The railroad agreed to the offer and began construction in 1900, and was absorbed by the Northern Pacific Railway during that time, outpacing Great Northern and their plans to build a railroad to their timber holdings in the Sauk River valley. Railway crews arrived in the Darrington area by the following year and the first train arrived at the town's depot on May 31, 1901. Several sawmills and other timber industries began in the years following the railroad's completion, as mining fortunes in the surrounding area dwindled. Most of the original prospectors had left the Darrington area during the Klondike gold rush of the late 1890s, while those who remained established a single smelter in the mountains. A Bornite mine was developed at Long Mountain and was hoped to revive the mining industry of the area, but was abandoned in 1910 after its mineral deposits were found to be smaller than expected. Darrington surpassed a population of 100 residents in 1906 and established a second hotel and its first social club by that time. The U.S. Lumber Company, which began in 1901 as the Allen Mill, was the largest employer in Darrington during the early 1910s and produced 23,000 board feet of wood per day. The U.S. Lumber Company hired 21 Japanese laborers who were paid a similar wage to their white counterparts, which angered the townspeople in Darrington. On June 13, 1910, a mob of 100 white men rioted and drove the Japanese laborers out of town after little resistance, paying for their train fare to Everett and allowing them to retrieve their belongings. The riot prompted an investigation from Seattle-based vice-consul Kinjiro Hayashi, who forwarded his report to the Japanese ambassador as well as the state government. The U.S. Lumber Company filed a court injunction after rioters had threatened to burn its Darrington mill and other properties should the company attempt to return the Japanese laborers to the town. The injunction was denied, but the townspeople eventually relented and allowed twenty Japanese laborers to return to the mill a week later following Prince Fushimi Hiroyasu's visit to Seattle. Darrington's residents also resisted the county government's plan to become a dry county, which would prohibit the sale of alcohol and close the town's saloons. A petition was circulated among the townspeople and residents of nearby areas to incorporate Darrington as a fourth-class city in order to continue alcohol sales, but the attempt at incorporation was thwarted after protests by the U.S. Lumber Mill and several civic leaders.