant.