mill burned in 1920, there were an estimated 2500 residents in the town meaning it rivaled Fullerton. With the stumpage reserve dwindled the mill was not rebuilt so the town began to disappear. The planer was converted to a hardwood flooring mill, which was moved to DeRidder in 1927 when all operation at Longville ceased. Unions Unions had been operating in many industries, such as the railroads and coal mines in the United States as early as 1870, and played an important part in securing a better working environment and pay. Coal miners benefited from unions because their work under ground was poorly ventilated causing Pneumoconiosis also known as black lung (and even referred to as P-45),] was a fact of life. Railroad worker unions succeeded in getting rid of the "old man-killer" link and pin coupler. Union organization began at Carson, Louisiana, led by Arthur Lee Emerson and Jay Smith in December 1910. Other areas such as Lake Charles, Merryville, and Eastern Texas soon followed. They met in Alexandria in June 1911 to established the Brotherhood of Timber Workers (BTW). The Southern Lumber Operators' Association'' had been created by member mills in 1906 to stop any future union organizations. The association took immediately plans to include lockouts, importing strikebreakers, hiring the Burns agency, Pinkerton detectives, and other steps with the purpose of destroying the union. John Henry Kirby, that owned the American Lumber Company in Merryville, Louisiana, did hire agents to infiltrate the union. Other mills either imported workers or closed mills. After the incident at Grabow suspected union workers were fired. There were no laws to protect unions such as the Erdman Act for interstate railroad workers. The cases of Allgeyer v. Louisiana (1897), and the landmark case of Lochner v. New York (1905), called the Lochner era that did acknowledge that states have certain "police powers", but effectively took away a lot of state control, resulting in more company allowed controls. It was not until 1955, ending the Lockner era. Employees of many sawmills were required to sign yellow-dog contracts to prove loyalty to the company and agree not to join unions. The union office in Merryville was destroyed, and within three months union activities ceased. C. B. Sweet, of the Long-Bell Mills, chose not to honor the lockout. Sweet already paid his employees in cash and made other concessions and there did not appear to be