In 1908, Carlson mortgaged his entire cut at Stockman to the First National Bank at Center; his steam boiler for $225 to J. M. Cardell [Cordell]. A year earlier, he had mortgaged a shotgun steam feed to Dilley & Son. The Carlson sawmill would have been close to the Texas & Gulf, the Waterman Lumber Company tram road connecting Waterman and Stockman to Timpson.
The Southern Lumberman reported in June 1908 that a large fire destroyed the lumber yard and about a million feet of pine and hardwood lumber, but the sawmill was saved.