The economic downturn has resulted in the closure of many small, privately owned businesses, but one family still carries the torch of a business that has been running for six generations – Burnett & Sons Planing Mill and Lumber Company.

Burnett & Sons got its start in the 1800s and has had a hand in projects such as the State Capitol and the Crocker Museum.

The family business has seen its share of ups and downs, including the Great Depression, but the two brothers and one sister who currently run it share a passion for the company and for the work it provides to the community.

“It’s a family business and that’s what I live for- to keep it going because it’s a legacy,” said Jim Miller, company president.

Jim Miller said that he has been working with the company from the ground up – pushing brooms, driving trucks, labor“whatever it took,” he said, and Simone Rathe, treasurer and corporate secretary, has been working with the company for 17 years after working in advertising in San Francisco, but said that she shares an appreciation for the millwork as well. The two share ownership of the company with their brother, Fitz Miller, the company’s vice-president.

Their father, Burnett Miller, sold the company to them in 2000. Still loosely involved with the business, he continues to be a prominent member of the Sacramento community, formerly known for his involvement as a council member and mayor for a year.

Burnett & Sons, including its mill, is currently located at 214 11th and B streets downtown, where it has been since 1933, in an old-style office building built by Burnett Miller himself.

The company turns rough lumber into siding panels and moulding for multiple construction purposes, cabinetry work and specializes in architectural millwork, often contracted to restore old buildings throughout the city. The company also provides the materials for individual home projects and takes on projects from all over the city.

Philetus Burnett, a carpenter, stair builder and cabinet maker from Massachusetts, founded the company with his son, Henry, in 1869.

Many company records were lost in a couple of fires early in the 20th century, but its most well-known projects include the main stairwell and south facing doors of the Capitol, the Crocker Art Museum, the lobby of the new City Hall, the Stanford Mansion and various restoration projects throughout Old Sacramento.

One of the more interesting sides to the company is that they are often called in for restoration work on buildings they’ve worked on in the past.

“A portion of our business has always been some restoration work along with architectural work that’s been designed specially by the various architectural firms in the area,” Burnett Miller said.

In 1870, the company built the stairwell in the new Capitol building. The Capitol was then modernized at the turn of the century, and the old millwork, mouldings and stairs were replaced with metal and stone. A section of the spiral staircase was moved to the St. Francis Church at 27th and J streets, which was being built at the same time

“For the bicentennial, the state project was to restore the Capitol the way it originally had been, and we had the contract to do the millwork and rebuild the stairs as they originally had been,” Burnett Miller said.

Another large restoration project for the company came in the 1980s, when Burnett Miller started a committee to raise money to restore many buildings along the riverfront in Old Sacramento.

“They just thought it would be a real tourist attraction and it would be a good thing for the city to have Old Sacramento rebuilt; they just had to raise the money,” Rathe said.

The company began in millwork and stairs, and gradually expanded to include cabinetry, custom countertops and windows and frames.

“We do a little bit of everything that keeps us diversified,” Jim Miller said. “We’re not just, as they would say, a box shop where you’re just doing strictly cabinets and nothing else. We sell lumber, siding, moulding, and we reproduce it here.”

Burnett & Sons has modernized, the owners said, with an upgrade to heavier computerized machinery that enables it to be more competitive with others and to work faster, but the integrity of individual and custom production has stayed.

“Rather than mass-produced and sold as an item, we’re more dependent on architectural work – architects design things that are specific for a particular building or a particular project,” Jim Miller said, adding that the company has very little mass production.

Burnett Miller said that the demand for wooden projects has gone down, as many houses are now made of stucco, and that to keep up with the competition, the company has added plastic laminate to its projects as well.

For the most part, owners said they feel that modernization is another part of keeping up with demand and staying in business.

“I think you have to change with the times somewhat, but there’s always been a demand for custom millwork that we do, and we have done quite a bit of restoration work besides the capitol,” Burnett Miller said.

Burnett & Sons customarily maintains an active apprenticeship training program provided by its union, teaching the company’s traditional craft through on-the-job training with a journeyman. Apprentices generally go to school two hours a night for two days a week and the program takes three to four years to complete, but due to the lack of business, the program is currently at a standstill.

“We just don’t have the volume of work to have people going through training all the time,” Jim Miller said. “When we are busy we try to hire apprentices and train them to learn the work so they’d be here for 20 or 30 years.”

Since the state’s economy has plummeted, Jim Miller said that Burnett & Sons has had to cut employees to stay afloat.

“Right now we’re at 25 (employees). We’ve been to 50, but with the economy slowing down,
you have to lay off people, and you hate to do it because you’ve had people work for you 25 and 30 years. It’s like a family – you come on board and you’re here forever – you assume – and you try to keep all your good employees and everything,” he said.

Rathe said she is staying positive, however, adding her grandfather’s reassurance that it was much worse before, and they still survived.

“When the Depression hit, he really had to pull back and cut back just like we are now,” she said. “There were times when my grandfather was driving the forklift himself – he did a lot just on his own to keep the doors open.”

“I think it’s best to just keep a positive attitude and try to ride it out and just do the best you can,” Jim Miller said.

“(A few years) have been a challenge, and we’ve gotten past it,” he added. “What’s in the future – it’s getting over that hump and being positive. Keep the doors open, keep people employed – it’s a family legacy,” he said.