Camp Manufacturing Company grew from a sawmill that operated here before the Civil War. In 1887, brothers Paul D. Camp, James L. Camp, and Robert J. Camp founded Camp Manufacturing Company, later Union Camp Corporation. The lumbering enterprise pioneered a program to purchase land as well as timber rights, which allowed extensive reforestation efforts. The facility became a major producer of paper, paperboard, lumber, and particleboard. The Blackwater River and the railroads traditionally provided transportation for raw materials and manufactured products for the western Virginia Tidewater area.