Formerly the site of a sawmill and dusty trail in the early 1900s, present-day Nichols Sawmill Road winds along a largely residential area of Magnolia with segments still lined by historic tall pine trees from generations past.
"[The sawmill] was there ever since I can remember," Magnolia native and historian Celeste Graves said.
Now 95 years old, Graves said she has lived much of her life in Magnolia and remembers the sawmill's existence in her younger years. Graves said the mill may have closed down sometime after World War II, which would have put its operational lifespan between 30–40 years.
"I was quite young to pay attention to those things," Graves said. "So I don't remember when it went out of business."
In Graves' 2004 book "Magnolia Memories," Annie Laura Nichols recounts the history of her ancestor's family sawmill.
In the 1860s, Alabama native John Anderson Nichols came to Texas during the Civil War and settled in Montgomery County after a trip through the Florida Everglades, according to Graves' book. Traveling with his parents, Nichols originally brought livestock to establish a farm, but the abundance of dense piney woods in the area led him to become interested in another industry—lumber.
"[The sawmill] was there ever since I can remember." —Celeste Graves, Magnolia native and historian
After purchasing 600 acres in the early 1900s, Nichols built a sawmill shortly thereafter on Three-Mile Creek in Montgomery County. Nichols later relocated the sawmill to the Magnolia area along the curve of Nichols Sawmill Road near Turtle Dove Lane. The exact timeframe of the relocation is unknown, although historical accounts estimate it was before 1909.
The Nichols family sawmill was one of many located in Magnolia at the time. Graves said the lumber industry was one of the main livelihoods for local residents along with farming.
"I doubt there were more than three or four [employees at the sawmill]," Graves said. "Those little sawmills were run by the family. The only other [businesses] were general stores, and there were only a few of those."
Nichols' son Harvey continued operating the family sawmill with his new wife, Edna Dinkins. Nichols' grandson, Harvey Lester, who was born in 1909, worked in the mill from his late teens. In 1930, Harvey Lester married Annie Laura Gale, the first cousin of Graves' father.
Graves, who worked as a dispatcher at Houston Municipal Airport during part of World War II, said the sawmill may have closed during one of her brief absences from Magnolia. During that time period, Graves traveled with her husband while he served as a radio operator for the military.
"In the [19]40s and [19]50s, he was in the service, so we were in California then," Graves said. "I remember coming back in the 1950s and seeing that Magnolia had been built up quite a bit."
The sawmill passed into history, but the name of the roughly 9-mile road it resided on remains as a marker. The exact date when the road was named is unknown due to a lack of historical records.
The road corridor has transformed over the past 50 years. Nichols Sawmill Road is now home to a mixture of residential development and businesses as well as Magnolia ISD schools and the Celeste Graves Education Center, named to honor Graves' 34 years of service to the district as a secretary and office manager.
