Wood flooring reclaimed from a building constructed on the site of the Northeast's first navigable commercial canal and the continent's first inclined plane lift is now available from Longleaf Lumber.
“This part of the Connecticut River Valley is just steeped in American history,” says Longleaf owner Marc Poirier. “We’ve made flooring from tobacco barns, paper mills, and dairy farms in the area, but we’ve never salvaged wood from a site with a history stretching back to the 1700s.”
The company salvaged heart pine beams and maple floorboards from the Carew Manufacturing building, built in 1873, feet away from the Connecticut River in South Hadley, Mass., and has begun milling the products into flooring.
The site also hosts an inclined plane lift built in the late 1700s to haul barges up an engineered slope in the South Hadley Canal.
The heart pine will be manufactured into six grades of flooring and paneling. The maple reclaimed from the building will be used exclusively for flooring applications.
Editor's Note: If your company reclaims wood with a story, we want to hear about it. Send the story and a few photos to [email protected].
