Retirement does not suit them well.

Fifty-nine-year-old Jeff Gruber and 62-year-old Paul Resch both left behind their jobs of many years in the last few years, but full blown retirement is not part of their DNA.

This week, they’ve been busy at Gruber’s small mill, running logs through a Wood-Mizer LT50 Wide hydraulic sawmill to fill orders as the pleasant aroma of fresh-cut pine hangs in the air. The mill can handle logs up to 41 inches in diameter. Gruber has had young people helping him at times, but they can’t always make it, so in turning to Resch to get the orders filled, he knew he’d have someone who he could count on in a pinch.

Tuesday, the duo was working on an order for Larry Lammers, who runs a fruit orchard north of Bonners Ferry. Larry and his wife, Robin, own the 4.5 acre Points North Orchard. Lammers needed 3-by-10 pieces for bridge decking.

“I taught his nephew in school,” Gruber said. “Larry and his family ran a huge sheep ranch east of Judith Gap before they sold out and moved west.”

In a 2019 article in the Bonners Ferry Herald, Lammers explained how during the drought years in the mid-1980s they drove to Wenatchee and brought back loads of peaches for the family, friends and neighbors.

“That is what started us in the fruit business,” Lammers said then.

While a large, working saw mill employing hundreds of people hasn’t existed in Lincoln County for many, many years, Gruber’s small operation, along with several others, still fills the needs of many across the region.

Gruber, a long-time teacher at Libby Public Schools and a local historian of considerable note, said nothing goes to waste in his operation.

“Jim Schmitt buys my waste and uses it to heat his home and business,” Gruber said. “I sell the sawdust to gardeners who use it to mulch their plants.

“The joke is, ‘We use every part of the tree except for the shade,’” Gruber said with an easy laugh.

Resch, who worked at the Stimson Lumber Co. plywood mill that operated in Libby until 23 years ago before going to work at Timberline Ford, is happy to be back doing what he grew up doing.

“I’m a little sore, getting back into shape doing this kind of work, but it feels good and you know at the end of the day you’ve accomplished something that matters,” Resch said.

Gruber has owned his current mill since 2019.

“I owned a small mill 20 years ago and I’d run it during the summers when school was out,” Gruber said. “It was of a commercial operation.”

Gruber said he is still busy, doing about 75 orders a year. They run from $100 to $15,000.

    Paul Resch moves a piece of pine lumber at Jeff Gruber's sawmill just south of Libby Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2025. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)
  

    Jeff Gruber moves some cut boards at his sawmill just south of Libby Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2025. (Scott Shindledecker/The Western News)