Nacogdoches County bills of sales records register that T. Tilford sold his interest in a J. S. Hunt Lumber Company sawmill that he owned with L. H. and L. C. Hunt in Houston County, which had been moved to Montgomery County.
J. S. Hunt was listed in the 1928 edition of the Southern Lumberman's Directory of American Saw Mills and Planing Mills as running a circular sawmill and planing mill operation at Grapeland. J. S. Hunt also operated a sawmill business in Nacogdoches, Jasper, and Willis at this time.
According to The Gulf Coast Lumberman, the J. S. Hunt Lumber Company was incorporated in 1926 at Nacogdoches with a stock capitalization of $30,000. The officers were A. W. Hunt, L. H. Hunt, and L. C. Hunt. It may have used The Farmers & Merchants Lumber Company to either do its logging or handle its retailing. J. S. Hunt Lumber Company also had a sawmill at Willis from 1928 to 1957, and one at Grapeland in 1928. Lacy H. Hunt served as president in October 1943.
All of the Hunts were partners in Tilford-Hunt Lumber Company, which owned mills at Chireno (1915) and Nacogdoches (ca. 1905 to 1943).
The mill at Grapeland was probably a victim of the economic depression, for J. S. Hunt Lumber was not listed by the LCA credit rating service at Grapeland in 1934.