The 1860 census showed there were about 200 sawmills statewide, but most were located near the Gulf Coast or north of the Big Thicket. Compared to other states, lumber production in Texas was small. As late as 1870, the majority of the forest of East Texas remained untouched. However that soon changed as the "bonanza era" (c. 1880–1930) of Texas lumbering began, facilitated by a rapidly developed railroad system. In 1877 Henry J. Lutcher and G. Bedell Moore started the first major mill in Orange, Texas. Others followed, many building company towns in remote areas, where employees were often at the mercy of their employers. In the midst of the lumbering activity, oil was discovered at Spindletop in January 1901, just south of the Big Thicket. The frenzy of activity that followed saw rampant drilling and exploration, the founding of Gulf Oil, Humble, and Texaco, and a rapid growth in population, development, and infrastructure. The population of Hardin County went from 1,870 in 1880 to 15,983 in 1920 according to the Census Bureau. John Henry Kirby "Prince of the Pines", started the Kirby Lumber Company about 1900 which ultimately held mineral and timber rights to a million acres in the region. By the 1920s East Texas timber was nearing depletion and most of the operations practiced a cut-out and get-out policy and moved on, many to the Pacific coast, leaving vast areas of clear cut forest behind. The Great Depression marked the end of the bonanza era for lumbering in East Texas. The population of Hardin County dropped to 13.936 (12.8%) in the 1930 census. Many of the towns in the Big Thicket emerged during this time in support of the lumber industry, as evidenced by names like Lumberton established in the 1890s, Kirbyville (1895) was named after John Kirby: Silsbee, (1894), was named for Nathan D. Silsbee an east coast investor in the railroads, others include Kountze (1882), Camden (1889), and Diboll (1894).