The Kelty sawmill was one of the earliest located near Lufkin. A company town was developed around it, including housing for various classes of workers, a company store, churches, and a cemetery. Employees were paid in scrip only usable at the company stores. The sawmill was located north of Old Mill Road, with a branch of the Cotton Belt Railroad running through the mill. No historic mill structures remain. Joseph Kurth, along with S. W. Henderson and Eli and Samuel Wiener (father of Shreveport architects Samuel G. and William B. Wiener), formed the Angelina County Lumber Company and in 1887 acquired the mill established by Charles L. Kelty in 1870. Kurth’s house, south of the mill, is a two-story classical scheme based on a center-hall plan. The cubic block of the house has a pyramidal roof with large hipped-roofed dormers and a monumental Tuscan portico, with a single level porch behind.
Across the road at 1847 and 1865 Old Mill are two Queen Anne houses. One, dating to 1898, with 1903 additions, was built for Ernest Kurth, president of the Angelina County Lumber Company, and the other (1900) for company physician Dr. Clark. Both houses had indoor plumbing, electricity, and an attached garage. Along Maas Street are several workers’ houses in various states of alteration. The three-room house at 109 Maas, largely unchanged except for modern windows, has board-and-batten siding and a front porch and originally was unpainted.