The Kirby Lumber Corporation was organized in 1901. Its founder, John Henry Kirby, was already a well-known lumberman and timber buyer with large interests in Southeast Texas and the growing city of Houston. At its peak, the Kirby Lumber Corporation operated some seventeen sawmills and a similar number of logging camps, cutting the timber from more than 900,000 acres of virgin pineland. The Kirby company was easily the largest in the entire south. With palatial headquarters in Houston, Kirby presided over a vast empire. He was an important political figure and held offices in both Texas and the federal governments. He was also a leader in organizing the Southern Pine Association and frequently spoke for the industry on national questions. During the Great Depression the company fell into financial difficulty and its control passed into the hands of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad Company. John Henry Kirby continued as president of the enterprise until his death in 1940. The inactive papers of the Kirby Lumber Corporation were deposited in the Forest History Archives in the Stephen F. Austin State University Library in 1971 through the courtesy of Thomas Orth and J. B. Webster