Gilman Paper Company

The Gilman Paper Company was a paper producer that was started in the 1880s by Isaac Gilman in Gilman, Vermont. In the 1940s his son Charles Gilman built an additional mill in St. Mary's, Georgia. The company was capable of producing 2.6 million pounds of paper per day, employed 1,100 workers and 1,500 independent contractors, with an office in at 111 West 50th Street, New York. At the death of Charles Gilman in 1967, the company was run by his two sons, Charles (Chris) Gilman Jr and Howard Gilman. During this period the photography collection was started by Charles's wife Sondra Gilman, with the support of Chris and Howard. At the death of Charles Jr, in January 1982, Howard bought the balance of the company from Charles's estate and both Gilman Paper and Sondra Gilman continued to collect photographs. During Howard's tenure as Chairman of the company, the mill was sold to Georgia Pacific, who rebuilt the uncoated free-sheet paper machine to make diazo and security paper. The newsprint machine and groundwood mill were discontinued. In 1990, GP sold the mill to Simpson Paper Company, and in 2000, Simpsons sold the mill to American Paper, an affiliate of American Tissue. In 2002, the mill was placed in bankruptcy on the initiative of its employees, who were due several weeks of wages and the mill's operations were shut down. In 2004, Dirigo Paper Company revived the operations and manufactured various printing and converting grades and employed over 100 workers. In 2007 Dirigo struggled with the rising cost of pulp (driven by the Chinese commodity super-cycle), its margins were inverted and it was forced to shut down the mill.

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  Gilman Paper Company
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  Gilman Paper Company