Роде
Twenty- four
November 24, 1934
★
IONl! towels, short towels, gay tow¬
el-, -iiIk1u>>.| towels, masculine
A towels. appealingly feminine
towels— no matter how your taste in
towel* runs, you’re *nre to find just
what you want at Kannapolis, "the
towel oily,” which hits the distinction
not only of being the home of the largest
towel factory in the world but also of
being the largest unincorporated town
in the 1'nitcd States.
Though Kannapolis is a thriving
little city of 12.000 inhabitants, it
hasn’t a government official to its
name. The town is owned by the
Cannon*, and nearly all of the people
who live there are connected directly
or indirectly with the operation of the
mills.
Good Living Accommodations
The employes live well too. They
are housed in attractive dormitories
in which they have the choice of single
rooms or apartments. There’s a Y. M.
A., motion pictures, a swimming
pool and other forms of amusement.
The Cannon volleyball team bolds the
championship of the South.
Some time ago. I was shown
through the towel factory and found
the process of towel making nil ex¬
tremely fascinating one. I was
amazed at the variety of colors and
designs made. Anything new in the
way of color or design is immediately
taken over to make a new Cannon
towel.
The process of towel making, from
the cotton field to the finished prod¬
uct i« most interesting. The cotton,
after licing cleaned, is compressed in¬
to bales weighing almost uniformly
500 pounds.
These bales are taken to the mills.
Towels
By the
Millions
В»;
W. J. LANE
where they are broken open and the
matted cotton fed to a bale-breaker
machine which bents out the worst
dirt and motes out of the fillers. Pick¬
ers then remove more motes and dirt
and roll the cotton into a thin, even
sheet called the “lap."' which is car¬
ried over a huge cylinder covered
with more than a million little wire
teeth, which remove the few small
inntes that are left, taking out the
short, hard fibers and straightening
out the rest. This process is known ns
carding.
Producing the First Yarn
The cotton which comes from the
cards is a thin web which is rolled
into a thick “sliver" and coiled into
large cans. These cans are carried
over to the drawing frames, which
take six slivers at once, combine them
and draw them into one smaller sliver.
Those are then run through large
spindles called “slubbers." which
give the first twist and produce
heavy, soft yarn known as "roving."
The roving is wound on large bob¬
bins or spools and sent through a
series of intermediate frames which
combine several strands, draw them
★
out and twist them into smaller and
smaller yarns.
The roving then goes to the spin¬
ning frames where it is spun into a
continuous cord of yarn.
The weaving is done on automatic
power looms, which can weave almost
any pattern by a simple adjustment
though it is necessary to use a "Jac¬
quard" loom to weave figures and
rounded patterns into the cloth.
There are numbers of interesting
weaves— plain, honeycomb, herring¬
bone. twill, etc. The loops on the sur¬
face of turkish toweling are put there
to make it more absorbent. The long¬
er the pile, the more absorbent it is.
The tops of the pile are cut olT in
some of the more expensive numbers.
After being woven, the cloth is sent
to the bleaehery where it is “fin¬
ished" by being run in a continuous
piece through several washings and
bleaohings. It is then put through a
process called “calendering” which
is really an ironing between very hot
rollers, to give it a shiny appearance.
The Process Continues
In the cutting room, the cloth is
cut or tom into individual pieces and
then hemmed. After being thorough¬
ly inspected, they arc wrapped by the
dozen in paper packages, packed in
cases and then shipped.
The famous Cannon sheets are also
made at the towel factory. They are
woven in the same manner as towels,
••lily they are in a different weave and
made on wider looms.
A pile of cannon balls and a can¬
non is the unique and appropriate
'rnde mark of the Cannon Mills. It
is to be found on every towel which
they make. You can niso see it atop
the main buildings of the mills in the
picture accompanying this article.