Bell Lumber and Pole Yards began business in 1919, treating telephone poles and lumber. The company hired many local men and is still in business today. In mid-1980s, after being declared a Superfund site by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Bell began the process of cleaning up the hazardous chemicals on its property, spending over $10 million to do so and also to rebuild the plant to treat poles and lumber using environmentally clean processes. This panorama photo shows the pole treating plant and the large telephone poles treated in the process.
MacGillis & Gibbs Company employees with their horses as they transport telephone poles. The company specialized in the treatment, production and distribution of telephone poles from 1919 and employed many New Brighton men. The firm treated telephone poles and lumber with chemicals to preserve the wood, which ultimately contaminated the soil and made its way into groundwater. In 1984 the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) declared both MacGillis & Gibbs Company site and an adjacent pole company, Bell Lumber and Pole, as a Superfund site. The cleanup continued until 1993.