D. C. Ford owned a sawmill near Tatum in 1891. That year he sold it for $666 to a firm comprising Jno B. Fort of Panola County and Brown & Flewellen of Harrison County. Equipment included the sawmill, an engine, a boiler, a shingle machine, and twenty oxen. The Galveston listing of 1893 still carried this mill under the name of D. C. Ford; the mill was cutting 15,000 feet of lumber daily. In 1907, a sawmill firm at Tatum in the name of Fort & Allen was listed in the Reference Book of the Lumbermen's Credit Association. Considering that no other Browns, Flewellens, or Allens were listed at or near Tatum during these years, it is reasonable to assume that Jonathan Fort had taken a partner named Allen before 1907.
The Brown and Flewellen Lumber Company of Longview dissolved in January 1908 when R. G. Brown bought out J. J. Flewellen. The sale included a nine-mile tram that ran nine miles north from Longview, all sawmills, planers, warehouses, commissaries, etc. The sale price was $5,000.