After finishing at Batson, G. W. Brown and David J. Williams of Brown & Williams ran a sawmill from 1904 to about 1915 at Thicket, also known as William's Station, some three miles southwest from Bragg, according to Robert L. Schaadt and Thelma Y'Barbo See. The following appeared in the American Lumberman on March 25, 1905: “Williams and Gunsendorf have begun work on their new mill at Bragg, on the Center branch of the Santa Fe. The firm, which has a capital stock of $25,000, owns 640 acres of stumpage.” The Williams Lumber Company plant was producing 45,000 feet of lumber daily in 1906, according to the Southern Industrial and Lumber Review. The ownership of the Williams Lumber Company consisted of G. W. Brown, David J. Williams, and H.P. Gunsendorf (or Geisendorf). David J. Williams was a son of David J. Williams, Sr., who operated a mill in or near Kountze for several years in the 1880s, which was known as the Brown & Williams Mill.
They also operated a sawmill and planing mill under the name of the Texas Lumber Manufacturing Company at Honey Island in 1909.