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Maritime trade route on the US West Coast
The West Coast lumber trade was a maritime trade route on the West Coast of the United States. It carried lumber from the coasts of Northern California, Oregon, and Washington mainly to the port of San Francisco. The trade included direct foreign shipment from ports of the Pacific Northwest and might include another product characteristic of the region, salmon, as in the schooner Henry Wilson sailing from Washington state for Australia with "around 500,000 feet of lumber and canned salmon" in 1918. The trade was instrumental in founding shipping empires such as the Dollar Steamship Company in which its founder, Captain Robert Dollar, emigrated from Scotland, worked in the lumber camps of Canada and, after moving to San Francisco in 1888 and buying timber tracts, founded a shipping line that extended to China.

As late as the California Gold Rush, New England lumber was still carried 13,000 miles around Cape Horn to San Francisco. But that started to change when Captain Stephen Smith (of the bark George Henry) established one of the first west coast lumber mill in a redwood forest near Bodega, California, in 1843. The first lumber mill on the west coast was established by John B. R. Cooper in Rancho El Molino near present day Forestville, California. By the mid 1880s, more than 400 such mills operated within the forests of California's Humboldt County and along the shores of Humboldt Bay alone. At first, the lumber was shipped in old square riggers, but these aging ships were inefficient as they required a large crew to operate and were hard to load. Soon local shipyards opened to supply specialist vessels. In 1865 Hans Ditlev Bendixsen opened one of these yards at Fairhaven, California on Humboldt Bay adjacent to Eureka. Bendixsen built many vessels for the lumber trade, including the C. A. Thayer, now preserved at the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. He constructed 92 sailing vessels between 1869 and 1901, including 35 three masters. Each dog hole was unique, which was why schooner captains often sailed back and forth to the same ports to load. The mariners were often forced to load right among the rocks and cliffs in the treacherous surf. The schooner rig dominated the lumber trade, since its fore and aft rigging permitted sailing closer to the wind, easier entry to small ports, and smaller crews than square rigged vessels. These ships needed to return to the lumber ports without the expense of loading ballast. Shipyards built some smaller schooners with centerboards that retracted. This helped the flat bottomed vessels to enter shallow water. At the time of the construction of the barque Hesperus in 1882, Jackson writes, "the form of the West Coast lumber vessels had become well established and were a radical departure from the New England built ships." Because lumber is a bulk cargo that does not require shelter, and is difficult to stow below decks, lumber ships from yards such as the Hall Brothers in Port Blakely, Washington were built without the between decks of the New England "Downeasters." "Close to half of their cargo was stowed as deckload – that is above deck." Jackson also writes that a triangle trade had developed at this time, with "lumber out to Australia, coal to Hawaii, and sugar to San Francisco. The return cargoes were compact and heavy, thus no need for the conventional deep hull form.". Eventually, however, steam powered vessels proved more dependable than sail, and railroads gained greater penetration of the coastal regions. Sailing vessels continued to compete with steamships and railroads well into the 20th century, but the last purpose built sailing lumber schooner was launched in 1905. Esther Johnson was of wooden construction with planking of three inch Douglas fir, 208 feet (63 m) long by 43 feet (13 m) and with 15 feet (5 m) draft. On 29 March 1943 the ship was purchased by the War Shipping Administration and by June had arrived in Australia to become part of the U. S. Army's Southwest Pacific Area fleet as X 9. Esther Johnson arrived in Milne Bay on 4 October 1943 and, capable of transporting 100 feet (30 m) wooden piles sufficient to build an entire pier, was instrumental in building piers at the bases at Lae, Finschhafen in New Guinea and Tacloban in the Philippines. The ship was bombed on arrival at Lae and both bombed and strafed at Tacloban and at war's end was badly damaged by shipworms. The badly leaking ship returned from Manila to Melbourne for repairs and then returned to the Philippines going into the reserve fleet on 20 December 1947 at Subic Bay before being sold to the Philippine government on 23 February 1948. The older and slightly larger Barbara C, built as Pacific, also served in the Southwest Pacific in the same role.