Stearns Salt and Lumber Company (Ludington, Mich.)

Ludington, Michigan, business firm established by Justus S. Stearns.

Justus S. Stearns was born April 10, 1845 in Pomfret, Chautauqua County, New York, where his father farmed and operated a lumbering business. In 1861 the family moved to Eire, Pennsylvania where Justus joined his father in running a retail lumber outlet. Ten years later the family moved to Toledo, Ohio, where father and son once again jointly operated a lumbering concern.

In 1876 Justus moved to Ludington, Michigan, where he was employed in a business venture founded by his sister-in-law's husband, E.B. Ward. While continuing his association with Ward, Stearns started his first independent business, the operation of a small saw mill, in 1880. His independent career was so successful that in 1885 he purchased the salt and lumber interests formerly owned by Ward.

The various firms operated by Stearns proved extraordinarily productive. In 1898 they cut 150,000,000 feet of timber. By 1900 Stearns ran the largest lumbering operation in Michigan. In addition to lumber, Stearns' Michigan investments included real estate speculation, railroads, banking, automobile manufacturing, and electric power generation.

Stearns may have decided to go outside Michigan to invest his wealth as the result of a federal court decision against the flagship Stearns Salt and Lumber Company. The firm was fined $10,000.00 for receiving illegal refunds on freight bills from the Pere Marquette Railroad. For whatever reason, Stearns began to invest large sums of money in the South. He held interests in ventures in Tennessee, Georgia and Florida, but his major investments were in Kentucky. Stearns, Kentucky, a company town he founded, headquartered his lumbering and mining operations in the state.

In addition to his business activities, Stearns played a role in Michigan politics. In 1898 he was elected Michigan's Secretary of State. In 1900 he bid unsuccessfully for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. Stearns never again sought elected office, but he remained interested in Republican Party affairs and was a delegate to the 1928 Republican National Convention.