PORT TOWNSEND — “The mill.” That’s shorthand for a company with powerful influences from economic to olfactory.
Since the Port Townsend Paper Co. rose over the Glen Cove area 93 years ago, its daily production has grown to some 901 tons of paper, containerboard and unbleached pulp.
In a free public program starting this week, the Jefferson County Historical Society will explore how it reached this point, and then invite local residents to make some paper of their own.
First off, General Manager Kevin Scott will present “One Hundred Years of History at the Port Townsend Paper Mill” at 7 p.m. Thursday via Zoom. The link is https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83781533348 and more information can be found at JCHSmuseum.org.
The talk is part of a series that will include art projects, children’s activities and a radio show, “to get folks engaged in the legacy of the mill in this community,” said Shelly Leavens, historical society executive director.
Thursday’s program will give viewers a chance to ask questions after Scott’s talk, she added. Those queries will be curated to focus on mill history.
If people have questions about emissions and pollution — “I do know that is a really hot topic,” Leavens said — those will be directed to the state Department of Ecology.
Port Townsend Public Works Director Steve King will be present Thursday to help field such questions if they come up in the chat.
Port Townsend Paper, Jefferson County’s largest private employer, is a subsidiary of PT Holdings Co. Inc., which is owned by Crown Paper Group of Atlanta. Crown Paper is not related to Crown Zellerbach, builder of the mill in the late 1920s.
Just fewer than 300 people are employed there, Scott said in an interview; that number has held steady through the pandemic.
“We’re an essential business; we provide a lot of food packaging,” he added.
With masking, social distancing and sanitation, “we’re going full-blown” with safety protocols.
Port Townsend Paper is also one of the Washington state’s largest cardboard recyclers, Scott said.
With a history rich in stories about labor, innovation, Pacific Northwest timber and rural life, the mill is ripe for artistic interpretation, Leavens said.
So the historical society is inviting artists and artist teams to submit proposals for two paper art projects to be installed in late March. The complete call to artists is described at JCHSmuseum.org under Education and Programs, while artists can envision their work on display in two locations: the Jefferson Museum of Art & History at 540 Water St. and at the Port Townsend Library at 1220 Lawrence St.
New paper mill-inspired items are now available from the library: a home papermaking kit for ages 8 and older and a “Follow Your Nose” bingo game. The latter has 30 vials, with their scents — floral, herbal, fruity — identified on the bottoms. People can check out the game from the library and test their fragrance-recognition abilities.
The mill smell, however, is not among the scents.
The library has multiple copies of these activities, and they can be checked out by searching the catalog at PTPubliclibrary.org or by phoning 360-385-3181.
That mill smell comes from the use of sulfur compounds in processing paper, Scott noted. The “kraft” method, using the German word for strong, produces brown paper that’s more robust than the mushy stuff made without sulfur.
Later this year, the historical society will host other mill-inspired programs: a Zoom presentation about its Olympic Gravity Water System at 7 p.m. Feb. 25, a KPTZ-FM radio show of millworkers’ oral histories in March and a springtime display of Swan School children’s paper art creations in a downtown storefront to be determined.
“The big thing is,” Scott said, “the mill is just part of our community. We’re all in this together.”
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Jefferson County senior reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-417-3509 or durbanidelapaz@peninsuladailynews.com.
