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Prentice Bloedel photograph collection, 1880s-1950s

Overview of the Collection

Collector
Bloedel, Prentice, 1900-1996
Title
Prentice Bloedel photograph collection
Dates
1880s-1950s (inclusive)
1920s-1950s (bulk)
Quantity
1587 photographic prints (12 albums)
10 boxes
Collection Number
PH0531
Summary
Photographs documenting the lumber operations of the Bloedel family in British Columbia and Washington
Repository
University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections
Special Collections
University of Washington Libraries
Box 352900
Seattle, WA
98195-2900
Telephone: 2065431929
Fax: 2065431931
speccoll@uw.edu
Access Restrictions

Entire collection can be viewed on the Libraries’ Digital Collections website. Permission of Visual Materials Curator is required to view originals. Contact Special Collections for more information.

Request at UW

Additional Reference Guides

Languages
English
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Biographical Note

Prentice Bloedel was a leader of the timber industry. He left a brief teaching career to join the management of his family's far-flung timber empire and led the industry's forest-conservation efforts. Bloedel guided the firm into a merger with H. R. MacMillan Export Co., which became the giant MacMillan Bloedel Ltd. Prentice and Virginia Bloedel were important patrons of the arts in Seattle, a tradition carried on by their daughter Virginia Wright. The Bloedels created the Bloedel Reserve, a botanical showcase of gardens, pools, lawns, and arbors on Bainbridge Island. Born in Bellingham in 1900, Bloedel graduated from Yale University planning to be a teacher. In 1929, in response to a request from his father, he gave up his teaching career and went to work in the family business: Bloedel, Stewart and Welch, based on Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

He first took charge of a new mill at Port Alberni, B.C. The mill became one of the first to make efficient use of sawdust and waste, called "hog fuel," to generate power. He believed integrating a pulp mill with sawmill operations would get the most out of every stick of timber, and the mill became one of the first waste-based operations in North America. In 1938, Bloedel guided the company into a reforestation program and the firm became the first company to plant seedlings. A decade later, the firm was responsible for 70 percent of all the reforestation carried out by private industry in British Columbia. During the 1930s and 1940s, Bloedel began buying land in Whatcom and Skagit counties that had been clear-cut and abandoned. He became treasurer of Bloedel, Stewart and Welch in 1942 and continued to implement innovations to the industry.

In 1948, he launched a plant designed to produce fuel briquettes made from shingle waste products, which were marketed under license as "pres-to-logs." Two years later, driven by a reluctant conviction that "to do the best with the resource would require larger units, greater markets and greater flexibility in product," Bloedel guided the firm into a merger with H.R. MacMillan Export Co., which became the giant MacMillan Bloedel Ltd. He moved back to Seattle and to Bainbridge Island and, in early 1972, retired from the board of MacMillan Bloedel. He continued his involvement in the industry through his leadership of Bloedel Timberlands Development Inc., a company he founded in 1945 in partnership with his father. The firm bought up land long since logged and essentially abandoned.

Prentice Bloedel died at his Capitol Hill (Seattle) home in June 1996, at age 95.

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Historical Background

Julius Bloedel went into partnership with J.F. Wardner in Fairhaven, Washington, organizing the Samish Lake Logging Co. in 1890. Eight years later he formed the Lake Whatcom Logging Co., which in 1901 was reorganized into the Larson Lumber Co. The company changed its name in 1913 to the Bloedel-Donovan Lumber Mills, taking over the property of the Lake Whatcom Logging Co., Larson Lumber Co. and the Bellingham Bay Mill Co. Bloedel began his Canadian venture in 1911 when he launched the firm of Bloedel, Stewart and Welch and began logging operations at Myrtle Point, British Columbia. Having been restricted to logging activities, the company did not enter the manufacturing field until 1923 when it acquired the Red Band Cedar Mill on the Fraser River, near New Westminster. Two years later, the company built a sawmill at Great Central Lake in the Port Alberni area, followed shortly after by another on the Somass River, which today is a key operating unit in MacMillan Bloedel's Port Alberni complex. In 1951 Bloedel, Stewart and Welch merged with the MacMillan Company and later with the Powell River Paper Company to form MacMillan Bloedel.

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Content Description

The collection consists of albums, loose photographs and ephemera documenting the lumber operations of the Bloedel family in British Columbia and Washington along with portraits of the Bloedel family and business partners.

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Use of the Collection

Alternative Forms Available

View selections from the collection in digital format

Restrictions on Use

Restrictions may exist on reproduction, quotation, or publication. Contact Special Collections, University of Washington Libraries for details.

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Administrative Information

Acquisition Information

Donated by Virginia Wright; July, 1997.

Processing Note

Processed by Meghan Brummett, Karma Tshering, Rachel Woodbrook, Don Romero, processing completed in 2012.

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Detailed Description of the Collection

 


2008 (Last modified: 2/16/2024)

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