Town of Fisher, U.S. Highway 171, Fisher, Sabine Parish, LA

1995 Charles E. Peterson Prize, Entry
Significance: Fisher is the last of the Louisiana sawmill towns built during the lumbering heyday at the turn of the century. It is located on U.S. Hwy. 171 between Hodges Gardens and many and an bout 20 miles from Toldeo Bend Lake. The village still reflects the nostalgic past and gives visitors an eerie feeling of having stepped back into time. The office complex and many of the original wooden houses, surrounded by white picket or plank fences, are intact and few plank walks still exist. The village was built following the incorporation of Louisiana Long Leaf Lumber Company, better known as 4-L Co., July 15, 1899. It was named for the company president and general manager, Oliver Williams Fisher, a Missouri lumberman. It was the largest sawmill town in the parish and the most important one on the Kansas City Southern Railroad. It remained a company-owned sawmill town until it was purchased by Boise Cascade in 1966. The new owners continued to operate the mill but subdivided the town and sold it to the residents. To keep the village from falling into oblivion residents incorporated the village and organized Fisher Heritage Foundation, Inc., a non-profit group dedicated to preservation. In 1971 the KCS Railroad presented the foundation with the depot, and in 1972 Boise Southern conveyed the office complex to the foundation. The property included 9 1/2 acres of land containing the office building, commissary, opera house, post office, paved village square, tree-shaded park and "the birds, the bees, and the grass thereon." In 1979 the village was designated as a Louisiana Landmark and placed on the National Register of Historic Districts.
Unprocessed Field note material exists for this structure: N609
Survey number: HABS LA-1251
National Register of Historic Places NRIS Number: 79001089