In 1885 Thea (John’s great-grandmother) moved to San Isabel from Rhode Island, with her husband John Ringstrom. They had three children, all who passed before the age of 5 in Rhode Island. After moving to Colorado they had two sons, John and Albert. Ringstrom died from damaged lungs and pneumonia. Thea then married Eklund, he died from being kicked in the head by a mule. She then met and married Magnus Emil Christenson and had two more children (Anton and Helen Christenson).
In the early 1900’s, Magnus, (John’s great-grandfather), Thea and their children, John, Albert, Anton (John’s grandfather, aka Tony) and Helen moved down to where Cara and John currently live. Magnus was a prospector from Sweden and helped develop the Marion Mine, but was a sawmiller by trade. He lost his larger operation at San Isabel to a massive fire. That event and the closing of the nearby school is what prompted them to move down the mountain to the Christenson’s current residence. There they built a house using a steam-powered mill located nearby.
Sometime in the ‘30’s John, Albert and Tony upgraded from steam to a steel wheeled cross-motor case tractor for a power plant. Then nearly a decade later, they upgraded to an American #1 circle mill that provided a larger blade and longer track. In 1954 they purchased a BIG tractor; it made an impressive 35 HP and was the talk of the community! Tony ran the mill into the 70’s until he just couldn’t keep up physically. Not too long after that, Roy and Shannon Christenson were married and Roy took over the mill along with operating a cow/calf operation and raising yearling cattle. Roy and Shannon built their family here on this ranch; daughters Carolyn and Karon, and their son John, who would eventually carry the mill forward.
Roy and Shannon operated their mill well into the 1990’s when Roy’s partner left the country and took his diesel powerplant with him. Roy and Shannon went on to open a “dude ranch” that complimented the operating ranch they were running. The mill sat and dilapidated.
The Christenson’s have many structures on the ranch built from “rough sawn” but they sourced owners of portable sawmills to help them. Some of the buildings are now part of the Brush Canyon Ranch wedding venue. Roy, Shannon and their daughters Carolyn and Karon, had the idea to start hosting weddings at the picturesque location in Rye. Brush Canyon Ranch was official in 1998 and now is a seasonal venue currently still in full operation and in high demand.
There was no operating mill on the ranch until 2017. During the winters of 2015 & 2016, John and Cara incurred some severe damage to a large pavilion associated with the venue and found that quality rough-sawn lumber was hard to find. The two of them (mainly John, scaring the absolute hell out of Cara!) assembled a plan and began shopping for a portable band sawmill. They purchased the current equipment in the fall of 2017. With the help of John’s best friend, Curtis, they began sawing lumber. They worked a couple of days per week as orders began to trickle in. Fast forward to now, Native Lumber keeps roughly 3-6 people busy working most days of every week of the year!
A sawmill has helped every generation of the Christenson’s prosper from mere survival to operating a rather lucrative business that provides an area with quality material. With the growing sales came a growing pain, too! We discovered a bottleneck which was a steady stream of logs for the mill. John’s Dad always said that “logs were going to be your biggest problem” and was he absolutely right!
In 2022 Native Lumber moved into sustainable logging and forest/wildfire mitigation. With these practices, we not only help landowners improve their property, we help areas of our forest regain health by thinning overcrowded timber.
Native Lumber and the Christenson’s strive to give back to the community by employing all local residents and supporting various organizations including our churches, schools, sports, bands (school bands and local music bands), drama clubs and anyone who might need a hand-up! We strive to offer a quality product at a reasonable price all while being friendly and helpful to our people! Thanks for taking the time to read this little bit of history! God Bless!