George A. Pope photograph collection, approximately 1880-1919

Andrew Jackson Pope and Captain William Talbot, both from families who owned sawmills in Maine, founded the Pope & Talbot Company shortly after they arrived in San Francisco in 1849. The pair had come to gold rush San Francisco to sell lumber that had been cut on the East Coast and shipped around Cape Horn. It soon became evident, however, that transportation costs severely cut into the profits of this venture. They thus decided to build a sawmill at Port Gamble. When the mill opened in 1853, it was only the fourth mill on Puget Sound. Pope & Talbot created a subsidiary, the Puget Mill Company, to run the mill. Although its mill was not as large as Captain William Renton’s Port Blakely mill, the Puget Mill Company still grew to be the most profitable lumber firm on the Sound. The company built another mill at Port Gamble in 1856, bought additional mills at Utsalady in 1877 and at Port Ludlow in 1878, and acquired several sailing ships throughout the nineteenth century.

Although Pope's name is stamped on the backs of the photographs, it is unlikely that he is the photographer because there is no evidence that he had any photography experience.