E.S.C. quarterly

              ^0°°*
(North Laronna ^aie uuiaiy
^c-* RKaalieeijgnh
The E. S. C. Quarterly
HDLUtofc 17, NO. 1-2 WINTER-SPRING, 1959
PUBLISHED BY
Employment Security Commission of North Carolina
RALEIGH, N. C.
PAGE 2 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
The E. S. C. Quarterly CHAIRMAN'S COMMENTS
(Formerly The U.C.C. Quarterly)
Vol. 17, No. 1-2 Winter-Spring, 1959
Issued at Raleigh, N. C. by the
EMPLOYMENT SECURITY COMMISSION OF
NORTH CAROLINA
Commissioners : Mrs. Quentin Gregory, Halifax; Dr. Maurice
Van Hecke, Chapel Hill; R. Dave Hall, Belmont; W. Benton
Pipkin, Reidsville; Bruce E. Davis, Charlotte; Crayon C.
Efird, Albemarle.
State Advisory Council: Public representatives: James A.
Bridger, Bladenboro, Chairman; Sherwood Roberson, Rober-sonville;
W. B. Horton, Yanceyville; Mrs. R. C. Lewellyn,
Dobson, and Dr. J. W. Seabrook, Fayetteville; Employer
representatives: A. L. Tait, Lincolnton and G. Maurice Hill,
Drexel; Employee representatives: Melvin Ward, Spencer,
AFL and H. D. Lisk, Charlotte, CIO.
*Ci
**%jp
HENRY E. KENDALL Chairman
R. FULLER MARTIN Director
Unemployment Insurance Division KENDALL
JOSEPH W. BEACH Director
North Carolina State Employment Service Division
TED DAVIS Editor
Public Information Officer
Sent free upon >-equest to responsible individuals, agencies,
organizations and libraries Address: E. S. C. Informational
Service, P. O. Box 589, Raleigh, N. C.
INDEX APPEARS ON PAGE 111
ABOUT THE COVER PICTURE
The three young ladies gracing our cover this issue are modeling play
clothes manufactured by Blue Bell, Inc., Greensboro. Blue Bell is the
world's largest manufacturer of work and play clothes.
AT DECEMBER MEETING OF STATE ADVISORY COUNCIL
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Pictured just prior to its December meeting in Commission Chairman Henry E. Kendall's office in
Raleigh is the ESC State Advisory Council. In attendance were: Mrs. R. C. Lewellyn, Dobson; Chairman
James A. Bridger, Bladenboro. (Standing, L to R): Melvin Ward, Spencer; A. L. Tait, Lincolnton; and
Dr. J. W. Seabrook, Fayetteville.
Henry E. Kendall, Chairman
Employment Security Commission
This issue of "The E. S. C. Quarterly" is intended to up
date the Summer-Fall "Quarterly" of 1952. That edition
covered thoroughly the Textile Industry, and a subsequent
edition depicted the Hosiery Industry's contribution to the
State's economy. In this 112-page issue
we are including both industries in ordei
that no cross-reference will be necessary
between this and subsequent editions.
A close examination of the figures se1
forth in the article on "Textile Employ
ment Dominant In North Carolina" bj
Director of ESC Research and Statistic}'
Hugh Raper will show that in the 1(
years from 1947 to 1957 a diversificatioi
of industries in the State began.
In the 1939-1951 period. Textile plant
in North Carolina increased from 695 to 1,047. These figure:
do not include hosiery units. Thirteen per cent of all plant;
in North Carolina in 1951 were textile. Two hundred an<
thirty thousand, or 50 per cent of all manufacturing worker
under Employment Security in 1951 were in textile plants
July, 1958, figures show 211,500 persons out of 442,200 ii
manufacturing employment in the State were in textiles
One reason for this percentage drop is that more efficien
methods have lessened textile labor i-equirements. Too, in
dustries manufacturing other items such as electronic de
vices, machinery, and chemicals have come to the State t
further diversify the economy and make it less dependen
on a single industry. Cotton, however, i
still a major raw material for our indus
tries and the 2,500,000 bales used ar
Dually is more than ten times the State'
estimated cotton production during 195$
Collectively, the Textile Industry i
one of the State's largest taxpayers. I
one year, franchise and income taxe
paid directly to local governments by thj
various textile mills hit the $11 millio
mark. Twenty-seven new plants bega
operation in the State during 1958. Tr.
last available figures show that 22 pe
cent of the nation's 1,043,000 textile enj
ployees work in North Carolina. Payro
taxes paid in for support of the Employ
ment Security program by North Car<
lina Textile Employers amount to ai
proximately $10,718,100 per year.
Textile firms operate in 76 of ox
hundred counties. Those counties wit
no textile units are mostly coastal, a
though four mountain counties ha^
none.
Interesting to note is the fact thi
gross textile payrolls have risen in tl
last ten years from $463 millions to $61]
millions and account for 25.2 per cent I
the gross payroll for all North Carolii
industries.
It is hoped that this edition of "Tl
E. S. C. Quarterly" will prove as info
mative and useful as the earlier issuj
the supply of which was long ago e
hausted. This edition is not intended
supplant, but rather to supplement i|
predecessor.
VINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 3
NORTH CAROLINA'S TEXTILE SOCIOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT PROVES GREAT
By Mildred Barnwell Andrews
The textile industry of North Caro-ina,
which has helped more than any
ither in the State's economic growth and
stability, has contributed vastly to its
;ocial development as well. The tourist
mssing through the state on its splen-lid
new limited access highways and
he collateral systems may well be as-ounded
by the number and neat ap-pearance
of the great textile mills,
•epresenting almost half of the entire
ndustry of the United States, that are
vithin the borders of North Carolina.
But he is probably not fully aware of the
human factors, the tangible benefits
vhich have accompanied the growth of
;he industry, and which, within the past
15 years, have brought an entirely new
vay of life to the more than 200,000
;extile mill employees and their families
bf this state. Best outward evidences of
fhis phase of development are the im-proved
mill communities and various pro-grams
sponsored by textile companies
ror the benefit of the employees and their
ramilies.
i Immediately following World War II
ii more accelerated effort for better com-munity
living became a planned business
with almost every textile mill. According
to each mill's geographic location and
pther factors, shall we say local option,
|he programs varied, but the overall
picture includes better homes, and home
ownership, broadened recreation facili-ies,
greater opportunities for cultural
idvancement, sound health programs,
righer-educational advantages.
A few years ago the word "paternal-
Ism" was often heard in connection with
the early efforts of textile management to
iiffer better living opportunities to the
ivorkers. Today, the public begins to
ealize paternalism is the wrong word.
vlills invest money in building better
ommunities. People who live in better
ommunities make better citizens. Better
itizens make better business. Plans for
setter community living are now a vital,
ntegral part of the general economy of
he textile industry, and many leading,
s well as typical, examples of this trend
re found in North Carolina.
One of the major factors in better citi-enship
and greater work potential is
having a good and pleasant home, in sur-joundings
worthy of choice and suitable
jo one's best economic ability. In the
jextile industry today, such a home may
je found in the mill community or in out-lying
farm areas populated by mill em-jloyees.
Today the mill community, if
ordering on a town, is a welcome ad-junct
to the corporate community. Its
Te\l kept streets and homes give an ad-itional
appearance of prosperity to a
)wn. If the mill and its village are some-what
isolated, one often finds the com-lunity
a place of real charm and usually
f substantial appearance.
Mill villages were never planned as a
source of revenue to a mill. They were
simply an outgrowth of the mill's loca-tion
which, in the early days, had to be
near water power. In order to obtain
power, mills were often built in remote
places. Transportation was a grave prob-lem,
and companies had to house workers
or have none. Today, with excellent
roads, high wages, and prevalent use and
ownership of automobiles, textile mill
villages are not the necessity they once
were and at least 50 percent of textile
employees live away from the mill, most
in their own homes. Now, it is the work-ers
choice, not the mill's necessity, which
populate the mill communities.
"I've been driving South for years and
never realized that many attractive
towns through which I drove were cotton
mill towns," said a tourist. He spoke
of the flower gardens, clipped hedges,
lawns and shady trees that go toward
making the pretty streets. "And I notice
the houses look better than in many other
sections of the country," he added.
One would have to travel far to find
a prettier, busier community to live in
than that of Kannapolis, built around
the great Cannon towel mills. There the
business section of the town is gradually
being remodeled along lines of Williams-burg
colonial architecture, and could
easily be mistaken for an outstanding
city suburb of the better type.
Cramerton, when it was first founded
by Stuart W. Cramer, Sr., became known
as the "model mill village". Today the
mill is part of Burlington Industries and
homes of Cramerton are now owned by
the mill workers. Sale of homes to com-pany
employees has consistently been
the policy of Burlington, the company
that inaugurated the trend that is now
a predominant one of the textile industry.
It is found that such real pride in
MAKING TEXTILE HISTORY
Mrs. Mildred Barnwell Andrews, who gained
much of her textile experience in North Caro-lina
circles, has written about and lectured on
the progress of the textile industry for many
years. From 1935 to 1945, she was Executive
Secretary of the Southern Combed Yarn Spin-ners
Association, with headquarters in Gas-tonia.
In the next six succeeding years, she was
affiliated with a New York public relations
program which handled the textile industry's
public relations.
Since 1952 she has been Executive Secretary
and Director of Public Relations of the Ameri-can
Textile Machinery Association. She is also
Public Relations Director for the American
Textile Machinery Exhibition, an event of
international scope to be held in Atlantic City
1960. Her work with ATMA takes her several
times each year to every textile producing
state, and has taken her to textile areas in
Europe on two occasions.
Mrs. Andrews served her industry, and her
country, with distinction during World War II
as special consultant on textiles in the Office
of the Quartermaster-General, and on War
Production Board's Industrial Salvage Com-mittee.
She is the author of numerous books and
and articles, technical and economic, on the
textile industry, and from her familiarity with
North Carolina and its chief industry has
written this article on the industry's sociological
development.
Her add'ess is: "Boxley Hill", Vienna, Vir-ginia,
P. O. Box 596.
ownership exists that there is good, na-tural
and neighborly rivalry in keeping
up the appearance of lawns and houses.
Cramerton is still an outstanding, model
community. Since 1946 when it first be-came
a part of the Burlington Indus-tries
group a fine Community Building
and swimming pool have been added to
the little town's facilities. The nine hole
golf course, originally established by
Cramer, is one of the sportiest in the
state, maintained exclusively for em-ployees
of the mill.
Many textile workers prefer to own
houses in town or country, to have gar-dens,
or to own small farms within com-muting
distance of the mill, and there
they may undertake normal farm activi-ties
such as having cows, or raising-chickens,
or turkeys, or engaging in
truck farming, in addition to their mill
job.
Such things as owning homes, paying
taxes, voting on bond issues and in city,
state and national elections, and in gen-eral
improving the community bespeak
the fact that people who work for textile
mills today are not mill workers in the
old sense of the word. They are substan-tial
citizens leading active and respon-sible
lives. Rental tenants in mill owned
houses have gained a comparable sense
of responsibility. In many textile towns
which are incorporated, it is not un-usual
to find mill workers of today serv-ing
on city councils, working on various
community drives, and participating in
all normal activities of a townsman. This
would have been unheard of three, even
two, decades ago. The trend today of
greatest social significance in textile
manufacturing towns and cities is the
disappearance of the old line of demarca-tion
between mill employees and other
members of the community. It is a
gradual development which is accepted
and welcomed by all.
In many instances today, community
recreation projects are joint investments
on the part of mill interests and the
town. Mill workers and everyone else
living in the community share in the
benefits and enjoyment of the health and
recreation program. Many of these have
been set up through the state's recreation
commission.
North Carolina is the only textile
manufacturing state which has a state
recreation commission. Set up by legis-lative
action in 1946 it has worked suc-cessfully
in its years of operation and
may set the pattern for other textile
states. The commission is a service de-partment
and acts as guide and counsel-lor
to communities and mills sponsoring
recreation projects.
Recreation programs sponsored by tex-tile
mills throughout the entire N. C. in-dustry
for their workers and families
take many forms and may include ath-letic
activities, all kinds of club work as
well as cultural education.
One of the largest Y. M. C. A. mem-
PAGE 4 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 195
berships in the United States (per town
population) is that at Kannapolis, N. C.
where Cannon Mills Company built a
most beautiful community Y. M. C. A.
building with a wide variety of facilities,
including swimming pool and gymnasum,
which is enjoyed by all residents of the
town as well as groups from all over the
state during tournament time. Other out-standing
Y's in the state's textile areas
are in Albemarle, North Charlotte and
Gastonia. The former was built by the
Wiscassett Mills as a memorial to its em-ployees;
and that in Charlotte was built
by the North Charlotte Foundation as
a memorial to the late Horace Johnston.
All buildings are complete in every rec-reational
detail, and both are fully en-joyed
by the entire citizenry of the com-munity.
Many times mills shoulder the entire
recreation program budget for their little
community. It would be a rare thing to-day
to find a textile mill without a plan-ned
recreation program. They vary ac-cording
to the locale of the mill, size of
the employment group, and scope of the
recreation budget. Such budgets have
been increasing annually, however, and
many mills' trained recreation directors
are included in the companies high execu-tive
salary brackets. The combination of
sports and cultural recreation projects
has brought to this generation of N. C.
textile workers a type of background
formerly thought accessible only to the
very wealthy.
Many examples could be given of the
splendid cooperation between state sup-ported
schools and the textile industry's
active and constructive endowment in all
lines of formal education. Today with the
cultural opportunities and college ad-vantages
offered to employees of textile
mills, or members of their families, the
entire educational structure of textile
workers has been raised to levels com-parable
to or better than other walks of
life. This is outstandingly true in N. C,
where the N. C. State College School of
Textiles is among the foremost in educa-tion
and research. In the past 15 years
it has availed itself of many advantages
made possible through the N. C. Textile
Foundation. More than $1,600,000 has
been contributed (or earned as interest)
to the Foundation by more than 400 tex-tile
mills, and individual textile leaders,
all for the sole purpose to supplement
salaries of professors or to provide pro-fessorships.
In addition to the Founda-tion
fund four memorial or "named" pro-fessorships
have been established by tex-tile
companies or families.
Also many textile companies maintain
scholarships or educational loans for
children of their employees, enabling
many worth while young people to attain
college degrees. These scholarships are
frequently set up so the student may
choose his alma mater.
Not all textile education is on the col-lege
campus, however. Among schools on
the vocational level, and serving a wide
area, are N. C. Vocational School at Bel-mont,
which is state supported, but which
has a Board of Trustees and a Board of
Advisors made up of textile leaders who
willingly give their time for guidance
and direction of the textile studies.
The Gaston County Technical Insti-tute
located in Gastonia in buildings
donated for the purpose by Firestone
Textile Mills and renovated by state
funds has an enrollment of close to 200,
some of whom have come from as far
away as Manteo or the Tennessee border.
This school, originally community plan-ned
for its textile technician require-ments,
was started with donations from
the local industry and from public spirit-ed
citizens. Its curriculum is between that
of Vocational and Engineering educa-tion.
Students must have completed a
high school education before entering the
Technical Institute, which is staffed by
teachers paid by N. C. State and is now
under State College's Extension Division,
directed by the Engineering School.
But educational assistance to the
young people of the state from textile
mills of North Carolina does not stop
with these projects. For example, aid to
education programs include the labora-tory
established at N. C. State by 4 tex-tile
companies with assistance from
A.E.C. for Atomic Research in textile ap-plications.
In the establishment of the
Nuclear Reactor program at State Col
lege, Burlington Industries was the larg
est contributor—and thereby placed th
college far ahead in the fields of researc
of this Atomic Age. Burlington also cc
operates in the support of the Institut
of Government at the University
North Carolina. This training school fo
community officials renders today, an
for the future, a service type of educ
tion not usually offered the would-be put
lie office holder. At the least, Burling
ton has expended $1,500,000 in the ir
terest of education, what they call "coi
porate good citizenship".
Textile companies cooperated in rais
ing the $1,500,000 for establishment c
the state's great venture in educatioi
the Research Triangle, a unique arrange
ment whereby research institutions o
projects may be located within the tr
angular area lying between Duke Un
versity, University of North Carolin
and North Carolina State College-radius
of about fifteen square miles.
If an industry-wide health survey
ever made of the workers in the textil
industry the good health of textile mi
employees and their families will mai
a creditable showing which twenty
thirty years ago would have been unb<
lievable. Today it will be accepted as
matter of course. Much of this progres
in health is due to the revised living an
working standards of the last two de
ades. Other contributing factors are tt
health insurance and hospitalizatio
plans common in the industry toda
Almost every mill has group health ii
surance covering sickness and hospital
zation at a cost from 35 cents to one do
lar a week. Many have plans which ma
include nutrition programs and clinii
ranging literally from head to foot, wit
treatment for all the ills known to ma:
Many textile mills have their own spi
cialty clinics, and many go in on cor
munity cooperative health plans. In mar.
large and small textile areas, large ho
pital projects are under construction <
recently completed.
Many years ago, textile mills and oi
or two other industries around Roanol
Rapids, North Carolina, cooperated
An old steam engine used in cotton mill at Spray around 1905 Reproduction of original engraving (1760) of old velvet loom, predeces
of modern Jacquard loom, developed by Joseph Jacquard in France,
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 5
build their own hospital and set up a
hospitalization plan for the community
that attracted such widespread interest
that observers have come from all parts
of the world to study its operation.
One of the finest health programs in
the nation is that of Cabarrus County.
It is largely financed by Cannon Mill
interests. The original hospital built in
1937 with funds from a county bond
issue and from the Duke Endowment,
was expanded a few years ago under the
Hill-Burton Act and was financed by
$600,000 of federal aid, $250,000 state
aid, and the balance of $1,250,000 from
local industry—mostly Cannon Mills. It
is one of the few North Carolina hos-pitals
whose nurses are awarded a B.S.
degree upon graduation.
Within the last five years Cannon has
supplied an additional $400,000 for ex-pansion
of the Hospital's Nurses home.
And another half million is going into
'expanded kitchen facilities, new and
'larger X-Ray departments, and complete
air conditioning for the entire hospital.
To each of these funds for improvement
pf the hospital the Duke Endowment
idds 10%.
The value of such hospital programs to
Worth Carolina is inestimable. One of the
jreat benefits to the state is the encour-agement
they give to fine, outstanding
(specialists to settle in North Carolina
jind man the hospital facilities, thus giv-ing
their medical skill and scientific train-ing
and knowledge to the people of the
state.
A unique health program that has
'ocused national and international at-
;ention on Cabarrus County is the anti-
Polio drive sponsored by the Cannon
nterests. As soon as the Salk vaccine
jvas developed Charles Cannon, president
)f the Cannon Mills, determined that it
vould be made available to every child in
he county. Later, as vaccine became
nore plentiful he expanded the plan to
nclude adults. The inoculation program
vas personally underwritten, but was
nade workable through the efficient mill
organization. In little more than three
years polio has been virtually stamped
out in Cabarrus—but two unwarranted
cases in 1958 renewed the activity of the
drive for total inoculation of all age
groups. This drive in 1959 will be pushed
through by local clubs, and retired textile
mill employees, the cost of the program
continuing to be met by its original
sponsor.
Mr. Cannon says about the Cabarrus
Hospital which now has 325 beds and is
one of the largest in the state, "It has
made it fashionable in our county to
have babies in the Hospital. Almost
100% of Cabarrus County's new citizens
come into the world in the hospital
—
regardless of color or creed. And it has
given us the highest ratio of maternity
safety".
Another of the state's big hospital
ventures and one of the largest financed
solely by textile interests is in Greens-boro.
It carries a heart warming story
which enhances its benefit to that thriv-ing
textile city. When the two Cone
brothers, Moses and Caesar, built the
Proximity Manufacturing Company at
Greensboro, North Carolina, many years
ago they put into it all they had and
all they could borrow from other mem-bers
of the family. The mills prospered
and became a great community and state
asset. Now Greensboro has one of the
most impressive gifts ever presented to
any community: the 300 bed Cone Me-morial
Hospital which, with the land on
which it stands, represents half the
estate of Moses Cone and part of the
estate of an unmarried sister, approxi-mately
16 million dollars! The Hospital,
owning 1/7 of Cone Mills Corporation,
is the company's largest stockholder and
beneficiary of 1/7 of the company's di-vidends.
These are just two examples. Actually
throughout the state hospitals in textile
communities benefit from large dona-tions
by textile mills.
All the sociological improvements
brought about by textile interests are not
in the areas of health, education and
welfare. One of the most significant
movements has been that of greatly im-proved
working conditions. It is an
economic necessity for a textile plant of
1959 to be equipped with the most modern
machinery and plant layout. Within the
last few years there have been many
improvements and developments in tex-tile
machinery that make earlier models
obsolete. The new efficiencies in some
cases double man-hour productivity. In
the overall modern textile manufacturing
pattern we find better cleaning systems
for machines as well as atmospheric con-ditions,
reduction in fire hazards, supe-rior
safety factors. We find new concepts
in space needs within the plant which
allow employees wide and roomy cor-ridors
between machines. We find more
attractive machine design, often high-lighted
by attractive color contrast. We
find mechanical materials handling meth-ods,
and excellent lighting and ventila-tion
systems.
The many millions of dollars spent
annually by the American textile ma-chine
builders on research and machine
development are reflected in the superior
working conditions found in the textile
industry today. With some of the most
progressive mills in the country located
in North Carolina, the state may well
be proud of the surroundings in which
textile employees earn their livelihood.
In the textile industry of North Caro-lina
employees earned in 1957 more than
half the $1% billion paid in wages in
all industry in the state. It is a true
example of the philosophy of the Ameri-can
system of business which enables
those who work for the success of the
industry to gain from it not only good
earnings under excellent working con-ditions,
but also those things that money
cannot buy: the high morale that comes
with freedom from fear, the gain in
health and wisdom made possible by
community development through mill
interests.
This Group Received And Gave Counseling Training In Central State Office Of ESC During December
tanding: Elmer R. Van Court, Greensboro; Conrad Forbes, Winston-Salem;
homos G. Roberts, North Wilkesboro; J. A. (Bobby) Overcash, Concord,
eated: Mrs. Anne T. Freeman, Employment Counseling Supervisor, Ra-igh;
Mrs. Thora R. Morris, Jacksonville.
Standing: Michael Swaim, Burlington; Gilliam Parker, Jr., Kinston; Lonnie
D. Dill, Morehead City; Bruce B.' Bishop, Hickory; James G. Mills, Jr., Mt.
Airy; Thomas D. Adams, Evaluation and Training Specialist, Raleigh; Mrs.
Joan B. Mclntyre, Burlington,
PAGE 6 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
"QUALITY" IS THE KEY WORD WITH THE AMERICAN AND EFIRD MILLS
With headquarters in beautiful Mount
Holly, N. C. on the banks of the historic
Catawba River in Gaston County, 13
miles from growing Charlotte and 12
miles from textile minded Gastonia the
American and Efird Mills, Inc. daily
pours into the life of home and foreign
markets combed, carded, worsted and
textured yarns of
every count along
with industrial sew-ing
thread and dyed
products. All of the
above comes from
their eight plants in
Mount Holly, name-ly:
Finishing, Tex-tured
Yarn, Ameri-can,
Adrian, Ma-dora,
Rush, Thread
and Woodlawn, the
Maiden Plant in
Maiden, N. C, Nelson and Spun Fibers
in Whitnel, N. C. and the five plants of
the Efird Division located in Albemarle,
N. C. A $22,000,000 corporation operat-ing
150,000 spindles makes it the largest
producers of combed and carded yarns in
the entire nation. The company has good
employee and public relations along with
one of the best safety programs in the
textile industry. A Personnel Department
in Mount Holly serves the entire com-pany
in this field.
Rush S. Dickson of Charlotte is Presi-dent,
A. K. Winget, Chairman of the
Board of Directors, W. H. Suttenfield,
Vice Chairman, A. W. Bell, Executive
Vice-President, Lewis E. Chittum, Treas-urer,
Frank L. McKinney, Secretary,
Thomas C. Smotherman, Vice President
and G. W. Krentler, Thread Sales Man-ager.
The heads of the various divisions
are: N. E. Sellers, Manager, Thread
Division, Sam M. Littlejohn, Manager,
Finishing Division, Robert F. Jessen,
Manager, Textured Yarn Division,
Frank A. Farnell, Manager, Spun Fibers
Division, Alan T. Dickson, Manager,
Spinning Division. The Company also has
a quality control testing laboratory, In-dustrial
Engineering Department, Meth-ods
and Standards, and Waste Control
Department which extends quality con-trol
over all production.
Box 471, Newton,
Box 748, Charlotte,
ALLIGOOD
Directors
J. W. Abernethy,
North Carolina
W. H. Barnhardt,
North Carolina
A. W. Bell, Mount Holly, North Carolina
R. A. Bigger, 1501 Wachovia Bank Bldg.,
Charlotte, N. C.
L. E. Chittum, Mount Holly, North Caro-lina
R. S. Dickson, 15th. Floor, Wachovia
Bank Bldg., Charlotte, N. C .
J. B. Efird, 1937 Selwyn Avenue, Char-lotte,
North Carolina
G. G. Gallaway, 119 East Fifth Street,
Charlotte, North Carolina
R. D. Hall, Belmont, North Carolina
F. B. Helms, 500 Wachovia Bank Bldg.,
Charlotte, North Carolina
R. E. Kerr, c/o American Commercial
Bank, Charlotte, North Carolina
G. W. Krentler, Mount Holly, North
Carolina
W. H. Morrow, Box 70, Albemarle, North
Carolina
T. C. Smotherman, Mount Holly, North
Carolina
W. H. Suttenfield, 350 Fifth Avenue,
New York, New York
A. K. Winget, 1045 Pee Dee Avenue,
Albemarle, N. C.
Officers
A. K. Winget—Chairman of Board
R. S. Dickson—President
A. W. Bell—Executive Vice Pres.
T. C. Smotherman—Vice Pres. 7 Sales
Manager
W. H. Suttenfield—Vice Chairman of
the Board
L. E. Chittum—Treasurer
F. H. McKinney—Secretary and Asst.
Treasurer, Mount Holly, N. C.
N. M. Crawford—Controller, 2306 Bev-erly
Drive, Charlotte, N. C.
E. R. Abernethy—Asst. Secty and Asst,
Treasurer
D. A. Bruton—Asst. Secty and Asst!
Treasurer, 5914 Tuckaseege Rd., Char-j
lotte, N. C.
Wm. S. Montgomery—Asst. Vice Pres
and Sales Representative, Jenkintown
Pa.
T. J. Davis—Asst. Vice Pres. and Sales
Representative, Mount Holly, N. C.
R. H. Crawford—Asst. Vice President
223 Huntley Place, Charlotte, N. C.
R. F. Jessen—Asst. Vice Pres. in charge
of Textured Yarn Division, Mounl
Holly, N. C.
S. M. Littlejohn—Asst. Vice Pres. ir
charge of Knitting and Finishing Di-vision,
1959 Wendover Rd., Charlotte
N. C.
—See "QUALITY," page 13—
Above is the winding room of the American and Efird Mills Nelson plant at Whitnel, N. C. On the right is the Adrian plant spinning room of the Compar
located in Mount Holly.
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 7
THE BLUE BELL STORY COVERS WORK AND PLAY CLOTHES FOR EVERYONE
Greensboro is the home office of Blue
Bell, Inc., world's largest producer of
work and play clothes. The company's
productive facilities and sales offices
span the nation. Its customers encircle
the globe.
From a modest start more than fifty
years ago, Blue Bell has developed into
; a company producing a range of about
2400 products, employing 7000 people,
- producing over three million dozen goods
i annually. It literally clothes the nation,
| making a range of garments from pure
work clothing to highly fashioned Ladies'
sportswear.
Whereas ten years ago Blue Bell was
known throughout the trade primarily
as a resource for high quality work
clothes, today it is becoming increasingly
known as a source of work and play
clothes for every member of the family.
From bib overalls and dungarees its
line has expanded to include highly styl-ed
Ladies' sportswear, blouses, Men's
and Boy's outerwear, famous Wrangler
i Western wear, and a host of other items.
Today Blue Bell's producing plants
[range from those in Greensboro, North
i Carolina as far West as Fresno, Cali-jfornia,
and from Indiana South to Miss-issippi.
Through a licensing arrange-iment
Blue Bell garments are produced
in Canada by the W. Howick Manufact-uring
Company, Ltd. in Montreal. A
recently setup Export Department is
now shipping Blue Bell products through-out
the world.
Blue Bell had its beginning in North
Carolina in 1904. Mr. C. C. Hudson
started an overall business in Greens-boro
as the Hudson Overall Company.
This company was later dissolved and
Mr. Hudson bought the interest of his
partners and continued to operate under
the name of Blue Bell Overall Company.
First operations were at 513 South
Elm Street; moving later to an old
abandoned Church building on Arling-ton
Street. A bit later the company mov-ed
into another building at South Elm
and West Lee Streets. In 1919 Mr. Hud-
MORRIS LeMATTY
son moved his plant into a new factory
at 626 South Elm Street, incorporating
a modern cafeteria for the 225 workers
then employed. A large addition was
erected in 1923 and the work force was
expanded to a total of 825.
Concurrently over in Jellico, Tennessee
the Jellico Clothing Manufacturing Com-pany
began operations with twelve ma-chines
as a subsidiary of Jellico Grocery
Company, which distributed and sold
most of its products. In 1915 Mr. Robert
W. Baker joined the firm as secretary
and a year later became vice-president
and general manager. In that year the
company had 35 sewing machines, turn-ing
out bib overalls, with a sales volume
of about $30,000.00 a year. Three years
later the firm erected a large modern
building in Middleboro, Kentucky and
changed its name to the Big Ben Manu-facturing
Company.
In 1926 Mr. Baker of Jellico and Mr.
Hudson in Greensboro, who had become
friends, worked out a merger deal. As
of the first of 1927 Mr. Baker's firm,
Big Ben Manufacturing Company, bought
out Mr. Hudson's Blue Bell Overall
Company in what was described as the
largest merger to date in the textile
industry. Blue Bell, at that time, was
the largest single company making over-alls
exclusively for the wholesale trade.
At the same time the company opened
sales offices in New York, followed
shortly thereafter by other sales offices
in Chicago, Nashville, Dallas and Los
Angeles.
Mr. Baker thereupon embarked on a
program of building a management staff
and brought into the organization a
group of young men who were to play
a large role in future development. A-mong
the earliest of these arrivals was
Mr. E. A. Morris, now president, who
was hired as a consulting engineer, and
later joined Blue Bell as plant manager
in Abingdon, Illinois. Mr. E. W. Weant,
who is now the Vice-President and Gen-eral
Manager of the manufacturing di-vision,
joined the company in 1932 as
a resident industrial engineer.
In 1936 Mr. J. C. Fox, who was the
work clothes buyer for the J. C. Penney
PAGE 8 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
Company, joined the firm and became
President, holding that position until
1948, when he became Chairman of the
Board. Mr. Fox had been in the overall
business in Atchison, Kansas with his
father prior to joining the J. C. Penney
company.
Later in 1936 Blue Bell Overall Com-pany
bought the Globe Superior Corp-oration
and the name of the consolidated
firm became Blue Bell—Globe Manu-facturing
Company. The Globe Superior
firm was under the management of
Lloyd Mosser and Charles Snyder, a
result of a merger in 1927, of Globe
Shirt and Overall Company, Abingdon,
Illinois and Superior Garment Company,
Columbia City, Indiana.
When Blue Bell and Globe Superior
merged in 1936, officials then, and still
with Blue Bell, included Roger LeMat-ty,
Mr. H. F. Mosher, Eugene Stanley,
Mr. T. F. Harden, W. C. Alderfer and
A. L. Lomax.
Blue Bell, and its predecessor com-panies,
was one of the pioneers in pro-ducing
Sanforized work clothing. The
Globe Superior Corporation, one of Blue
Bell's predecessors, worked closely with
Mr. Sanford Cluett, the inventor of the
sanforization process, in developing
Sanforized denim. The first Sanforized
denim was made for Blue Bell's pre-decessor
company by Erwin Mills, Inc.,
and the first garments were produced
at the company's Abingdon, Illinois plant.
Because of its dominant position in
the cut and sew industry, Blue Bell was
naturally called upon by the United
States Government in the early war
years to lead the way in producing
clothing requirements for the Armed
Forces. In mid-1940 the company opened
a plant on Green Street and a few months
later bought the Greensboro Full-Fash-ion
Hosiery Plant on West Lee Street,
converting it to a coverall factory. Be-fore
the end of that year the plant in
Middlesboro, Kentucky was closed and
a new plant, purchased at Natchez,
Mississippi, thus adding production of
semi-dress shirts and pants to Blue Bell's
product line.
In the war period work clothes became
war clothes and under the Government's
admonition to make it snappy, Blue Bell
produced 21,670,000 garments for Army.
Navy, Air Corps and Marines. For the
Army it produced jungle suits, one-piece
suits, denim pants, coats, olive
drab, herringbone jackets, trousers, khaki
dress pants and shirts and fly-bars and
barrack's bags; for the Air Corps
—
flying suits; the Navy—denim and white
trousers, herringbone jackets and shirts.
Blue Bell, during the war period, made
many improvements and changes as well
as additions to its line of production
thus preparing it for more effective
operation and better production of Blue
Bell products in the post war period.
As the Blue Bell trade name became
more important, the Globe name was
used less and finally in 1943 the name
of the firm was changed to Blue Bell,
Inc. In that same year Blue Bell ab-sorbed
the Casey Jones Company, which
had been in business in Baltimore for
more than thirty years. This gave Blue
Bell additional productive facilities in
Maryland and in the vicinity of Luray,
Virginia. The following year saw further
expansion when Blue Bell leased large
plant facilities in Lenoir.
Blue Bell was one of the earliest work
clothes manufacturers to win the Good
Housekeeping guarantee seal of approval.
In 1944 Blue Bell's Executive Office
was moved to the textile center at Worth
Street in New York City. Executive and
Sales Offices were merged at 93 Worth
Street.
In 1945 the company pioneered in in-formative
labeling program, which it
called "Qualitag Labeling." This was
an informative ticket or tag attached
to every garment giving full and com-plete
information about the garment
its sizing and laundering instructions.
An important part of the Qualitag
guarantee was Blue Bell's unconditional
guarantee of satisfaction on each gar-ment.
The Qualitag booklet was a major step
forward in the merchandising of wort
clothes and contributed greatly to the
building of customer confidence and ac-ceptance,
and paved the way for readj
sales of Blue Bell's added lines as
its planned diversification took shape.
Blue Bell has long been a leadei
in the work clothing field in paying gooc;
wages to its employees. It was among
the first to offer employee services. Irj
1945 it established a group insurance!
plan for its employees and hospitaliza]
tion and surgery plans were added short
ly thereafter at a nominal premiunj
generously subsidized by the company!
It also established vacation with pajj
for one and two weeks, based on lengtlj
of service and annual pay. Employee:
have the advantage of modern cafeteria:
with food below cost and music durin|
working hours. Several of the Blue Bel
plants have regular employee newspaper;
and magazines.
It is significant that since the arriva
of the present management Blue Bel
—See BLUE BELL, page 45—
Sergers or overedgers overcast the raw edge of cloth to prevent raveling.
West Uee Street Plant in Greensboro,
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 9
FINEST OF CARPETS ARE PRODUCED AT ROBBINSVILLE'S FONTANA MILLS
On the shores of Lake Santeelah, in
the Graham County seat town of western
North Carolina's, Robbinsville, an ultra-modern
carpet mill has been built and
put into operation in a period of less
than two years. Today, Fontana Mills,
as the James Lees and Sons Company
plant is known, is producing- some of the
newest and finest carpets in the 1959
floor coverings market.
Great modern looms, including some
of the newest weaving techniques known
to the industry, are being manned by
i North Carolinians who, a few short
months ago, had never seen a carpet
mill. This is a tribute to the skills and
i craftsmanship of these mountain resi-i
dents of Graham County, an area inci-dentally
which is entirely within the
| confines of the Nantahala National For-est,
in an area the native Cherokee
[Indians call "the land of the Middle
(Sun."
The land upon which Fontana Mills
jis built was purchased from heirs of
Chief Junaluska, the Cherokee whose
'personal heroism saved the life of Gen-jeral
Andrew Jackson at the Battle of
Horseshoe Bend in 1814. It was for
(this deed that the North Carolina Legis-lature
years later made the land grant
of several hundred acres to the Chero-kee
chief. His remains are in a hill-side
overlooking the Fontana site.
The 112-year-old carpet manufacturer
sought out this site after it had located
a yarn spinning mill at Dahlonega,
Georgia, known as the Pine Tree plant
and a modern tufting mill and dye house
at Rabun Gap, Georgia, known as Ra-bun
Mills. Robbinsville was in the 75-
mile diameter of the other two mills.
After a four-month search of suitable
sites in 1956, President Joseph L. East-wick,
a great grandson of the founder
)f the Lees firm, visited the Robbins-ville
site and gave the word to proceed
with the erection of Fontana Mills.
On the southern edge of the Great
Smokies, Robbinsville is in an area of
man-made lakes which serve the Alum-inum
Company of America, and is also
only 37 miles from Fontana Lake where
the TVA dam is the third highest in
the world. Fontana, from which the
Lees mill gets its name, is a thriving
new resort area which promises to rival
Gatlinburg on the Tennessee side of
the mountains.
Before the general contractor, Fiske-
Carter Construction Company, of Green-ville,
N. C. could break ground for the
new mill, it was necessary to change the
course of the Graham County Railroad
which ran right through the mill site.
The tracks were moved in order to pro-vide
continued access to the Bemis Hard-wood
Lumber Company on adjoining
ground which is the only other large 'n-dustry
in the area.
The Graham County Railroad operates
the only shay locomotive still in action.
It runs from Robbinsville through the
picturesque mountain forest and valleys
to Topton, 12 1/2 miles away, where it
feeds to the Southern Railway running
south from Asheville.
Leaders in Robbinsville (Pop. 550-1950
census) had been seeking a new industry
to augment employment in the Graham
County (U. S. Pop. 6,500—1950 census)
area.
After Robert and Company Associates,
Atlanta architects and engineers, drew
the plans, ground was broken Septem-ber
14, 1956.
Despite heavy rains throughout the
winter and spring, not unusual for this
mountain area which is 2,150 feet above
sea level, the building was put into use
the following summer and by January,
1958, was producing quality carpets in
goodly quantities.
The plant was built for Wilton and
Velvet weaving, two of the three tradi-tional
types of carpet manufacturing:
however, the types of carpet produced
at Fontana are newer and different from
those made on traditional looms of this
type.
In addition to a huge loom area, Fon-tana
operates preparatory equipment,
modern finishing equipment and a large,
well-lighted inspection floor.
Railroad and truck sidings offer quick
transportation facilities to Lees ware-houses
and retail customers in all parts
of the nation.
Before the building had actually start-ed,
seven engineers and technicians from
the company's first Southern operations
in Glasgow, Virginia (started in 1934)
started to train local personnel in the
American Legion Hall, just off the main
street of Robbinsville.
—See ROBBINSVILLE, page 13—
PAGE 10 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 195<
JOHNSTON MILLS FEATURES "DIRECT TO THE CONSUMER" SALES METHOD
JOHNSTON
Johnston Mills Co., Chaxdotte, is the
yarn selling agent and one of the nine
corporations comprising the chain known
as Johnston Mills and its affiliated com-panies.
These include five yai-n spinning
mills, a mercerizing and dyeing plant,
a group of three mills manufacturing
cotton textiles and cloth and the corpora-tion
which owns and
operates a 17-story
office building in
Charlotte known as
the Johnston Build-ing.
Foundation for
the extensive Johns-ton
Mills activities
was laid in 1895
when Charles W.
Johnston came to
Charlotte to serve as
secretary and treas-urer
of Highland Park Mfg. Co., in Char-lotte.
Mr. Johnston, a farseeing and able
mill executive, through successful opera-tion,
continued to expand the Johnston
holding by building new plants and pur-chasing
plants already in operation. John-ston
Mills became one of the larger tex-tile
groups in the State during his di-rection
of their affairs which ended with
his death in 1941. His son, R. Horace
Johnston, succeeded him as head of the
organization with successful operation
until he died, a relatively young man,
in 1949. David R. Johnston, son of R.
Horace Johnston and grandson of the
founder, now heads the organization
and has continued its successful opera-tion.
The five yarn spinning mills in the
Johnston chain are: Johnston Mfg. Co.,
Charlotte; Union Mills Co., Monroe;
Eastern Mfg. Co., Selma; Park Yarn
Mills Co., Kings Mountain; and Worth
Spinning Co., Stony Point. The mercer-izing
and dyeing plant, processing the
yarns from those five mills is Spinners
Processing Co., Spindale. Another large
unit is the Highland Park Mfg. Co.,
engaged in both spinning yarns and
weaving cloth, with two units, Plants
Nos. 1 and 3, in Charlotte and Plant
No. 2 in Rock Hill, S. C. Combined, these
plants contain approximately 153,000
spindles and 1,600 looms. They employ
about 2,900 workers. The manufacture
of cotton yarns in the five yarn mills
is directed by general superintendent
Joseph L. Wright who also has charge
of operation of the Quality Control
Program and the laboratory maintained
by the mills to assure uniform high
quality in the yarn produced. Spinners
Processing Co., Spindale is equipped for
warp mercerizing, gassing, chain dye-ing
and bleaching and also has a modern,
well equipped package dye house. This
plant handles the mercerizing, dyeing
and bleaching of yarns for the other five
yarn mills. Officers of this corporation
are David R. Johnston, president; Don-ald
R. Jonas, vice-president, and Charles
J. Stokes, secretary, with Horace S.
Doan as superintendent.
Highland Park Mfg. Co., with its main
office and Plants Nos. 1 and 3 in North
Charlotte and Plant No. 2 in Rock Hill,
S. C, produces staple and fancy ging-hams,
broadcloths and shirtings. The
three units operate 63,216 spindles and
1,600 looms in addition to operating a
dye house and finishing plant equipped
to sanforize, mercerize, dye, bleach and
finish its fabrics. Those units employ
approximately 1,700 workers. Officers of
this corporation are David R. Johnston,
president; T. W. Church, Jr., executive
vice-president and treasurer; Harvey W.
Moore, vice-president; Charles J. Stokes,
secretary, with M. L. Brackett as general
superintendent of the Charlotte plants
and Z. G. Willis as superintendent of
the Rock Hill, S. C. plant. J. P. Stevens
& Co. is the sole selling agent for High-land
Park. Among the recreational fa-cilities
for this largest unit of the
Johnston chain are a modern lighted
baseball park and a major interest in
the $500,000 North Charlotte YMCA
Building, erected by the North Charlotte
Foundation in memory of the late Rich-ard
Horace Johnston who founded the
North Charlotte Foundation.
Johnston Mfg. Co., Charlotte, operates
20,208 spindles in manufacturing 8s to
40s single and ply, combed peeler yarns
on cones, tubes, ball warps and beams.
This plant also operates the modern
cotton classing room and Quality Con-trol
Laboratory, which serves all of the
mills in the corporation. Approximately
300 workers are employed. Officers of
this corporation are David R. Johnston,
president; Charles J. Stokes, vice-presi-dent,
and Arthur R. Newcombe, Jr. sec-retary,
with William L. Brightwell as
superintendent.
Union Mills Co., Monroe, employs 210
workers and operates 19,056 spindles in
manufacturing 18s to 40s single, combed
peeler and carded peeler yarn on cones
and tubes. Officers are Albert S. Orr,
president and treasurer; David R.
Johnston, vice-president, and Donald R.
Jonas, secretary, with Thomas M. Dun-can
as superintendent.
Eastern Mfg. Co., Selma, employs 180
workers and operates 15,996 spindles in
the production of 18s to 40s carded yarn,
single and two ply. Officers are Charles
J. Stokes, president; Harvey W. Moore,
vice-president; Glenn W. Grier, Jr. secre-tary
and treasurer, with Albert S. Orr,
Jr., as superintendent.
Park Yarn Mills Co., Kings Mountain,
employs 220 workers and operates 22,368
spindles in the production of 36s to 80s
combed peeler yarns, single and ply, on
cones, tubes and warps. Officers are
David R. Johnston, president; Harvey
W. Moore, vice-president, and Charles
J. Stokes, secretary with Thomas H
Watson as superintendent.
Worth Spinning Co., Stony Point
operates 12,096 spindles in the productior
of 30s to 60s single and ply combec
peeler knitting and warp yarn. Officer;
ai-e Charles J. Stokes, president; Davie
R. Johnston, vice-president; John D
Stratford, secretary-treasurer, and Rob
ert G. Belk, assistant secretary-treasure]
with Joseph F. Cline as superintendent
Anchor Mills Co., Charlotte, owns anc
operates the 17-story Johnston Building
near the center of the business distric
in Charlotte. This building was erecte<
in 1924 and is considered to be one o:
the finest office buildings in the Southj
Officers of this corporation are Charle
J. Stokes, president; David R. Johnston
vice-president and assistant-secretary
and W. B. Phelps, secretary, with Josepl
M. Brackett as building manager.
Johnston Mills Co., Charlotte is sola
sales agent for the five yarn mills an
the mercerizing and dyeing plant in th
Johnston chain. This corporation has it
principal office in the Johnston Building
Charlotte, and operates branch office
in New York, Philadelphia, Reading an
Chattanooga. Officers are David R. Johr
ston, president; Charles J. Stokes, vice
president; Donald R. Jonas, executiv
vice-president and treasurer, and Joh
D. Stratford, secretary. Donald R. Jona
functions as general sales manager. OtI
er division sales managers and thei
locations follow: W. J. Yates, E. E
Jones, Jr. and A. R. Newcombe, III
J
Charlotte; W. B. Phelps and P. Gesof I
New York; W. J. Crummer, E. Peacoc
j
and H. Byrne, Philadelphia; R. M. Becrj
tel, Reading, and F. N. Belk, Chattan<j i
oga. Fred C. Krueger functions as cotto |
buyer for all of the mills. Arthur (
Garland is insurance manager of all (
the corporations in the Johnston chai
and also administers their Unemploj
ment Insurance Claims Control prograr
Next- Edition Features
Farming and Electronics!
The Summer-Fall Edition of "The lj
S. C. Quarterly" will feature the indu
tries of farming and electronics. Bo1
industries will have articles develop(
from the angle of ESC cooperation.
Deadline for materials submitted fi
the issue has been set for August 1
1959. Should there be electronics man
facturing plants which have not receivi
questionnaire letters relative to their ol
erations, they are requested to write t
Editor of the "Quarterly" immediately!
There are two Chemical Fibre mar
facturing plants now in operation
North Carolina, Enka, at Enka; and E|J
Pont at Kinston.
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 11
WORLD'S LARGEST ZIPPER TAPE PLANT IS LOCATED IN STANLEY, N. C.
LAYNG
The world's largest zipper tape weav-ing
plant is located in Stanley (Gaston
County), North Carolina, owned and
operated by Talon, Inc., world's oldest
and leading producer of slide fasteners.
The entire output of the Stanley tape
mill is consumed by the primary Talon,
Inc. zipper assembly plants located in
Meadville, Pennsylvania; Woodland,
North Carolina; Cleveland, Georgia; Mor-ton
and Durant, Mississippi. The huge
Stanley mill, which began operations in
the fall of 1953, rep-resents
an invest-ment
in excess of
$1% million, con-taining
the latest
tape weaving, dyeing
and finishing equip-ment.
Approximate-ly
700 miles of zip-i
per tape are pro-duced
every day
i from patented shut-
|
tleless tape weaving
machines which Talon, Inc. designed and
| constructed at its Meadville plant. The
i; Stanley mill also produces cord which
I is woven in the tape, and is equipped
with the most modern facilities required
l to dye and finish zipper tape in almost
j
300 colors.
The history of Talon, Inc. has been
termed a "Romance of Modern Industry".
The forerunner of the present zipper was
an invention of Whitcomb L. Judson in
1891. Colonel Lewis Walker, grandfather
of the present President of Talon, Inc.,
was so interested in the potentials of
this invention that he formed a company
in 1894, known as the Universal Fasten-ing
Company, to develop it. This com-pany,
first located in Chicago, subse-quently
moved to Elyria, Ohio, Catasau-
I qua, Pennsylvania, and finally to Hobo-
! ken, New Jersey. In 1901 the Fastener
j Manufacturing Machine Company was
j organized to improve the Universal
j Fastener and develop machinery to pro-i
duce it. Three years later it was re-
I organized as the Automatic Hook and
j Eye Company, selling its product under
the trade name C-Curity.
The Automatic Hook and Eye Com-pany,
in 1906, employed Gideon Sund-back
as its engineer to redesign the
fastener. A new fastener, called Plako,
because it was intended primarily for
skirt plackets, appeared in 1908. While it
represented an improvement over the C-Curity
product, it could not be regarded
as a satisfactory fastener.
In 1912, Dr. Sundback designed a new
type of fastener, the basis of the present
day zipper. Because new capital was
needed, Colonel Walker, on May 15, 1913,
formed the present company, then called
the Hookless Fastener Company. Equip-ment
was acquired from the Automatic
Hook and Eye Company and the entire
operation was moved from Hoboken, New
Jersey to Meadville, Pennsylvania,
Colonel Walker's home.
Progress was slow. The first commer-cial
use for, the product came in 1917,
when it was put on money belts sold to
sailors on the waterfront of Brooklyn,
New York. In the following year, the
Navy designed a flying suit, substituting
fasteners for buttons in an effort to make
the suit windproof. In 1919 the fasteners
appeared on tobacco pouches. The turn-ing
point came in 1923 when the Hookless
Fastener became identified with galoshes
marketed by the B. F. Goodrich Company
under the trade-mark "Zipper Boot".
Other markets (jackets, trousers, cor-sets,
bathing suits, work clothing, lug-gage,
etc.) were subsequently developed,
so that today the zipper is an accepted
item wherever a convenient closure is
required. In 1928 the name of the product
was changed from "Hookless" to "Talon".
In 1937 the Hookless Fastener Company
changed its corporate name to reflect the
well-known name of its product.
Talon, Inc. is now a national organiza-tion.
Including its Universal Button sub-sidiary,
the company operates seven
manufacturing plants and has extensive
warehousing facilities and sales offices
located strategically throughout the
United States. It has subsidiary com-panies
in Canada and Mexico, and licens-ing
arrangements with companies in
Argentina, Guatemala, and the Philip-pines.
The officers of Talon, Inc. are
—
T. Franklin Soles, Chairman of the
Board; Lewis Walker, President; Grosve-nor
S. McKee, Vice president—Works
Manager; James E. Turner, Vice Presi-dent—
Finance & Administration; Robert
M. Evans, Vice President—Sales; L.
Merle Campbell, Vice President; Frank
C. Layng, Secretary; Norman N. Bab-cock,
Treasurer; Charles E. Hershelman,
Controller; John M. Barchus, Assistant
Treasurer; and Ralph E. Meech, Assis-tant
Secretary.
Approximately 3,600 persons are em-ployed
by Talon, Inc., and of that num-ber
about 200 are located in Stanley.
Top left shows a partial view of the Tape Weaving Department of Talon, Inc., Stanley, N. C. Top
right depicts J. A. Hendley, Textile Division Manager for Talon and Secretary Mrs. Peggy Garrison.
Lower left may be seen part of the Dye House while on the right appears the Tape Inspection Depart-ment
of the Company.
PAGE 12 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
TEXTILE EMPLOYMENT IS DOMINANT IN THE ECONOMY OF NORTH CAROLINA
By HUGH M. Raper, Director, Bureau of
Research and Statistics, E. S. C.
Textile employment accounted for al-most
half, 49 per cent, of the manufac-turing
employment in North Carolina
during 1957. Nationally, textile employ-ment
in the first quarter of 1957 account-ed
for only 6.2 per cent of the nation's
manufacturing employment total.
In 1957 there were 1,025 textile estab-lishments
which
reported employ-ment
and wage
data to the Em-ployment
Security
Commission. The
average monthly
employment in
these reporting
firms was 227,800.
Since textile em-ployment
for the
nation showed a
1957 monthly av-erage
of 1,030,100
workers, North
Carolina's employment in textiles ac-counted
for 22.1 per cent of the nation's
textile employment. By September 1958,
North Carolina's share was 22.7 per
cent of the industry's national employ-ment
total.
Employment Volume Remains High
The iollowing text Table A highlights
a number of significant developments in
the industry during the 1947-1957 period.
Likely of greatest significance is the
fact that North Carolina's textile em-ployment
total in 1957 was slightly
RAPER
greater (775) than the 1947 monthly
average while the textile industry for the
nation as a whole showed a loss of more
than 293,000 workers, a 22.1 per cent
decline in textile employment.
One might well ask: In an industry
showing on a nation-wide basis an em-ployment
decline, what accounts for the
constancy of employment in North Caro-lina?
The answer, for the most part, is
found in the trends in textile employment
for the principal textile areas of the
nation, those employing 30,000 or more|
textile workers. Table B which follows I
highlights the shifting in textile employ-ment
that has been taking place and it;
points up the areas that have given up
textile firms to North Carolina and to
other southern states. This in-migration'
has served to offset significant changes}
affecting the whole industry; e.g., in-creased
use of man-made fibers (chem-icals);
modified and improved production)
methods, including advances in the in-(
Table A. Textile Employment—United States and North C arolina
Selected Years 1947— 1957
Calendar Average Monthly IImployment % of Manufacturing
U.S.
8.8
Employment
Year U. S. N. C.
227,022
N. C.
1947 1,323,100 58.5
1950 1,289,600 229,415 8.7 57.1
1953 1,186,150 238,011 6.9 53.9
1954 1,072,950 227,235 6.8 52.9
1955 1,082,420 234,219 6.6 51.8
1957 1,030,070 (1st Qtr. ) 227,797 6.2 (1st Qtr.) 49.0
Table B. Textile Employment in Selected States
September 1951 and September 1957
Sept. 1957 Employ
Employment Per cent ment as % of
State September 1957
1,006,575
September 1951
1,222,047
Change
— 17.63
National Textile
United States 100.00
North Carolina 228,317 228,599 - 0.12 22.68
South Carolingi 131,732 140,166 - 6.02 13.09
Georgia 101,144 110,461 - 8.43 10.05
Pennsylvania 93,295 129,255 - 27.82 9.27
New York 66,853 82,163 - 18.63 6.64
Massachusetts 58,142 102,317 - 43.17 5.78
Alabama 44,219 53,228 - 16.93 4.39
New Jersey 42,790 55,321 - 22.65 4.25
Virginia 36,225 40,304 - 10.12 3.60
Rhode Island 33,262 53,008 - 37.25 3.30
Tennessee 31,770 37,120 - 14.41 3.16
All Other States 138,826 190,105 - 26.97 13.79
EMPLOYMENT SECURITY COMMISSION OF NORTH CAROLINA
COUNTY DISTRIBUTION OF COVERED EMPLOYMENT IN TEXTILES
MONTHLY AVERAGE EMPLOYMENT FOR YEAR 1957
None - Unshaded
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 13
Table C. Relative Growth in Pay rolls: All Insured, Insured
Calendar
Manufacturing and Textile Pay rolls
Selected Years: 1947—1957
Gross Pay roll
Textile pay roll
as per cent of
Year AH Insured Manufacturing: Textiles \11 Ind. Mfg.
1947 $1,257,672,783 $ 787,132,792 $463,817,463 36.9 58.9
1950 1,608,614,392 982,753,964 566,611,983 35.2 57.7
1953 2,044,702,169 1,210,680,256 628,380,222 30.7 51.9
1956 2,602,448,604 1,443,665,944 674,403,989 25.9 46.7
1957 2,678,973,978 1,477,356,399 674,094,343 25.2 45.6
Table D. Types of Production by Textile Reporting Firms —1957
Industry Type Production in Number of Re- Avg. Monthlj Wage
Code
222
Establishments porting: Units Employment
193 47,690
Payments
Yarn and Thread Mills $128,847,250
223 Broad Woven Fabric Mills 159 103,785 333,429,550
224 Narrow Fabrics 28 1,805 5,624,150
225 Knitting—Incl. Hosiery 537 64,250 173,695,550
226 Dyeing and Finishing 37 7,145 23,693,725
227 Carpets, Rugs, etc. 9 675 648,575
229 Misc. Textile Goods 37 2,450 7,145,550
dustry's mechanization ; the influence of
imports of foreign-made goods and de-clines
in the export markets and other
factors which influence the economy of
the industry from time to time.
Industry's Predominance is Receding
While North Carolina's employment in
textile production has remained nearly
constant between 1947 and 1957, the im-portance
of the industry's contribution to
all manufacturing employment has les-sened.
In 1947 employment in textile pro-jduction
accounted for 58.5 per cent of
the State's manufacturing employment;
but, by 1957 textile employment repre-sented
only 49.0 per cent of the State's
'manufacturing employment total. A con-tributing
factor has been that a major
jpart of the newly acquired industries are
[producers of other goods; i. e., food pro-jducts,
electrical goods, apparel, chemi-cals,
and a variety of other products,
which serve to give greater diversity to
our manufacturing structure.
Turning from employment, an analysis
of the insured pay roll data suggests
that in the 1947—1957 period the textile
industry's position has weakened. In
1947, textile pay rolls accounted for
about three-eights of the insured wages;
but by 1957, the textile industry's con-tribution
was only slightly above one-
Ifourth of the State's insured pay roll.
(Text Table C above shows that by 1957
the textile industry's share of the in-sured
manufacturing and total insured
pay roll had shrunk sharply.
Production is Varied
Apart from the industry's over-all
significance in the North Carolina eco-nomic
structure, other areas of interest
pay be found in the nature of textile
production by the more than a thousand
North Carolina textile establishments
reporting to the Employment Security
Commission. Table D which follows high-ights
textile employment and pay rolls
n terms of type of production, with the
production in integrated plants generally
carrying the code of the major product
marketed.
Table D suggests that the majority of
the textile production is in terms of goods
ready for marketing which provides the
industry with added stablity.
Textile Firms in 76 Counties
In geographical terms textile produc-tion
facilities are found in 76 counties.
Counties without some textile produc-tion
are primarily coastal area counties
in the eastern portion of the State.
There are, however, four counties in the
mountain area without textile production
facilities. The shaded map rather point-edly
highlights the relative importance
of textiles in the State's 100 counties.
Coming Up On WNCT
During Month Of March
The following assignments for appear-ance
on the "Today On the Farm" pro-gram
each Monday at 12:00 noon over
Television WNCT, Greenville, have been
announced by Philip B. Pollock, New
Bern-Elizabeth City Area Supervisor.
March 16-Mrs. Jeannette M. Grainger,
Manager of the Wilson ESC Office will
discuss the agricultural activities in Wil-son
County. She will also take up other
factors relating to the agricultural pro-gram
of the Employment Service Divi-sion.
March 23-Norman L. Pendleton, Man-ager
of the Elizabeth City Office, will
present that section's agricultural pro-gram.
His area is comprised of the
counties of Camden, Carteret, Dare and
Pasquotank. Pendleton will cover the
program as handled by an Interviewer
II and four farm interviewers.
March 30-Raymond P. Umstead, State
Farm Placement Supervisor, Raleigh,
will give a resume of the agricultural
activities in the northeastern section of
North Carolina and will present the total
agricultural picture of the State from
an ESC view.
"QUALITY"
—Continued from page 6
F. A. Farnell—Asst. Vice Pres. in charge
of Spun Fibers, Inc., Carmel Park,
Charlotte, N. C.
N. E. Sellers—Asst. Vice Pres. in charge
of Thread Division. Mount Holly, N. C.
Sales Offices
New York—5605 Empire State Building,
New York 1, N. Y.
Mr. Suttenfield
Mr. James L. Bryant
Mr. W. E. James, Jr.
Mr. Romero
Mr. Charles L. Harding, III
Chattanooga, Term.—728 James Building,
Chattanooga, Tenn.
Mr. H. W. Davenport
Jenkintown, Pa.—Benson Building, Jenk-intown,
Pa.
Mr. W. S. Montgomery
Providence, R. I.—420 Industrial Bank
Bldg., Providence 3, R I.
Mr. L. T. Howick
Chicago, III.—222 West Adams St., Room
423, Chicago 6, Illinois
Mr. W. H. Hutchinson
High Point, N. C—P.O. Box 110, High
Point, N. C.
Mr. E. J. Holbrook
Reading, Pa.—522 Washington Street,
Reading, Pa.
Mr. Gene J. Matthews
ROBBINSVILLE
—Continued from page 9
—
Later this training was augmented in
a large garage just outside Robbinsville
where the big looms were first erected.
The plant is built of structural steel
with insulated brick walls and roof. It
is air-conditioned. Large column centers
and extra high ceilings permit material
handling to be accomplished largely by
overhead cranes.
Electricity is supplied by the Nan-tahala
Power and Light Company, while
Fontana generates its own steam in a
separate boiler building.
Offices of the mill supervisory person-nel
are built on a mezzanine balcony,
overlooking the entire one-floor opera-tion.
The main offices are occupied by
Plant Manager, Norman Dawson and
his staff.
Modern outdoor street lighting illumi-nates
the hard surface roadway and
parking lot which permit access to work-ers
and visitors to the 97-acre site from
Robbinsville's down town.
Teletypes and telephones permit quick
communication between Fontana and its
three other Lees plants in the Southland.
Newest member of the Employment
Security Commission State Advisory
Council is Mr. G. Maurice Hill of Drexel.
He was appointed by Governor Luther
Hodges in December. Mr. Hill is Vice
President, Director of Manufacturing,
Drexel Furniture Company, Drexel.
PAGE 14 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
IN PRINTS FROM CRANSTON, THERE'S FAR MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE
Miles of 'plain grey cloth are beaatifie
ea'c,chh year %in tzhne ggrreeaait Cranston plant, i
This story tells you how
By Dwight H. Owen
This is a 10-minute saga of a yard of
cloth. After reading it you will know
more than nine out of 10 Americans do
about the print dresses and shirts and
other clothes they wear and take for
granted.
Our story takes place at the Cranston
Print Works Company, one of the oldest
established finishing companies of the
U. S. Its works in Cranston, R. I., where
the main offices are located, has been
printing cloth since 1825. Two other
operating divisions are in Webster, Mass.,
and Fletcher, N. C. The southern division
is the latest, having been opened in 1950,
and is as modern as any to be found. The
plant at Fletcher has nearly 600 employ-ees
and 9 printing machines. John Greg-ory
is its Resident Manager.
Cranston Print's 2,400 employees turn
out quality prints on millions of yards of
cloth annually. The company is a service
organization. That is, it does not own the
fabrics it processes. The cloth handled is
owned by converters who, after Cranston
has processed it, sell it to garment cutters
or has it made into clothing for sale in
stores throughout the country.
Cranston is a big name in the cloth
world, in fact it is the largest indepen-dent
job printer and finisher of fine cloth
in the U. S. Cranston was the first com-pany
in the industry to guarantee not
only the printing and dyeing of the cloth,
providing it bore a Cranston-processed
tag, but of the garment itself. One of the
newest guarantee tags is that for Dri
Smooth finish which gives lasting crease
resistance to a garment and makes iron-ing
unessential.
But let's start the odyssey of our yard
of cloth. It starts when it reaches the
Print Works in a bale from the Grey
Mills where the cotton has been woven
into cloth.
Grey is its original color. In olden
times grey cloth was bleached by laying
it out in a meadow and exposing it to
the sun and water. They do it differently
now.
Our yard of cloth, sewn to another 100
or so and stamped with a lot number, is
exposed to a gas flame which defuzzes its
face and back simultaneously. Then it is
dipped in a malt solution which opens its
fibres so that motes, sizing and other ma-terial
is removed. Next it is either boiled
from six to 12 hours at a high tempera-ture
or run through a continuous bleach-ing
process where chemicals and water
turn it a pure white.
After being stretched to desired width
and dried by hot air, our yard of cloth
with as many as 2,500 others is batched
into roll form and set ready for printing.
Which design or pattern will we use ?
That is up to the Cranston customer, who
sends a sketch of one to the Print Works
where it is determined whether it can be
engraved. The design must be copied on
a copper roll.
Several colors call for several rollers.
They are engraved in several different
ways—by die and Mill or pantograph en-graving,
or perhaps by the newest meth-od,
photoengraving. Die and mill is used
primarily where straight lines are in-volved.
Pantograph or photoengraving
are used for floral patterns or those of a
scenic design.
Since 1860 Cranston has had its own
dye and mill engraving department and
the Rhode Island plant continues to be
the only one to have one.
Once the design for our yard of cloth
is upon copper, the rollers go into the
printing machines capable of printing as
many as 15 colors at once. The skilled
printer adjusts his machine so that the
design will be "infit". The carefully pre-pared
colors are brought to the machine.
The roll of cloth, containing the yard we
are following, is set in place.
The printing process, complex and re-quiring
the greatest care, is under way.
The rollers spin, feed color as they turn,
and the cloth races through the machine
at speeds up to 150 to 200 yards a minute.
Our yard of cloth along with its broth-ers
on the roll is dried after printing on
steam-heated drying cans. To make it
color fast it is aged by exposure to hot-ter
steam. A chemical reaction results
and the colors of the design will not fade
from sunlight or laundering.
To free it from any excess gum or
color and to further bring out the bloom
or blossom of the colors the cloth we
have been following is now oxidized and
washed. In this operation which is con-tinuous,
it might be dyed with a light
shade of blue or brown, or whatever
other shade the customer desires.
When again dried it is ready for finish-ing.
Consciously or unconsciously, we feel
a garment with our fingers and hands
when we are shopping. We're more apt
to buy if the cloth has a pleasant touch,
or "hand", as it is known in the industry.
The "hand" or finish desired is pro-duced
by the application of different
kinds of starch and softeners or mechani-cally
by means of calendars. There are
all types of starch: that of tallow gives
a soft, full hand while mineral or olive
oils give cloth a silky feel. Cranston's
foreman finishers prepare the desired
Top, left: Constant vigilance to insure quality printing is exercised by I. F. Reese, journeyman printer,!
as he adjusts his roller printing machine. Right, Charles Wright, Fletcher Division, lines up cloth as
it is fed into a short frame for straightening. Lower left: Cloth in bolt form is packed into eases fol
shipment by Joe King while Sue Sutton tabulates the number of pieces and yardage. Right: George
Johnson checks cloth as it enters pup tenter prior to sanforizing. All photos made in Cranston Pnn'[
Works. !
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 15
starches to meet their customers' re-quests.
Cloth to be calendared is first pulled
out to proper width on a tenter frame
and then run between heavy rollers or
bowls to give it a lustrous or highly
glazed appearance.
Another type of calendaring is called
"embossing". The cloth is first treated
with a resin finish and then run between
two bowls. One having the design raised
upon it and the other countersunk, so
that the design has an embossed or raised
effect. When cured by heat, the effect is
made permanent.
From the finishing process, the cloth
may go directly to Cranston's folding and
putup departments or it first may be
sanforized. Sanforizing is a mechanical
process which preshrinks cloth to a pre-determined
width. Cranston was the fifth
concern to be licensed to carry out the
Cluett Peabody Sanforizing Process.
Practically 75 per cent of Cranston's
orders call for sanforizing. The purchas-ing
public has come to expect that shirts
and other garments will not shrink no
matter how many times they are washed.
Two more departments must handle
our yard of cloth before it is ready for
its journey, usually by truck to the gar-ment
cutter.
In the Folding Room it and others on
the roll are placed upon a hooking ma-chine
which automatically folds the cloth
into yard lengths. As the material is
folded an operator visually inspects the
material for defects which she tags. A
folder then checks the defects, makes
necessary yardage allowance for the cus-tomer,
counts the yards and folds the
cloth into the form of a bolt.
How many yards in a bolt? It varies
from 40 to 80 or more.
Tied and ticketed, the cloth moves to
the packing department. Every effort is
made to place in each case goods of the
same shade. That is so the garment cut-ter
may lay out goods of a similar shade
for cutting.
Interestingly, the color in various bolts
of cloth may vary to some extent. It is
due to changes in printing machine
speeds, the starting and stopping of _ the
machines, variation in the color mixes
and for other reasons.
At last the bolts of similar shade and
color go into the packing cases. The cases
are sealed and marked for delivery. In-side
one of them is our yard of cloth,
now printed.
It might be in the shirt or dress you're
wearing today. Who knows ?
Pamphlets Available
Several new pamphlets of interest to
employers have recently been published
by the Employment Division of the Em-ployment
Security Commission. They may
be had by writing to ESC, Raleigh, and
requesting them.
Three of the pamphlets are " If You
Are Looking for Workers", "Technical
Services for Employers", and "A Spe-cial
Message To You, Mr. Employer".
Sovelco Mills Has Grown Rapidly Since 1956
The present management assumed con-trol
of Sovelco Mills, Inc., 740 East 27th
Street, Winston-Salem, North Carolina
on July 1, 1956. During this short period
of control we have had several expan-sions
of our physical plant and we now
occupy approximately 100,000 square
feet of floor space in a modern one-story
building. This area is devoted exclusively
to the dyeing and finishing. This area is
devoted exclusively to the dyeing and
finishing of cotton and synthetic fabrics.
Our entire plant has been engineered for
efficiency and for streamlined produc-tion
to meet the evergrowing demand for
Sovelco Finished Fabrics. The finest and
most modern equipment available has
been installed to assure our leadership
in this highly specialized field.
Our firm specializes in the dyeing and
finishing of nylon linings and all types
of pocketing and waistbands. In addi-tion,
we are pioneers in specialized fini-shes
for cottons, nylon and cotton and
all blends. Our trade marks "Sovel-Set"
and "Sovel-Fast" are well known by con-verters
and manufacturers who desire the
best in Wash'N Wear finishes. The
world's leading authority on Washable
and Colorfast finishers, The American
Institute of Laundering, has awarded us
their coveted Seal.
Sovelco's Laboratory contains all types
of equipment for conducting Chemical
and Physical analysis of fabrics. The
constant laboratory control by our chem-ists
assures trouble-free fabrics for the
convertor, cutter, and retailer. Millions
of yards of fabrics used throughout the
garment industry have been tested not
only to assure permanency of finish but
also retention of the beauty of finish
after repeated washings. Non-slip and
non-raveling are assured and residual
shrinkage is held to an absolute mini-mum.
The services rendered by our firm
have proved invaluable to convertors and
manufacturers who demand tcp-quality
Wash'N Wear at competitive prices. That
is why our 1958 production was four
times greater than 1957. Our continuous
dyeing methods plus quality control pro-duces
perfect color from piece to piece
and batch to batch. This eliminates cut-ting
room bottlenecks through costly
matching thereby saving the cutter time
and money.
The priceless ingredient of true crafts-manship
lies in people. More than a plant,
more than machines, the art of producing
a first quality product is in direct rela-tion
to the people who produce the pro-duct.
It is these people, the men and
—See SOVELCO, page 16—
Above are some of Duro's operations involved in making Nylon linings and all types of pocketings
and waistbands. All Nylon, nylon and cotton, and cottons with specialized finishes and all blends.
PAGE 16 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
Valhalla Hand Weavers Serve World From Tryon Royal Cotton is
Valhalla Hand Weavers, Tryon, N. C.
is a craft industry started May 1, 1941,
with two looms by Mr. Ralph B. Lawr-ence
and has since been operated by Mr.
and Mrs. Lawrence. Mr. Lawrence has
been in the weaving craft for about
30 years. The plant is located about three
miles north of Tryon on the Tryon-Hen-dersonville
Highway 176 and in the Val-halla
community, a Biblical name mean-ing
a place of rest and refuge.
The plant started producing hand
woven rugs during World War II and
has continued to add to its products
various items including homespun fab-rics
for men's and ladies suits and all
wool hand loomed baby blankets. Nylon
handloomed bags are also one of the
leading products at Valhalla. Up to date
styles of Zipper bags, Bucket bags, and
of course the drawstring bags are a big
item at Valhalla, being made in all the
latest shades of material. Lovely hand-woven
all wool stoles are made here too.
The handwoven wool ties have long been
a popular line and always a good assort-ment
of colors, solids, plaids and stripes
can be bought. Nylon table place mats
are made on the looms and are found in
homes all over the United States.
SOVELCO
—Continued from page 15
—
women at Sovelco Mills Inc., who are es-sentially
responsible for its unusual rapid
growth. To our 75 employees we have en-trusted
the most modern machinery
available. The machinery illustrated in
this article typifies the variety and mag-nitude
of the equipment.
Our President, Mr. Edward W. Ricci,
is a master dyer and finisher who is
equally at home in the front office or at
the one-hundred ton hydraulic calendar.
He possesses a rare combination of ex-ecutive
ability and technical skill. Our
Treasurer, Mr. Leo Goldberg, is top
liaison between plant and customer. His
knowledge of textiles is recognized and
respected throughout the industry. He
sincerely believes that a satisfied cus-tomer
is the best customer and this theme
is reflected throughout the plant. Mr. Al-fred
Zimmerman, our plant manager, has
managed a number of leading plants in
the United States and South America.
He possesses a vast knowledge of textile
finishing. He is a great organizer and
planner. His daily conference with dyers,
finishers, and chemists has enabled him to
increase and maintain our quality pro-duction.
Our customer service department is the
last word in plant efficiency. Every order
receives constant attention from the
moment it is ordered into production to
the time it is packed for shipment. To
maintain close communications with our
New York Sales Office and customers a
direct line teletype service is employed.
Valhalla Hand Weavers, having had
several expansions during their opera-tion,
increasing the looms from two to
twelve, also added the Gift Shop in which
their own products and other items are
sold at retail.
Looms are distributed in various homes
which permit families to increase their
income by working and bringing the pro-ducts
back in as the weaving is done on a
purchase basis. In the seasonal opera-tions
about thirty or more workers are
employed.
In addition to the retail trade, Valhalla
Hand Weavers also enjoys a splendid
mail order business, supplying suitings,
rugs, baby blankets, stoles, hooked chair
mats, nylon bags and many other items,
all made on the looms at Valhalla.
Catalogues are sent to anyone upon re-quest
and at Valhalla Hand Weavers, the
welcome mat is always out to anyone to
come in and visit with us and see the
work being done in the weave shop.
Being located in the Isothermal area
and at the foot of the Blue Ridge Moun-tains,
one finds the seasons very nice.
All of us at Valhalla look forward to
seeing our many friends that come in
each year for a visit with us. We welcome
any newcomers and want them to always
feel at home when they visit us at Val-halla
Hand Weavers.
Spray Yarn Mills
Began In 1896
The Spray Cotton Mills began opera-tion
in Spray, North Carolina in the year
1896. Two years later, in 1898, a sub-stantial
addition to the mill was made
and other additions have been made
through the years to greatly increase the
production capacity of the plant. The
latest building addition was made in 1951.
Cotton sales yarn constitutes the pro-duct
of this mill and is used in a myriad
of finished products made by weavers
and knitters inside North Carolina and
many other states.
Through the years the mill has been
equipped with modern machinery and at
present another machinery moderniza-tion
program is under way that will en-able
the mill to produce better quality
yarns and to become a more firm source
of employment for the 225 employees
working in the mill, who are the re-cipients
of the more than $500,000.00 an-nual
payroll.
The present management of the com-pany
consists of Karl Bishopric, Chair-man
of the Board; Welsford Bishopric,
President and Treasurer; E. W. Schoen-heit,
Vice President; Z. D. Ford, Secre-tary,
and W. R. Matthews, Assistant Sec-retary.
Service Firm
Royal Cotton Mill Company is a cotton
sales yarn producer servicing hosiery and
underwear knitters, package yarn dyers,
mercerizers and weavers with combed
cotton yarns.
Operation originally began in 1902 in
Wake Forest, N. C. as a small weaving
plant producing muslin sheeting. Not
much is known of the operation of the
mill during its early years, however it
must have progressed satisfactorily dur-ing
this time as the mill building was
doubled in size in 1926. Thereafter
though, times became so hard that the
mill went into bankruptcy sometime
around 1932. In 1933 the mill went into
the hands of a receiver with ownership
and management both changed. Principal
stockholders became Don P. Johnston and
family and Willis Smith and family. At
this time the mill began operation as a
carded yarn producer, making very
coarse counts.
Again in 1945 the mill changed hands
with Willis Smith, B. Everett Jordan and
Sellers Manufacturing Company being
the principal stockholders. A moderniza-tion
program was immediately begun
with the installation of new Saco-Lowerr
Combers, drawing, spinning frames, twis-ters
and winders. Association with Sel-lers
Manufacturing Company was a fa-vorable
action for both companies in that
the range of yarns made complemented
each other for a better sales program.
Royal Cotton Mill makes 10's through
30's single and ply, while Sellers and its
affiliate, Jordan Spinning Company, pro-duce
26's through 70's single and ply. All
these yarns are sold in the greige, mer-cerized,
dyed and bleached through the
sales office in Saxapahaw, N. C
Royal's production is for the most part
devoted to very soft twist combed yarns
for hosiery and underwear makers. How-ever,
production facilities are geared to
handle a variety of counts and twists fori
both large and small users.
President and Treasurer is B. Everett
Jordan (now the U. S. Senator from
North Carolina). The company's progress
can be attributed to his experienced
leadership and even during the lean
years so frequent in our industry, the
company has made a modest showing.
The Secretary is Willis Smith, Jr. of
Raleigh. Also associated with the com-pany
are Frank Longcrier, Vice Presi-dent
and Sales Manager of Sellers Manu-facturing
Company; W. Lewis Jackson,
General Superintendent of Methods,
Standards and Quality Control of Sellers
Manufacturing Company, and B. E. Jor-dan,
Jr., President of Sellers Dyeing
Company. Local management consists ofj
Alton B. Smith, Vice President and P
E. Moran, Superintendent.
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 17
CAROLINA MILLS HAS MULTIPLIED SEVERAL TIMES SINCE BEGINNING
The story of Carolina Mills, Inc. is the
story of an organization which in a little
more than three decades has grown
several times its original size through
wise acquisition of other plants and
through a steadfast aim or philosophy of
making the best possible products and
sharing with employees whatever finan-cial
success is realized.
When the company was organized in
1928 to acquire the defunct Carolina Cot-fton
Mills here in the foothills of North
; Carolina at Maiden, there was only the
j single plant and a mere 110 employees.
Today the organization embraces four
plants and furnishes employment to more
than six hundred men and women on the
! production line.
As far back as 1942, the company es-tablished
a retirement plan for its em-ployees,
probably the first cotton mill in
[the south to do so, and nearly a decade
'earlier, in 1934, inaugurated a hospitali-jzation
and insurance plan for employees
jthat was not only among the first such
'.programs but which today is among the
jbroadest to be found anywhere.
The hospitalization plan covers not
ionly the employees but the dependent
imembers of their families. One fact in the
way of hospitalization, any employee or
his dependent who will accept ward ac-commodations
at Catawba Hospital in
Newton, the insurance policy pays an
amount sufficient to cover all hospital
{and surgical charges.
The foregoing is a brief and incom-plete
outline of the company's employee
benefits. In addition, bonuses are paid
when company earnings permit. It is in-teresting
to note that the company
spends considerably more on these em-ployee
benefits—exclusive, of employee's
wages and bonuses—than is paid in divi-dends
to the stockholders whose money
invested in the company makes the opera-tion
possible.
Each year the company issues to em-aloyees
what is called a "Business Re-sort"
covering the fiscal year. It reviews
business conditions affecting the complex
extile industry and briefly summarizes
merations of the company under what-ever
circumstances are prevailing at the
ime, with whatever outlook or forecast
?or the future that can be expected on
such a basis.
With each annual report, there is a
:hart showing the distribution of each
lollar of the company's income. For in-stance,
the table for the fiscal year 1958
shows 66.09 per cent of the dollar going
'or raw materials, services and supplies;
1. 10 per cent for taxes and donations;
!.16 per cent for wear and tear on build-ngs
and equipment, and kept for future
growth; 22.67 per cent for wages and
salaries; 2.75 per cent for pension fund,
lospital insurance, employee's welfare,
'acation pay and bonuses; 1.23 for divi-lends
to the 100 people whose savings
ire invested in this business.
While the company has pioneered in
certain benefits for employees, it has paid
wages on a parity with the highest wage
scale in the region in its segment of the
much-segmented textile industry. Even
in depression years the plants have never
failed to operate and have never failed to
meet a payroll, although the textile in-dustry
is actually affected by every de-pression
or business recession.
The fact that the plants have provided
steady employment through the years,
good and bad, and the additional fact that
wages and salaries are now running at
an annual rate approaching $2,000,000.00
illustrates the powerful impact that the
mills have upon the community economy.
Such, briefly, is an outline of the opera-tion
and scope of Carolina Mills, Inc. at
the present time. But how did the organi-zation
come into being? How was it
built? Whose vision and principles made
such growth possible ?
In the middle 1920's, the Carolina Cot-ton
Mills in Maiden was experiencing
rough going. There seemed no alternative
but to go into receivership. Several ex-perienced
and well-known textile men
were approached to become receivers of
the mill, but they all shook their heads
sadly. Finally, the mill's attorney,
Thomas P. Pruitt, persuaded J. A.
Moretz, who ran a clothing store in near-by
Hickory, to take on the job.
Mr. Moretz was an able and sound
businessman, but he hadn't the slightest
idea of what the inside of a cotton mill
looked like. Yet good business practice
is pretty much the same whether it is
running a store or operating a complex
cotton mill. Mr. Mortez simply took over
tending to the business end of the enter-prise
and wisely left the operating end to
men who had the know-how, such as W.
L. Heffner, the general superintendent.
When he came to the mill, Mr. Moretz
actually didn't know one piece of machin-ery
from the other. But he was a firm
believer in the principle that no success-ful
enterprise can be built unless there
is a recognition on the part of both em-ployer
and employees, that each is inter-dependent
on the other and that when
the enterprise loses, everybody loses and
when the enterprise prospers, everybody
prospers.
In 1928, Mr. Julius W. Abernethy, an
experienced financier and textile opera-tor,
who was the defunct mill's principal
creditor, along with Moretz and Pruitt,
made a deal to buy the plant. They called
the new company Carolina Mills, Inc.
There was no change in personnel only a
change in officers.
The new enterprise had hardly been
launched, when the stock market crash
of 1929 came and the subsequent long
depression of the 1930's. Mr. Moretz was
the guiding genius in the management
of the company through these turbulent
years. He managed the mills until his
death in August, 1942, when the job was
taken over by his son, Leonard Moretz,
who had been his assistant for 13 years.
It was indeed a difficult situation that
was faced by the company in its early
years. For one thing, the machinery and
the plants were in such condition that
the company could not be expected to
operate with a degree of efficiency neces-sary
to meet the competition in what is
—See CAROLINA MILLS, page 67—
PAGE IS THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
FIRESTONE PROCESSED RAYON TIRE CORD AS EARLY AS THE YEAR 1938
Gastonia, North Carolina is the home
of Firestone Textiles, one of the world's
largest plants manufacturing tire cord
fabrics. A division of the Firestone Tire
& Rubber Company, with headquarters
in Akron, Ohio, the Gastonia plant is a
major link in the history of the textile
industry in Gaston County and the sur-rounding
area.
The original portion of the Gastonia
plant was built in 1900. Firestone pur-chased
the plant and a large number of
homes constituting the Loray Village
from the Manville-Jencks Company in
April of 1935.
Originally "Firestone Cotton Mills,
Inc.," the plant first turned out tire cord
fabrics only. Today, principal production
is centered in rayon and nylon cord fab-rics
for Firestone Tires. There is also
some production of monofilament fabrics,
cotton carded yarns and woven fabrics
for further processing in Firestone plants
in the U. S. A. and abroad, and for the
general textile market.
In the period of June-November, 1935
production totalled only 3,159,368 pounds.
Now, the same volume can be turned out
in less than two weeks of operation. The
plant now employs just under 2,000 men
and women.
Rayon tire cord fabrics were experi-mentally
processed here as early as 1938.
A shortage of rubber in World War II
forcing curtailment of tire fabrics out-put
led to production of sales yarns. In
1942 alone, the plant sold more than
5,000,000 pounds for army tent duck, and
500,000 pounds of fabrics for other
armed-forces needs.
The firm received one of the first of
several Army and Navy "E" awards
for efficiency in the production of de-fense
materials.
To better describe operations, the
firm's name was changed in 1944 to
Firestone Textiles, Inc. This corporate
name was discontinued in 1950, at which
time Firestone Textiles became a divi-sion
of the parent company.
Since 1945, an extensive program of
improvement, enlargement and installa-tion
of new equipment has made the
plant one of the most modern textile
operations in the world.
Among major installations were a
plant wide fluorescent lighting system
costing in excess of $200,000, constant
humidity and temperature control, en-larged
parking facilities for some 300
cars per shift, increased office space,
sanitary equipment, and safety-engineer-ed
machinery.
The gigantic electronic Safety-Tension-ing
and Gum-Dipping Unit for process-ing
synthetic fabrics was—when put in-to
operation in 1955—the world's first
cord-treating factory of its kind.
Firestone in Gastonia encourages civic
pride among its employees and provides
them with opportunities for improved
living standards, community service, rec-reation,
and education. It was one of the
first textile manufacturers to sell com-pany-
owned houses to the employees who
lived in them. Today, with all houses
sold, the company takes pride and satis-faction
in the manner the owners have
improved and are maintaining their prop-erties.
For 23 years, the plant has maintained
Camp Firestone on Lake James near
Marion, N. C. Facilities are free to em-ployees
and members of their families.
The main features of a liberal fringe-benefits
program are vacations with pay,
employee insurance and hospitalization
benefits.
Firestone and its people play an im-portant
role in community life. Support
of civic affairs, education, and the ad-vancement
of youth activities are of
prime importance to the company.
For its contributions to the Greater
Gastonia United Fund, the plant in 1957
and again in 1958 received a citation,
"in recognition of outstanding achieve-ment
in serving the human needs of the
community."
Since 1953, the Firestone company has
maintained a college scholarship pro-gram
which provides a minimum of 15
four-year scholarships each year to sons
and daughters of employees in the United
States. But the number of scholarships
has never been less than 19. They have
totalled as many as 29 in a single year.
There are now 91 Firestone scholars in
63 schools of their choice across the na-tion.
Thirty-two scholars have received
degrees under the program to date.
Scholarships have been awarded to six
children of Firestone Textiles employees
As another example of the company's
interest in education, in 1956 it deeded its
three Gastonia dormitory buildings to
the Consolidated University of North
Carolina, as the new home of Gaston
Technical Institute. Classes were started
in these buildings in September of 1958.
and the formal dedication was held in
November of that year.
Boy Scout work is strongly encouraged.
A banquet in Gastonia each spring
honors up to 50 boys from the area foi
their achievement in Scoutcraft. Thirteer
boys from the Gastonia area have wor
the company's highest award for excel
lence in Scouting. The award includes s
silver medallion, certificate of merit, a
$100 Savings Bond, and two weeks at the
regional Boy Scout camp. Each of the
other Scouts honored every year receives
a merit certificate and a check whicl
covers the cost of spending two weeks al
the regional Boy Scout camp near Tryon
An estimated 50 per cent of the Gas
tonia plant employees take part in somi
form of company-sponsored recreation
Sports teams of employees, and then
children, have won many championship
in interdepartmental, inter-industry an(
community competition. The All-Sport;
Banquet, held annually since 1936, honors
outstanding participants in this program
It features speakers from among na
tionally known leaders in the sports-rec
reation, and business fields.
The Gastonia plant holds many safety
honors—dating from 1941, when it es
tablished a world record in the textilj
industry for 9,217,146 continuous man
hours operation without a lost-time in
jury. A plaque commemorating ten con
secutive years of safety achievement a
the plant was presented jointly in 1957
by the North Carolina and United State
Departments of Labor. In 1958, an 11th
—See FIRESTONE, Page 23—
Firestone Plant, Gastonia
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 19
J. P. STEVENS ONE OF LARGEST AND MOST DIVERSIFIED OF PLANTS
J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., is one of the
largest and most diversified manufac-turers
of textiles in the United States.
The company has a priceless heritage
built up through 146 years of service to
America and the world.
Historically, woolens come first on the
Stevens list of fabrics, for the Company
traces its ancestry back to that small
broadcloth mill, established in 1813 at
North Andover, Mass., by Nathaniel
Stevens and his two partners. Here, in
an old stone grist mill, Stevens pioneered
the manufacture of woolen goods. And
on the very site where the grist mill
stood, the descendants of Nathaniel Stev-ens
have continued the manufacture of
woolens without interruption for 146
years. This firm became known as M. T.
Stevens & Sons Company.
Equally germane to the Stevens opera-tion
of today is the manufacture of cot-ton
goods. J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., es-tablished
a link with America's first cot-ton
mill, founded by Samuel Slater at
Pawtucket, Rhode Island, in 1790,
through the acquisition of the Slater
Plant at Slater, South Carolina, a busi-ness
that had been conducted for over
150 years by members of the Slater
family.
J. P. Stevens & Co. was established in
1899 by John P. Stevens, a grandson of
the founder of the first Stevens mill. Its
original place of business was 23 Thomas
Street, New York. The function of the
new firm was to act as selling agents for
M. T. Stevens & Sons Company, of North
Andover, which, by 1879, had become
one of the largest manufacturers of
woolen goods in the United States.
Just as M. T. Stevens & Sons Company
had strengthened and diversified its op-eration
by the acquisition of other mill
properties, so too J. P. Stevens & Co.
followed a policy over the years of buy-ing
outright or purchasing an interest
in a number of the mills for which it
acted as selling agents. Always interest-ed
in diversification, J. P. Stevens & Co.
was also a pioneer, first with the weav-ing
of rayon, then with nylon, and more
recently with Dacron, Crlon, Acrilan,
Dynel, Fibeiglas and many other fibers
of scientific origin.
In 1945, the selling' organization join-ed
with nine mill companies to form the
present J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc. To-gether
they operated 29 manufacturing
plants. During the past 13 years the
number of plants operated by the com-pany
has been increased to 45.
Today, J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., is
owned by approximately 10,COO stock-holders,
employs more than 32,000 people,
and produces in excess of 500,000,000
yards of textile goods annually. Sales,
which in 1957 exceeded $400,000,000, are
divided among 13,000 customers, includ-ing
garment manufacturers, industrial
companies, converters, wholesale distri-butors,
mail order houses, chain stores
and retailers. John P. Stevens Jr. is chair-man
of the board and Robert T. Stevens
is president of the company. An imagina-tive
approach to styling and marketing,
plus wide diversity of fabrics and the
best in modern production facilities, give
the Company confidence in its ability to
maintain a position of leadership in the
industry for the future.
Today, America lives in Stevens fab-rics—
woolens, worsteds, cottons and di-verse
fabrics of science—for the family,
for the home and for industry.
P'or Apparel: Worumbo, Hockanum,
Forstmann, Stevens Woolens; Twist
Twill and Resilient Cottons; Fuller Fab-rics;
Qualitrique Lingerie Fabrics.
For the Home: Utica-Mohawk Sheets,
Fuller Fabrics, Simtex Table Cloths and
Fiber Glass for Curtains and Draperies.
For Industry: Specialized fabrics for
all industrial purposes.
As a leading manufacturer of fine tex-tiles,
Stevens has the responsibility for
producing- fabrics which, in texture and
color, construction and finish, are in keep-ing
with today's fashion trends.
Fundamental to the success of the
Stevens operation is a reputation for
quality which is expressed in the Com-pany's
familiar slogan, "Fine Fabrics
since 1813". That there may be no break
in the long tradition of fine workman-ship
that characterizes all Stevens fab-rics,
continuous inspection and rigid
quality control are integral parts of the
Stevens manufacturing cycle from raw
fiber to finished fabric.
Rayon Plant, Gastonia
Carter Fabrics, Wallace
i?!—' " IfimiU""" „.,.,j
UL%
Carter Fabrics, Greensboro Cleveland Cloth, Shelby
PAGE 20 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., operates 12
plants in North Carolina. These plants
employ 6,500 persons. These plants op-erate
under the supervision of three di-visions.
They are:
Synthetics Division (Executive offices,
Greensboro): Carter, Greensboro; Carter,
Wallace; Cleveland, Shelby; Randleman,
Randleman; Stanley No. 1 and No 2,
Stanley.
Cotton Division (Executive offices,
Roanoke Rapids Group, Roanoke Rapids,
N. C): Roanoke No. 1 and No. 2, Roa-noke
Rapids; Patterson, Roanoke Rapids;
Ragan, Gastonia; Rosemary, Roanoke
Rapids.
Woolen and Worsted Division (Execu-tive
offices, Milledgeville, Ga.): Hannah
Pickett, Rockingham.
Following are short descriptions of the
Stevens plants in North Carolina:
Carter plant, Greensboro: This was
the original plant of Carter fabrics Cor-poration.
Built in the mid-thirties, this
plant is of modern, one-story, window-less
construction. The Greensboro plant,
which employs around 500 persons, has
all box looms making a variety of syn-thetic
dress goods plus glass drapery
fabrics.
Carter plant, Wallace: Started in 1951,
the Wallace plant is one of the most
modern textile plants in the country.
The plant employs some 525 persons.
Wallace knits and finishes a variety of
tricot fabrics. This plant also weaves
wide synthetic dress goods, underwear
fabrics, draperies and other synthetics.
Cleveland plant, Shelby: Cleveland
Cloth Mills was started in 1925. The
plant was purchased from the late O.
Max Gardner in 1946 by J. P. Stevens
& Co., Inc. The plant has been moderniz-ed
and enlarged. The Cleveland plant
operates altogether on box looms making
a variety of novelty drapery fabrics,
suitings and many types of synthetic
dress goods. This plant employs approxi-mately
600 persons.
Randleman plant, Randleman: This
plant was leased from Cone Mills Cor-poration
in 1956. Randleman specializes
in novelty synthetic drapery yarns plus
a variety of blended yarns . . . dacron
and cotton staple which goes into Stev-ens
weaving mills at Greensboro, Wal-lace
and South Boston, Va. Payroll at
this plant includes 250 persons.
Stanley No. 1 and No. 2, Stanley: These
plants, which joined the Stevens group
in the forties, make a variety of dope
dyed synthetic yarns both for sales and
for use in Stevens weaving mills. They
also make a variety of worsted sales
yarns, orlon knitting yarns and a gen-eral
variety of blended yarns for use in
the hosiery trade. The two Stanley plants
employ some 600 persons.
Roanoke plant No. 1, Roanoke Rapids:
This plant was built by Roanoke Mills
Company, which company was incor-porated
in 1895. The No. 1 plant was com-pleted
in 1897. Upon completion the
plant employed approximately 225 work-ers.
The original production was towels
and flannels. Towel making was discon-tinued
after a few years and the mill
converted to the production of fancy
flannels and shirting flannels. In 1928 the
plant was acquired by the Simmons com-pany.
During the year 1949 the plant
began the production of mattress tick-ings
for the Simmons company and the
Top left, Roanoke Rapids Plant Number 1. Top right, Patterson plant No. 1. Bottom left, Roanoke Rapids Plant Number 2. Bottom right, Rosemary Plant
j
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 21
general trade. This plant was acquired by
J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., during the year
1956 and now produces Stevens' Twist
Twill fabrics. This plant employs ap-proximately
450 persons.
Roanoke plant No. 2, Roanoke Rapids:
This plant was completed during 1918
and equipped with 25,200 spindles for the
production of yarns for automobile tires.
In 1920 a total of 700 looms were in-stalled
for the manufacture of fancy out-ing
flannels. In 1928 the plant was ac-quired
by the Simmons company and
during 1929-30 was converted to the pro-duction
of tickings and upholstery fab-rics
for the Simmons company and the
general trade. In 1956 the plant was ac-quired
by J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc. and
now produces tickings, employing ap-proximately
600 workers.
Patterson plant, Roanoke Rapids: The
Patterson plant was completed in 1910,
with 400 looms and 10,000 spindles, em-ploying
approximately 275 persons for
the production of ginghams, chambrays
and outing flannels. In 1929 this plant
was acquired by the Simmons company
and converted to the production of nar-row
upholstery fabrics, tickings and
sheetings for the Simmons company and
the general trade. During the years
1947 and 1948 the plant was completely
modernized and converted to a grey goods
mill, for the production of commercial
sheeting. In 1956 the plant was acquired
by J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc. and now
operates 1,008 looms, with approximately
600 employees, in the production of com-mercial
sheeting, jeans cloth, laundry
toweling, birdseye, and diaper cloth.
Rosemary plant, Roanoke Rapids: The
first unit of this plant was constructed in
1900 with 4,000 spindles and 52 looms for
the production of Jacquard woven table
damask, employing approximately 100
persons. Since 1900 the plant has ex-perienced
a steady growth, constructing
a second mill in 1901 and a third mill in
1913, for the production of tablecloths,
napkins, and upholstery fabrics. In 1930
a finishing plant was added. During the
year 1928 the Rosemary plant was ac-quired
by the Simmons company. In
1956 J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., purchased
this plant. It employs approximately 1,
400 persons in the production of table-cloths,
napkins, upholstery fabrics, tick-
Numbers 1 and 2 Stanley Mills, Stanley, Gaston County.
ings, automotive fabrics and drapery
fabrics. This plant enjoys the reputation
of being the largest Jacquard mill in the
world.
Ragan plant, Gastonia: The Ragan
Spinning company was incorporated in
Gastonia in 1922 with original incor-porators
being George W. Ragan, Sr.,
R. L. Stowe, S. P. Stowe and A. G. Myers,
Sr. The plant went into operation in
1924. In 1946, Caldwell Ragan, president
of the corporation, announced the sale
of the Ragan Spinning company to J.
P. Stevens & Co., Inc. At the present
time, Ragan produces quality carded and
combed cotton yarns. All of which are
used by other Stevens plants. The plant
has a payroll of 180.
Hannah Pickett plant, Rockingham:
This is the only plant of the J. P. Stev-ens
Woolen and Worsted Division locat-ed
in North Carolina. Hannah Pickett
has gained the reputation of producing
some of the finest fancy worsteds on the
American market. These include such
well known fabrics as Hockanum and
Forstmann, as well as a line of uniform
cloth. The physical plant was built in
1924 by the Leak Manufacturing com-pany,
a locally owned corporation, and
was engaged in the manufacture of cot-ton
denim and drills. J. P. Stevens ac-quired
the property in July 1947. Today
Hannah Pickett is considered one of the
most efficient operations in the com-pany's
Woolen and Worsted Division.
There is a lot of personal pride among
the workers and all personnel of Han-nah
Pickett in producing a quality pro-duct
at a reasonable and competitive
cost ... in a plant with low labor turn-over,
low absenteeism and a good safety
record. The plant has some 620 employ-ees.
In these 12 North Carolina plants J.
P. Stevens & Co., Inc., today produces a
wide variety of wool, cotton, rayon, and
fabrics of science; cotton goods for cloth-ing
of all kinds—shirts, dresses, work
clothes and special fabrics for the up-holstery
and industrial trades; woolens
and worsteds, ranging from lightweight
fancy suitings to heavy overcoatings,
rayon and wool blended fabrics for
sportswear and popular priced garments,
and materials for automobile upholstery;
filament and spun rayon, Nylon and Or-ion
woven into fabrics for women's
dresses, underwear, men's and women's
suitings and a variety of industrial uses.
Thousands of North Carolinians are
offered frequent opportunities at schedul-ed
"Open House" programs to visit the
mills of the company. At such visitations
one becomes acquainted with not only
the Stevens manufacturing processes
done by its employees who have the best
working tools and pleasant working con-ditions,
but one is impressed by the
company's practice of sound human rela-tions.
Stevens officials and management
are proud in saying, "Our organization
is a living testimonial to the more than
32,000 men and women who operate its
plants, machines, and offices, thus con-tributing
to the progress of America."
North Carolinians may look with pride
for Stevens to strive by means of deeds
to continue to be a textile business op-erating
in North Carolina as an organi-zation
of character serving the public
interest.
Hannah Pickett Plant, Rockingham. Office and Laboratory, Carter Fabrics, Greensboro.
PAGE 22 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
ENKA, CHEMICAL FIBER PLANT, IS NORTH CAROLINA'S LARGEST EMPLOYER
American Enka Corporation, Western
North Carolina's largest industrial em-ployer
with more than 3,500 persons
engaged in the production of rayon,
nylon and Tyrex tire yarn at its plant
seven miles west of Asheville, is this
year observing its 30th year of operation
in North Carolina.
It was on July 1, 1929 that the Dutch-founded
concern
"spun-in" what
has remained a
continuous output
of viscose rayon.
From an original
capitalization of
16 million dollars,
the Company's
growth during
three decades has
resulted in a cur-rent
investment
of approximately
120 million dol-lars.
Enka now ranks
as the nation's
second largest producer of rayon and is
a substantial manufacturer of nylon. It
operates under 50 roofed acres at Enka,
employs more than 5,200 persons here
and at Lowland, Tenn., and has an an-nual
payroll of more than 22 million dol-lars.
The Company moves into 1959 with
confidence in its future. After several
years of depressed business, the textile
I
AYERS
industry has been in an improved posi-tion
during the past three months. Dur-ing
the year ahead, over-all demand for
textiles should be up about eight per
cent, according to McGraw-Hill's Depart-ment
of Economics.
Tyrex tire cord is now in short supply
and is expected to be in strong demand
during 1959.
Enka is a leading manufacturer of
Tyrex viscose tire cord and last year pro-duced
more than 20 per cent of all vis-cose
tire yarn used in this country.
Sales of tire cord have amounted to more
than 50 per cent of Enka's total business
for several years. Auto manufacturers
use Tyrex cord tires as standard equip-ment
on 99 per cent of all new models.
The auto industry, also the biggest in-dustrial
consumer of textiles, will prob-ably
buy larger quantities of Tyrex cord
tires and textile rayon and nylon if the
predicted increase in auto production
materializes.
During the years that American Enka
has been making tire yarn, it has main-tained
a research program to develop
stronger and stronger fiber. Its efforts
have been highly successful. In the period
from 1950 to 1955 viscose tire cord was
greatly increased in strength and flex
resistance. Then in 1957 a major break-through
in cellulosic research made pos-sible
the development of Tyrex, a new
viscose yarn.
Tires made with Tyrex have shown
American Enka Corporation, one of two chemical fiber manufacturing concerns in this State is shown
above. Located at Enka, N. C, outside of Asheville on Highway US 19-23, the aerial view gives a
good idea of the plant's size. In the foreground may be seen the Research Center while in center
background appears the multi-storied Nylon unit. Behind the plant may be seen the Great Smokies.
extra-ordinary high speed performance
and tread wear characteristics, in addi-tion
to softer and quieter riding qualities.
Underlying the search for longer last-ing,
tougher cord for tires is the basic
desire to give greater safety to motorists.
Modern Tyrex cord practically eliminates
the danger of blowouts. Its fibers actual-ly
grow stronger as road friction raises
tire temperatures.
In addition to automotive and truck
tire uses, a growing number of newer
applications have been found for Enka
high-tenacity yarns, such as power and
conveyor belting, high-pressure indus-trial
hose, wire covering, and rope.
The emphasis on research at Enka has
not been on tire cord alone. The modern
Enka Research Center, built at a cost of
two million dollars and occupied in 1956,
is a centralized location for a research
staff of more than 200 scientists and
technicians who are seeking new ways
to improve the properties of cellulosic
and man-made fibers. The center sym-bolizes
Enka's faith in research as the
cornerstone of growth and progress. The
staff is equipped with facilities to meet
the challenge of a highly-competitive in-dustry
in which success depends on keep-ing
abreast of new developments, im-proving
present products and developing
new products.
A large number of products used in
daily living are made from Enka rayon
and nylon. Many well known companies
buy the firm's yarns and fibers for sub-sequent
processing into finished products
which are distributed on a national scale.
Enka's rayon textile yarns are used
extensively in the manufacture of dress-es,
suits and linings, sportwear, under
garments, curtains, shirtings, tie fabrics,
ribbons, laces, braids, and broad and
narrow woven fabrics. Draperies, carpets,
and upholstery fabrics made of rayon
have also gained wide acceptance.
Looking toward the future of the new-er
man-made fibers, Enka completed a
nylon plant at Enka in 1954. Its textile
nylon has gained acceptance in such end
uses as intimate apparel, hosiery,
blouses, sportswear, sweaters, upholstery,
carpeting and automotive interiors.
Company directors authorized in Dec-ember
a $7,500,000 expansion of nylon
facilities which will double capacity. This
will be Enka's second major expansion
program—the first was completed in
June, 1958—since production was begun
less than five years ago.
Construction has begun and the new
addition will go into production by early
1960. When the enlarged installation is
in full operation, plant personnel will
be increased by more than 300 employees.
In promotion and sale of its nylon,
Enka claims that it is a "new and very
different nylon," with advantages in soft-ness,
luster and affinity for dyes.
As part of a program to broaden the
WINTER-SPRING, 1959 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY PAGE 23
base of Enka's operations, a management
group is functioning to investigate and
promote commercial possibilities in fields
and products in whicb the firm is not
presently engaged. Last year Enka ac-quired
a controlling interest in the Rex
Corporation of West Acton, Mass., a
producer of plastic covered wire and
cable and ultra-high frequency insulating-material
for the communications and
electronics industries. The acquisition of
Rex was the first step in the company's
diversification program.
Through the years Enka has been
significantly important to the economy
of the Asheville area. The establishment
of the corporation 30 years ago came at
a time when the community was strug-gling
to recover from the dismal burst
that followed the great real estate boom
of the middle Twenties. It brought en-couragement,
revived hope and bolstered
the economy to such an extent that it
eased the great shock of the depression
years of the Thirties.
Through investments, payrolls, taxes,
and other expenditures, Enka has poured
over the years more than two hunderd
million dollars into the economic life-stream
of the Asheville area. Its em-ployees
have made constructive contri-butions
in many phases of religious,
civic and cultural life.
Enka's wage and salary structure and
employee benefits programs rank among
the highest in the textile industry. In
December 1958 pay increases amounting
to an estimated $650,000 annually were
granted its employees.
The Company takes pride in offering
career employment. More than 800 em-ployees
have over 25 years service.
Through The Enka Foundation, 15 Col-lege
scholarships are awarded each year
to outstanding high school seniors in the
plant areas. During the 1959-60 term,
37 students will be attending college on
Enka scholarships.
To meet the needs of community wel-fare,
charitable and character-building
agencies, American Enka and its em-ployees
contributed and pledged more
than $50,000 last November to 1959 fund
drives in Buncombe, Haywood, Hender-son
and Madison Counties.
"New Businesses" Encompass Creativity Fields
FIRESTONE
—Continued from page 18
—
year bar was added. For several years
the Gastonia plant has shared with the
parent organization in top safety cita-tions
from the National Safety Council.
As a part of its employee and com-munity
relations program, Firestone Tex-tiles
publishes Firestone News, a month-ly
newspaper to keep employees informed
about plant and Firestone company activ-ities
and affairs.
Fieldcrest in ."Spray, is the only com-pany
in the wojid which manufactures
>very part of the blankets they distribute
ill over the world.
John Harden of Greensboro, one time
secretary to the late Governor Gregg
Cherry and long active in civic and
political affairs in North Carolina, has
opened a new public relations firm at
Greensboro.
HARDEN
Mr. Harden, a vice president of Burl-ington
Industries, world's largest textile
enterprise, for ten years, resigned that
position in the fall to open his new busi-ness.
He continues with Burlington In-dustries
in this new capacity since
Burlington is a client of Harden's new
firm.
J. Spencer Love, chairman of the
board for Burlington, expressing regret
when Harden left the Burlington com-pany
and announcing that Burlington
would be a Harden client, said: "John
Harden has been a valuable and effective
member of our management for the past
ten years. Our company and the industry
has benefited from his ability, keen judg-ment,
and wide knowledge of North
Carolina and the other states in which
we operate. We certainly wish him every
success in his new endeavors."
Harden's new firm is John Harden
Associates. It is located in the Jefferson
Standard Building in Greensboro.
Mr. Harden has had careers as a news-paperman,
on the political scene as secre-tary
to a North Carolina governor, and
in industry- He is also the author of two
books published by the University of
North Carolina Press, "The Devil's
Tramping Ground," a collection of un-solved
North Carolina mystery stories,
and "Tar Heel Ghosts," a compilation of
North Carolina ghost stories.
He was secretary to Governor Gregg
Cherry during his administration and
served as co-chairman of Senator Wil-liam
B. Umstead's campaign for re-election
in 1948. He also served as co-chairman
of Public Schools and Mental
Care, Inc., a state-wide campaign and
election in behalf of bonds for public
schools and mental institutions during
the administration of Umstead as gover-nor.
He was editor of the Burlington Jour-nal
before he was 21 and subsequently
served the Burlington Times-News, the
Raleigh News and Observer, the Char-lotte
News, the Salisbury Evening Post,
and the Greensboro Daily News. He re-signed
as news editor of the Greensboro
News in 1944 to head Governor Cherry's
staff.
He is a native of Graham and a grad-uate
of the University of North Carolina,
where he served as assistant director of
the University News Bureau while a stu-dent,
and which institution he has re-cently
served as president of the General
Alumni Association. He is chairman of
the North Carolina State Library Board
and a member of the State Personnel
Council.
Other diversified civic, regional, and
industry enterprises in which he is en-gaged
include Piedmont Associated In-dustries
of which he is a director and
former president, public relations com-mittee
American Cotton Manufacturers
Institute, legislative committee N. C.
Textile Manufacturers Association, trus-tee
Southern Association of Science and
Industry, Inc., trustee N. C. Symphony
Society, director Southern Industrial Re-lations
Conference, member Greensboro
Advisory Committee to Guilford College,
and public relations chairman of Greens-boro's
United Fund.
He is a regional executive committee-man
and a member at large of the Na-tional
Council of Boy Scouts of America,
e
ft
#?
Harden-Produced Promotional Pieces.
a member of American Management As-sociation,
a Rotarian and a former direc-tor
of the Greensboro club.
Mr. Harden is an Episcopalian, secre-tary
of the Vestry at St. Andrew's Church
and 1958 chairman of that church's an- —See HARDEN, page 24—
PAGE 24 THE E. S. C. QUARTERLY WINTER-SPRING, 1959
AMERICAN COTTON MANUFACTURERS INSTITUTE HEADQUARTERS IN N. C.
The American Cotton Manufacturers
Institute, with headquarters in Charlotte,
N. C, is the central, or overall trade
association of the cotton, man-made fiber
and silk segments of the U. S. textile
industry and serves, represents and acts
as spokesman for nearly 80 per cent
of these three segments.
Although the textile industry is lo-cated
in 44 of the 49 states, its pre-dominant
range is from Maine through
Texas and is concentrated heaviest in
the Southeastern states.
The Institute was incorporated under
the laws of the State of North Carolina
in 1949 as the result of a merger of
the American Cotton Manufacturers As-sociation
and the Cotton Textile Institute
when the Northern and Southern manu-facturers
joined forces to create a na-tional
association. In 1958 the member-ship
of the National Federation of Tex-tiles,
representing man-made fibers and
silk segments of the textile industry,
was consolidated with ACMI.
The membership of ACMI consists of
two classes—active and associate. Active
members are textile mill firms which
operate machinery for the manufacture
or processing of textile products (ex-cepting
those who produce man-made
fibers and yarn by a chemical process
and those who manufacture hosiery. The
latter group has its own association).
Associate members are individuals
representing machinery and supply hous-es,
cotton shippers, commission houses,
banks, laboratories, exchanges and engi-neering
firms as well as any other in-dividuals
whose businesses or professions
are closely allied with the textile in-dustry.
The officers of the Institute include a
president, first vice-president and second
vice-president who are industry men and
who serve without pay; an executive
vice-president (Robert C. Jackson) and
a secretary-treasurer (F. Sadler Love).
These last two offices are salaried posi-tions
and they direct the effbrts of the
employees making up the Institute's
staff.
The president of the Institute this
year is Halbert M. Jones of Laurin-burg,
president of Waverly Mills, Inc.,
and an outstanding business, educational
and religious leader.
The affairs of the Institute are handled
by a boai'd of directors composed of
representative mill men from many
states.
Personnel of the Man-Made Fibers and
Silk Division are quartered mainly in
New York. This office serves as the
Institute's liaison with the market in-terests
and with the New York daily
and trade papers. In addition, it repre-sents
the Institute in the field of textile
exports. Through an arrangement with
the Textile Export Association, the di-rector
of the New York office also serves
as secretary of that association.
The Technical Service Division, lo-cated
in the Clemson office, has as its
principal responsibility technical service
to the textile industry. It serves the
members by using its testing laboratory,
when requested, to evaluate the break-ing
strength, fineness and other qualities
of raw cotton. Also under the direction
of a professional technician, a training
program is conducted for personnel of
member mills in the use of fiber-testing
equipment.
Institute President Halbert M. Jones
The primary responsibility of the
Washington office, is to maintain liaison
with the agencies of the government,
with the Cong