Category: Community Page (Page 3 of 5)

Tallapoosa

Come see an old mining town that struck gold in the textile industry due to its easy access to the nearby river and railroad.

An early gold mining town in Haralson County, Tallapoosa’s easy access to the Tallapoosa River and Georgia Pacific Railway made it an ideal place for cotton manufacturing. Due to the low cost of shipping and building in the city and the presence of a ready workforce Tallapoosa became the site of a series of industrial enterprises. The first successful cotton manufacturing company, Tallapossa Mills, brought new commerce and jobs to the city.

The Jackson brothers, owners of Tallapoosa Mills, sold their majority stock holdings in the company to the William Whitman Company, after World War I, but the organization remained mostly unchanged. At the beginning of the Great Depression, C. E. Pearce continued to serve as manager of the cotton mill, and A. V. Howe, one of the original organizers and officers, served as president. After operating part-time during the Depression, the mill closed in 1939 due to economic decline.

The northeastern-based American Thread Company (ATCO) purchased Tallapoosa Mills in 1943 to make combed cotton yarn and reopening the mill on January 28, 1944. World War II ended in 1945 and ATCO expanded the Tallapoosa plant in February 1947. The three-story extension of 110,000 square feet was built next to the original building, adding 25,000 spindles.Manufacturing volume increased by 140 percent as did the number of employees, rising from 315 to 680. In 1959, ATCO expanded operations once again.

To help promote ATCO brand yarn in the 1940s and 50s, the ATCO franchise published a series of knitting and crocheting pattern books, called “Star Books.” ATCO’s Tallapoosa mill closed in the early 1980s, the last textile manufacturer to close in the city. Venus Threads purchased the mill and reopened it in the early 1990s, and continue to operate it today.

Visit

Things to Do

West Georgia Museum, 185 Mann Street: This museum has exhibits on the Tallapoosa area’s history, as well as its natural history.

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Mandeville Mills Cotton Gin, 76 East Alabama Street: The Mandeville Mills of Carrollton had a number of side businesses including a cottonseed oil mill and a fertilizer factory. To supply the cotton for their textile operation and the seeds for their oil mill, they set up a network of gins in the surrounding countryside, even up into Haralson County. Their Tallapoosa gin still stands, it was repurposed into an antique mall and local business which have since closed.
Tallapoosa Cotton Mills/Atco Mill, 191 West Atlanta Street: This 100-year-old facility is still standing and remains in operation as Venus Threads. This building is an excellent example of both the early- and mid-20th century industrial architecture. The southern facing wall (opposite the water tower and smokestack) is the original facade. It features rows of windows that have been bricked over. The northern facing wall is the expansion added by ATCO and features a more sleek design with no windows, reflecting the fact that the building was air-conditioned. ATCO operated the facility until the late 1980s. It was purchased by Venus Threads, who still run it today.
Tallapoosa Knitting Mill/Kimball Knitting Co., 2276 US-78: This location has since been demolished and unrelated buildings constructed in its place, but you can still see the surrounding area. This small-scale operation was only active in the 1890s and early 1900s.

History

Explore this community’s history via the drop-down sections below!

Survival of the Fittest: Tallapoosa’s Early Attempts at Joining the Textile Industry

Founded as an early gold mining town in Haralson County, Tallapoosa’s easy access to the Tallapoosa River and Georgia Pacific Railway made it an ideal place for cotton manufacturing. Due to the low cost of both shipping and construction in the city, as well as the presence of a ready workforce, Tallapoosa became home to several textile manufacturing operations which brought new commerce and careers to the city.

Alliance Knitting Company, Tallapoosa’s first textile mill, opened in the 1890. Initially the mill employed a small shift of 13. However, they quickly expanded to employ 24 people, mostly women and children. The mill hired them to spin, knit, and weave materials such as cotton, wool, and silk fibers. However, textile companies that started with such a diverse product line often had a hard time making a name for themselves as they never focused enough on one product to catch the attention of selling agencies. In the end, Alliance Knitting Company went under after less than a year of production.

Students at the Tallapoosa School circa 1906. Photo Courtesy of the University of West Georgia’s Center for Public History.

Alliance Knitting Company was not alone amongst the Tallapoosa textile startups in the 1890s; Anchor Woolen Mills, Enterprise Cotton Company, and Southern Hosiery Company all rose and fell in the same decade. Tallapoosa’s young companies, such as Alliance Knitting, were always going to have a hard time without streamlining their production. However they also had the misfortune of starting a business in and around the Panic of 1893, which brought established mills along the Trail, even the mighty Eagle and Phenix of Columbus, to their knees. Tallapoosa’s infant textile industry had no chance.

Indeed, Tallapoosa’s shaky start in the textile industry continued with several mills either closing within a few years of being opened or never making it past the planning phase. W.C. Kimball and Co., opened in 1902, produced women’s and children’s ribbed hose with 8 knitting machines and 16 steam-powered cylinders. By 1904, this mill had closed and sold off its machinery. In 1902, local businessmen proposed the Tallapoosa Cotton Mill Company, but they abandoned it by the next year.

A New Era: The Establishment of Tallapoosa Mills

An early postcard depicting Tallapoosa Mills. Photo Courtesy of Jarrett Craft.

Tallapoosa’s first prosperous mill was Tallapoosa Mills, Inc. A group of local businessmen, headed by A.L. Jackson, led the drive for the capital needed to start up the mill. They were successful, and they completed construction on the $200,000 mill building in January of 1908 during the second “Tallapoosa Boom”. By April of that same year, the contracting firm of A.H. Washburn of Charlotte, North Carolina completed the installation of the mill’s 10,000 spindles.

The mill complex consisted of the mill itself, two warehouses, an engine house, an electric plant, and a water plant with a 250,000-gallon reservoir. Thirty double-houses were built for operatives, with this number increasing dramatically during the first two decades of the mill’s operations. A major product of this mill was 20s 2-ply skeins, which means that each skein (the technical name for a ball of yarn) was made with 16,800 yards per pound. Later on, they produced 16s and 12s 2-ply skeins alongside their 20s. Even after changing ownership in 1923, this mill continued to manufacture similar products. The cotton used to create these skeins was locally grown and purchased from areas such as Carrollton, Tallapoosa, and Cedartown.

The S. S. Monroe being launched on her maiden voyage. Photo Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

The Tallapoosa Mills did not employ a selling agent to act as a middleman in bringing their goods to market. Instead, they sold their products directly from their office, indicating that the majority of their early sales might have been from a relatively local market. However, by 1914 after operating for several years, Tallapoosa Mills had made enough of a name for itself to where their goods were demanded on a national market. It was in this that the Tallapoosa Mills faced a major complication: how could they efficiently ship their product to far away customers in New York, San Francisco, or Europe?

The challenges that the young company faced is illustrated by the sinking of the steamship Monroe, as reported by the New York Times. Struck by another ship, the Monroe went down within 12 minutes with hundreds of people, and ten bales of Tallapoosa Mills’ goods, on board. Although it might have been safer to ship the goods overland, it would have cost so much in shipping that the company could not make a profit. The shipping company employed by the mill, who chose to ship the product on the Monroe independently without consulting the mill, refused to cover the cost of the lost goods. A court case against the shipping company by the mill was not resolved until May of 1921, when the steamship company paid $671 ($9,805.67 in 2021) to cover the loss of goods.

Tallapoosa Mill Paycheck. Photo courtesy: Tallapoosa Museum.

Although they made enough money in the 1910s to expand their mill’s machinery capacity twice, the Jackson family, who had also come to control the Hutcheson Manufacturing Company in Banning, opted to sell the majority of their stock holdings to the William Whitman Company of Boston, Massachusetts for $500,000 ($7.6 million in 2020) in 1923. This new ownership group promised to employ 325 operatives the year round; however, there was no real change to on-site management for quite some time after this purchase. The Times-Recorder of Americus, Georgia notes this sale as another move of northern mill interests to the south, which can be seen in many communities throughout the Textile Heritage Trail. Tallapoosa Mills slowly but surely increased the capacity of their mill, hosting 60 cards, 16,896 spindles, and three boilers by 1935. In November of 1938, the mill was reported to be running two full-time shifts. It was no secret that the mills awarded their employees with significant paychecks, money that in turn fueled the economy within Tallapoosa.

Plucked out of the Fire: American Thread Company Bails out Tallapoosa

Despite this growth, the mills closed in 1939 due to the Great Depression’s strong effects on all aspects of American industry. In the beginning years of the Great Depression, the mill continued to operate one to two days a week, just enough for its workers to be able to afford groceries. During this time, they also waived rent fees for anyone living in the mill village. This closure led to a drop in Tallapoosa’s population, with residents who remained in town having to seek work out elsewhere.

Throngs of partygoers at the American Thread Company barbecue in front of the Tallapoosa Mill. 3,000 people attended the barbeque thrown in January of 1944 to celebrate American Thread Company reopening the town’s largest employer. Photo Courtesy of the Lane Brothers Commercial Photographers Photographic Collection, 1920-1976 housed at the Photographic Collection, Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library.

The American Thread Company purchased the mill in 1943 under the influence of an Atlanta promoter. They began producing fine cotton yarns and threads in January of 1944, operating 16,000 yarn spindles and 7,500 thread spindles. In May of 1944, the company hosted a celebration that included barbeque and a flag raising to officially open the mill. Three to four thousand people attended this celebration, including dignitaries and out-of-town visitors. Newspapers noted this event as the start of a “new era for Tallapoosa”.

Soon after opening, this company was able to give its workers a raise of eight cents per hour, bringing their hourly wages up to 73 cents per hour; today, this would be an increase of $1.07, bringing wages up to $9.74. By 1947, The American Thread Company was noted as being the largest thread manufacturing operation in the United States with plants scattered across the nation; this helps to explain how the company was able to increase their wages so soon after opening.
With the growth and wealth they were able to accumulate from this Tallapoosa mill, the American Thread Company saw fit to double down on their investment by expanding upon the mill itself as well as constructing a new sales and service branch in 1947. The new 3-story, 110,000 square foot mill building would come to benefit the company by housing 25,000 additional spindles and employing 680 operatives, an increase of 140%. The sales and service branch would carry a complete stock of the company’s sewing threads, crochet cotton, knitting wools, stamped goods, and Star Brand instruction books.

Company Men: Rejecting the Unions

Despite this company’s success in this Haralson County town, there were a significant number of disturbances that occurred relating to this mill, specifically against those who were interested in unionizing. A group of mill employees approached a known United Textiles Workers-AFL organizer, and threatened to harm him if he did not leave and not stop until he reached Alabama. Opposition to unionizing came mostly from those who benefited from an informal system put into place by managers and higher-ups, who often went outside of understood labor-management relations. A major case involving the American Thread Company and unionizers occurred when an organizer for the Textile Workers Union of America, C.I.O., claimed to be abducted by American Thread Company employees and dumped outside of Tallapoosa in 1948. Two employees were laid off for one and three days, respectively, but no other punishments seem to have occurred for this crime.

An arial view of the American Thread Company’s Tallapoosa plant after rounds of expansions in the 1940s and 1950s. Photo Courtesy of the Lane Brothers Commercial Photographers Photographic Collection, 1920-1976 housed at the Photographic Collection, Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library.

Employees from the American Thread Company’s mill in Tallapoosa even threatened workers from the same company’s mill in Dalton, Georgia. Textile Workers Union (C.I.O) members from the Dalton mill were met in August of 1949 outside of the gates of the Tallapoosa mill with clubs and pistols. Those who were opposed went to the Attorney General to investigate this “mob action.” Two mill workers were faced with a restraining order after facing charges for assault with a deadly weapon. This altercation resulted in a suit for $300,000 to be filed for damages.

In 1951, a subcommittee of the Senate Labor and Public Welfare Committee found that efforts towards self-organizing and collective bargaining on the part of employees were losing ground against their employers, specifically in southern textile mills such as the American Thread Company’s Tallapoosa plant. Employers being able to avoid this collective bargaining from their employees allowed for them to have a substantial advantage over their northern counterparts.

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Sargent & Arnco

These small communities have a huge textile history that hosted two mills and a railroad.

Sargent and Arnco, while never being incorporated as individual towns, hosted a rich textile industry. The first textile mill opened in Sargent in 1886 with a general store being opened not too long after to provide textile workers with basic necessities. The last of the textile mills closed in 2001 due to increased international competition.

Visit

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Arnco Mills and Mill Village, 229 Arnco 3^rd Street: Located in an unincorporated area just north of Newnan on Highway Alt 27/State Route 16 and Old Carrollton Road, Arnco Mills opened in 1927. Seventy-five employee homes were also constructed and five homes were built for the mill superintendent and overseers.
Wahoo Manufacturing Company/Arnall Mill and Mill Village, Henry Bryant Road: In 1907, Willcoxon Manufacturing constructed a new mill just north of the original mill site named Wahoo Manufacturing Company and later Arnall Mill. In the 1920s and 1930s, the owners of Arnall Mill built additional mill village housing in an area known as “New Town” in Sargent. These mill village homes were of various designs, including shotgun homes, saltbox homes, and gable-front cottages, common in mill villages of the era. Certain streets of the mill village were dedicated to shotgun homes and others to gable-front cottages. The size of the home rented to an employee was dependent on the job skill and job level the employee held within the company. Slightly removed from the main village, on Bridges Street off Railroad Street at the western edge of the mill village, were the homes built for the mills African American employees. These homes followed the same pattern as the other homes in the village with little to no ornamentation and no formal landscaping.
Wilcoxon Manufacturing Company and Mill Village, Henry Bryant Road: In the late 1880s, J.B. Willcoxon, H.J. Sargent, and George Sargent built the first mill to produce cotton textiles, under the name Willcoxon Manufacturing Company. Mill village homes were also built to house the mill employees. A fire destroyed the mill in 1906 however, the stone foundation of the mill still exists. Most of the homes in the mill village still stand in an area referred to as “Old Town” in the northern portion of Sargent. These simple unadorned homes were typical of mill village homes of the era.

History

Photo courtesy: Weaver Special Collections
Photo courtesy: Weaver Special Collections

The small industrial communities of Sargent and Arnco have a substantial textile history. Both communities were named for prominent businessmen in the area’s cotton textile industry. Sargent was named in honor of H.J. Sargent and George Sargent, partners in Willcoxon Manufacturing Company. The name Arnco is a merger of the names Cole and Arnall, two other prominent mill families in the area. These neighboring areas were an important location for cotton textile manufacturing in Coweta County. Different from the other mill communities, the communities of Sargent and Arnco were further away from the nearest cities and were never incorporated as individual towns.

Willcoxon Manufacturing Company opened a cotton mill in 1886 in Sargent to manufacture cotton rope. John B. Willcoxon, Harrison J. Sargent, and George Sargent, partners in the company, built a four-story brick building on Wahoo Creek at the site of an old gristmill. The spinning machines were powered by water from the creek. Later, two additional buildings were added at the site to serve as warehouses. In 1906, the original mill building was struck by lightning and burned down and a new mill building was constructed in 1907.

The workforce at Willcoxon Manufacturing Company was made up of men, widows of Confederate Veterans, and children as young as 5 years old. In 1888, the company was purchased by Henry Clay Arnall and Thomas G. Farmer and renamed Wahoo Manufacturing Company. Under the new ownership, the operations were expanded to make cotton rope and cotton yarn. In 1919, the Arnall family acquired full ownership of Wahoo Manufacturing Co. and the name was changed to Arnall Mills. Arnall Mills made novelty yarns and around 1929 began making cotton blankets. A weaving room was added in 1930 and additional workers were hired.

The railroad was important to the operation of the mill as blankets were hauled out by freight. The Central of Georgia rail line ran through Sargent from Griffin to Chattanooga and had a freight and passenger depot. To haul the blankets to the freight depot, a special wagon was built and the mill owner purchased a fine team of mules.

In the late 1880s, the first company store was built on Main Street to supply the mill workers with basic necessities. The original store burned down in 1935 and a new building was erected in 1936. The mill workers made purchases at the store and the cost of those purchases was deducted from their weekly paychecks. Mill workers and their family members were able to receive services from the town doctor by paying a doctor tax of 50 cents a week.

By 1926, there was a need for additional outlets for the large amount of cotton yarn made at Arnall Mill, and Arnco Mills was opened near Sargent to fill that need. The name Arnco, a combination of Arnall and Cole the last names of the mill president and vice president combined, was given to the new village built to house the mill workers. Seventy-five employee homes were constructed and five homes were built for the superintendent and overseers. Construction of the mill and mill village started in the summer of 1926, operations began at Arnco Mills in May of 1927, and Arnco became its own unincorporated town. The mill first made cotton blankets known as American cotton blankets and later made part-wool blankets. Throughout the early twentieth century, the mill village was expanded, more houses were built including segregated housing for African-American workers and a baseball field was added. The two mills and villages were entirely separate entities and the companies encouraged friendly competition between the two.

By the early 1930s, due to low wages and deteriorating labor conditions, nearly 44,000 Georgia workers participated in the General Textile Strike of 1934, including many from the Sargent and Arnco areas. The first strikers to be arrested were at the nearby East Newnan Cotton Mills and Arnall Mills in Sargent. The National Guard arrested strikers and took them to Fort McPherson in military trucks where they were forced to live outside until the strike was over. Some of the Arnall Mill employees who supported the strike efforts returned to work at the mill, others were blacklisted from the industry, and some left town to find work elsewhere.

In 1964, Bibb Manufacturing purchased Arnall and Arnco Mills and mill village to manufacture blankets from cotton and synthetic fibers. The company made improvements, modernized the machinery, and raised the pay for employees and the company store was closed. The company also built a 98-acre lake to furnish water for wet finishing blankets and for recreation use. In 1970, the mill village homes were sold to private individuals, many of whom were mill employees. The old company store was used as a recreational facility for mill employees. In 1986, Bibb closed Arnall Mills and moved its operations to Arnco Mill. Arnco Mill continued operations producing sheets, pillowcases, and other cotton items. In 1996, Bibb Companies went through a bankruptcy reorganization and were unable to recover economically. In 1998, the company was sold to the Dan River Corporation of Virginia. In February 2001, due to low-priced textile imports from Asia and the growing economic recession in the United States, Dan River Co. announced the closing of Arnco Mills.

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Newnan

The textile industry in this community began earlier than many others and grew quickly.

The city of Newnan was already an established industrial center before the textile industry appeared in 1888. Beginning with cotton, Newnan’s textile industry diversified by adding a hosiery mill in 1926. Soon after Newnan participated in the General Textile Strike of 1934. The cotton and hosiery mills operated until the 1990s when they faced international competition.

Visit

Things to Do

McRitchie-Hollis Museum, 74 Jackson Street: Located in Newnan, this home was built by Arnall Mills’ president Ellis H. Peniston and his wife Mildred Willcoxon Arnall Peniston in 1937. Now home to the Newnan-Coweta Historical Society’s McRitchie-Hollis Museum, the museum hosts exhibitions and shares stories of the textile industry. For more information visit newnancowetahistoricalsociety.com.
Newnan-Coweta Historical Society’s Depot History Center, 60 East Broad Street: This historic depot was built in the 1890s to serve passengers as well as freight. The depot is now operated by the Newnan-Coweta County Historical Society and can be toured by appointment. While you’re there pick up a “City of Homes” driving tour brochure to see Newnan’s historic homes!
The Coweta County African American Heritage Museum, 92 Farmer Street: The African American Heritage Museum & Research Center provides a repository for African-American artifacts and records while also serving as a genealogy workroom for African-American research. Adjacent to the museum, which is housed in a restored shotgun-style house, is the Farmer Street Cemetery which is one of the largest slave cemeteries in the South. The museum is open on Wednesdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
“City of Homes” Historic Homes Tour: Pick up a self-guided driving tour brochure from the Coweta County Convention & Visitors Bureau located at 200 Court Square in Newnan’s historic courthouse. The tour provides a nice stroll through Newnan’s downtown area and includes fifty historic homes. The visitor’s bureau is open Monday through Friday from 9 a. m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Newnan Cotton Mill No. 1 and Mill Village, 110 Field Street: This mill has been transformed into Newnan Lofts. The building and the surrounding mill village are both listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Drive down East Washington Street past Robinson Street to see the mill village, homes built by the mill owners to house their employees.
Newnan Square, 100 Court Square: The first official land sale in Newnan which took place in 1829, resulted in the construction of this small town square, featuring a log cabin and a small store. With the rise of the textile industry, the square served as a hub of trade and home to several textile-related businesses, including Newnan Hosiery Mill and the Manget-Brannon Company. Indeed, a building occupied by Newnan Hosiery Mill can be viewed from the road at the corner of Spring and LaGrange Streets. The building is brick, painted white, and features distinctive Palladian-style windows on the second floor. It currently houses several local businesses. Historic photos from the 1890s show the square full of horse-drawn carriages loaded with cotton coming from the country to sell in the city markets. The original 1829 courthouse, which has been remodeled several times, remains in its original location at the center of the square. Over the decades, the square continues to serve as a space for social gathering and home to many local businesses.
International Playtex Corporation, 320 Temple Avenue: In 1954, this company opened its Sewn Products Division, northwest of the town square. Playtex was among the companies that took over the textile industry in Newnan in the 1960s. Making bras and a line of baby pants and bibs, the plant employed mostly white women from the area. By the late 1990s, most textile mills across the nation closed due to increased foreign competition with Asia, and this company closed its doors here in 1999.
Manget-Brannon Company, 24 1^st Avenue: Founded in 1918 as the Manget Brothers Company grocery store. Later, the company shifted its concentration to the cotton brokerage trade remaining in the business until 1962. The old Manget-Brannon Company cotton warehouse now provides space for retail business and charities including the Bridging the Gap Community Outreach.
McIntosh Mill and Mill Village, Jefferson Street: This mill has since been demolished. Located at the intersection of Sprayberry and Jefferson Streets, this village is an example of the type of housing provided to mill employees in the early twentieth century.
Newnan Cotton Mill No. 2 and Mill Village, 94 East Newnan Road: This mill has been largely demolished and the site is fairly overgrown, although the foundations and a few outbuildings might still be visible. The mill village is still standing, it makes up a sizable portion of East Newnan. The village is centered on East Newnan Road stretching down from Freeman Street to Cole Street. Two clusters of houses are based between Freeman and Front Street and Hill and East Murphy Streets respectively.
Newnan Hosiery Mills Inc./Mann’s Hosiery Mill, 17 Augusta Drive: This was an important employer in the area until closing in 1950. This property is currently vacant and for sale.

History

Mill village house. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling
Old mansion. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling
Old cotton gin. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling

The booming county seat of Newnan had already become a leading commercial center and a railroad hub by 1888, when local investors established the Newnan Cotton Mill. The company added a second mill, the East Newnan Cotton Mill, in 1901. Both mills specialized in the production of mixed fibers. During the construction of the first mill, the company added a dozen saddlebag homes nearby to house the mill employees, and additional homes were built in 1905. By the 1920s, this mill employed nine hundred workers, both white and African American, to produce weaving and specialty twist yarn.

Keeping up with the New South trend of the 1920s, Newnan’s textile industry diversified with the opening of the Newnan Hosiery Mills in 1926. Also known as, Mann’s Mill, the hosiery mill manufactured socks and at its height employed up to three hundred and fifty local workers. The mill closed in 1950. The International Playtex Corporation opened its Sewn Products Division in the former Newnan Hosiery Mill Building in 1954. By 1965, this plant employed six hundred people locally. In 1991, the Playtex Corporation was purchased by the Sara Lee Corporation, which shut down operations in Newnan in 1999 when the company reorganized.

Newnan is also well known for its involvement in the General Textile Strike of 1934, since the first strikers to be arrested worked in East Newnan Cotton Mills and nearby Arnall Mills in Sargent. The Georgia National Guard and local civil authorities arrested the picketers, inspected them for weapons, and transported them in military trucks to Fort McPherson outside Atlanta. The National Guard kept the strikers in outdoor detention facilities built for World War II prisoners until the strike ended three weeks later. Afterward, some workers were blacklisted and forced out of company homes because of their participation. Atlanta Constitution photographer Kenneth Waters documented the strike, and his photographs are available at the Atlanta History Center.

During World War II, the Newnan Cotton Mill received the Army-Navy award for excellence in war production. By 1950, the Newnan Cotton Mill and East Newnan Mill employed over one thousand workers and were pioneers in the field of blended fabrics used for a variety of products, including men’s suits and overcoats and women’s dresses and hats. Over the next two decades, however, a series of national companies purchased the plant, including Mt. Vernon Mills, West-Point Pepperell, and Bibb Manufacturing. Operations ceased in 1970.

Facing increasing foreign competition from Asia, the remaining textile mills in Newnan closed in the late 1990s. Fortunately, remnants of Newnan’s rich textile history are still around. In 2001, the Newnan Cotton Mills buildings were rehabilitated into Newnan Lofts, a mixed-use development now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Drive down E. Washington Street past Robinson Street to see the Newnan Cotton Mills’ mill village, homes built by the mill owners to house their employees. The former Manget-Brannon Company’s cotton warehouse now provides space for retail business and charities including the Bridging the Gap Community Outreach. The historic railroad depot is available for tours and special event rental.

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Resources to Explore

Click on the following links to learn more about this region.

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Moreland

Initially a cotton agricultural community, Moreland eventually opened its own textile mill.

While the textile industry began many years prior, the first textile mill constructed in Moreland was the Moreland Hosiery Mill in 1920 that operated until 1978.

Visit

Things to Do

Erskine Caldwell’s Childhood Home, 20 West Camp Street: Caldwell, author of Tobacco Road, God’s Little Acre, and other Southern novels, was born in Moreland in 1903. His birthplace has been moved to the Town Square and converted into a museum, open by appointment.
Moreland Hometown Heritage Museum, 7 Main Street: The Moreland Cultural Arts Alliance, Inc. and Moreland’s Hometown Heritage Museum combined their collections to open the Hometown Heritage Museum in the Historic Moreland Mill. This complex of unified commercial buildings from the 1890s era is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and also houses Town Hall. An 8,000 square feet portion of the complex is dedicated to a museum of “things” from the home, the farm, the country store, and Moreland Knitting Mills dating from 1900-1945. Their hours of operation are Thursday through Saturday 10:00 am – 3:00 pm.

History

Moreland Hosiery Mill. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling
Moreland Hosiery Mill. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling

The community that became Moreland began as a settlement around the Mt. Zion Methodist Church in 1843. The railroad arrived in 1852, along with a wooden train station called Puckett Station. In 1888, the town was named for the first doctor with the Atlanta and West Point Railroad, Dr. John Moreland, and a railroad depot was built.

Primarily an agricultural region, local farmers in Moreland grew cotton as well as fruit. Marketing the produce through the railroad, local farmers utilized a local cotton ginnery and a brick cotton warehouse constructed along the railroad in 1904.

The boll weevil began to destroy the cotton crops as early as 1915 and through the 1930s, leaving many farmers destitute. Well-known yet controversial local novelist Erskine Caldwell, whose house remains on the Town Square, wrote about the region’s Depression-era challenges in his most famous books Tobacco Road and God’s Little Acre.

In 1920, the Moreland Hosiery Mills opened in an old cotton warehouse and fertilizer plant built around 1904. The Moreland Hosiery Mills employed twenty-five people, mostly white women, girls, and boys, to produce seamless socks for women and children. Due to a decrease in the cotton market and financial hardship, a group of investors purchased the mill in 1926. Renamed the Moreland Knitting Mills the company manufactured cotton hosiery, later rayon, and nylon hosiery. The knitting mill was the major employer in the area until it ceased operations in 1968.

After the knitting mill closed, the property was sold and used as a storage facility except for a brief period when Bobby Powell manufactured women’s garments on the property. In 1974, the property was sold to the PEB Corporation to manufacture women’s uniforms and housecoats until it closed in 1978. In 1983, the PEB Corporation gifted the property to the City of Moreland.

The former hosiery mill is now the Hometown Heritage Museum. The museum hosts exhibitions about local history and authors, including both Erskine Caldwell and Lewis Grizzard, a prominent author and commentator on southern history, life, and culture. The 1890s era building is on the National Register of Historic Places and houses Town Hall.

Charter Trail Members

Resources to Explore

Click on the following links to learn more about this region.

Facts for Kids
Digital Library of Georgia
Georgia Archives Virtual Vault
Georgia Historical Society
Coweta County, New Georgia Encyclopedia

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Email the Trail at wgtht@westga.edu or visit our Contact Us page for more information.

Lithia Springs

This community’s textile industry was both early and short-lived with its only mill being burned down during the Civil War.

Starting early compared to other communities, Lithia Springs’ first textile mill was massive and opened in 1849. This mill was burned down during the Civil War and was never reconstructed. The surrounding area is currently a state park.

Visit

Things to Do

Sweetwater Creek State Park Visitors Center, 1750 Mount Vernon Road: Those who visit the Visitors Center will find everything that they need to hike the trails that run throughout the park. The Visitor’s Center also features exhibits and wildlife displays.

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

New Manchester Mill Ruins, Sweetwater State Park: In an effort to preserve the ruins of the New Manchester Manufacturing Company, the interior of the ruins is not open to the public. The ruins can still be viewed from the outside.

History

Sweetwater Creek State Park New Manchester Mill Ruins. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling
Sweetwater Creek State Park New Manchester Mill Ruins. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling

Sweetwater Factory began operations in 1849. Natural resources from the surrounding area were used to build the mill. When the mill was completed, the Sweetwater factory was massive and “taller than any building in Atlanta.” A small mill village officially named Sweetwater, but also known as Factory Town by some of its inhabitants, quickly grew around the mill. Unlike other mill villages, Sweetwater did not provide any educational or recreational facilities for its employees. The town consisted mostly of small farms of those who worked in the mill.

New Manchester mills produced cotton fibers. This raw product was shipped to other manufacturing companies to be processed into yarn. After a reorganization of the company, Sweetwater changed its name to the New Manchester Manufacturing Company.

During the Civil War, Union forces targeted Southern textile mills to weaken the Confederacy’s economy and wartime production. New Manchester was no exception to the brutality of the Civil War. Federal forces burned this mill during Sherman’s March to the Sea. New Manchester never recovered after the Civil War. The ruins of the mill were left undisturbed and were soon covered with dense foliage.

Today, you can visit Sweetwater Creek State Park to hike to the ruins of New Manchester Manufacturing Company. Enjoy the Visitors Center’s exhibit about the mill and mill life while you are there!

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Resources to Explore

Click on the following links to learn more about this region.

Facts for Kids
Digital Library of Georgia
Georgia Archives Virtual Vault
Georgia Historical Society
Douglas County, New Georgia Encyclopedia

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Grantville

This small town has a textile industry known for its appearance in the famous zombie franchise “The Walking Dead”.

The textile industry was brought into Grantville with the introduction of the railroad, as was the case with many other communities. Grantville Hosiery Mill and Grantville Cotton Mill called this community home and both closed down in 1980. Keep an eye out in AMC’s “The Walking Dead” for the remains of the cotton mill and a ruined cotton warehouse downtown!

Visit

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Arnold & Baxter Cotton Warehouse, 17 Church Street: The brick remains of this building were used to film AMC’s “The Walking Dead” and still bear Morgan’s message, “Away With You”. It currently serves as a courtyard for the adjoined local restaurant.
Grantville Freight Depot, 30 Main Street: This train depot was originally built in 1852 to handle both freight and passengers along the Atlanta and West Point Railroad. In the early 1900s, a second depot was built across the street to accommodate passengers only.
Grantville Hosiery Mill and Mill Village, 78 Moreland Street: This building has been partially demolished. The surviving portion is home to an architectural salvage store. The Grantville Hosiery Mill Village is located along Banks, Shephard, and Rock Streets. These villages consist of mostly one-story, wood-framed houses.
Grantville Passenger Train Depot, 30 Main Street: This passenger train depot was built along the Atlanta and West Point Railroad.
Grantville Yarn Mill and Mill Village, 41 Industrial Way: This site was used in the filming of AMC’s “The Walking Dead”. As of 2020, the 100-year-old property is vacant and has been for sale for several years. The mill village for the Grantville Mill is located along Grady, Smith, Maple, and Arnold Streets.

History

Explore this community’s history via the drop-down sections below!

Homegrown Business: The Early Years for Grantville Hosiery Mills

Early photo of the Grantville Hosiery Mills’ knitting mill. Photo Courtesy of the Grantville Genealogy Society.

The town of Grantville began as a small settlement known as Calico Corner in 1840. In 1852, the first train came to the settlement courtesy of the Atlanta and LaGrange Railroad, and it sparked economic development in the community The town was renamed Grantville in honor of the chief engineer of the railroad, Lemuel P. Grant. With the success of the regional cotton industry and the railroad by the early part of the twentieth century, Grantville flourished, offering opportunities for industrialists to invest in the growing textile industry.

On August 21, 1896, The Herald and Advertiser of Newnan, Georgia published a small article on Grantville’s industries. They noted that “The progress made on this [building] indicates that in a month or so we can hear the buzz of the spindles as they weave the cotton thread into serviceable fabrics.” This excitement was about the Grantville Hosiery Mills, which began operating in late 1896 or early 1897 under the leadership of Nathaniel O. Banks. The stockholders envisioned a fully-integrated hosiery knitting operation, one which would eventually spin its own thread or yarn and turn that material into a finished product. However, initially they did not have the resources or machinery to spin their own yarn, and they relied on costly imports. Therefore Banks and his stockholders built the mill along the railroad track, at the bend of modern-day Moreland Street, to lower production and logistical costs in obtaining their thread and shipping their final product. Their plans progressed quickly; in February 1897 The Herald and Advertiser announced that the company had goods ready for sale. By 1899, the Grantville Hosiery Mills operated with 38 steam-powered knitting machines.

Although the Grantville Hosiery Mills started small, its stockholders had big plans for their fledgling enterprise. In 1899, the directors announced that they would double its capacity; when the expansion was completed the following year, the Grantville correspondent for The Herald and Advertiser proudly announced that the company produced 450 dozen pairs of hosiery per day with 75 knitting machines. The Grantville Hosiery Mills’ client base was steadily growing with regular customers in Baltimore, New York, Philadelphia, and Boston as well as orders from as far away as Australia. With that in mind, the stockholders authorized a second round of expansion. On April 17, 1903, Nathaniel O. Banks, president of the Grantville Hosiery Mills, agreed to a contract with the R. D. Cole Manufacturing Company to build a two-story brick 48×56 foot addition to the mill, as well as a 30,000-gallon water tower. The Herald and Advertiser expected that the machinery in the proposed addition would bring the total number of employees up to 125.

Having made a name for themselves and established a strong client base, the mill’s leadership finally addressed one of its most significant production costs: purchasing yarn and thread. The stockholders elected to build a yarn mill to supply their hosiery production. They chose a site, at modern-day Industrial Way, along the railroad on the opposite side of the town square from the original hosiery mill. They built houses for their employees and set up shop in 1905 with a capacity of 3,000 ring spindles producing knitting yarn; finally realizing their goal of creating a fully-integrated company. That same year they adjusted their charter to allow for greater investment, up to $300,000 in capital stock; although only $52,400 had actually been paid in at that point. By 1909, they expanded the yarn mill to 5,000 ring spindles with bleaching and dyeing facilities.

A Time to Mourn: The Passing of Nathaniel O. Banks

Grantville Hosiery Mills experienced a leadership crisis in 1908 and 1909 which put all that growth in jeopardy. First, Thomas Arnold died and had his estate advertised for liquidation in The Herald and Advertiser after his death. He was an original incorporator of the mills and a major stockholder who owned seven $100 shares of Grantville Hosiery Mills’ capital stock as well as a $1000 gold bond from the mills. Just one year later in 1909, the mill’s president and “one of Coweta’s best and most useful citizens”, Nathaniel O. Banks died at 56 years old. This loss not only shook the leadership of Grantville Hosiery Mills to its core, but also had a significant impact on the greater Grantville community.

An early photo of Grantville Hosiery Mills’ employees outside one of their mills. Photo Courtesy of the Troup County Historical Society.

However, his son, William N. Banks assumed Nathaniel’s role as president of the company shortly after his death. Those who expected the young company to flounder under its relatively inexperienced new president would have been pleasantly surprised by William Banks’ performance. He quietly stabilized the company and oversaw a period of unprecedented expansion which would become Grantville’s golden age of textile production, albeit with a couple of hiccups along the way.

In June of 1910, the Grantville Hosiery Mills joined a multitude of other Georgia mills charged with violating the Sherman Antitrust Act. Those indicted frequently purchased all of the locally produced cotton and sent the surplus to New York. This kept the price of cotton in the South low and prevented it from fluctuating; all at the expense of the farmers. This example shows how serious of a business the textile industry was in the South during the early twentieth century. Not long after this scandal, the mill’s employees avoided a major tragedy on February 27, 1912. That day, a hosiery press exploded within the mill, injuring no one except the press operator who was “severely scalded”. The February issue of The Atlanta Constitution describes the explosion as having “pieces of iron flying to the ceiling.” After overcoming those two mishaps, William Banks pushed for yet another round of expansion, traveling as far away as New York to purchase the best equipment for the yarn mill. The expansion added 5,000 ring spindles, effectively doubling the yarn mill’s capacity.

The Golden Years: Grantville Mills under William N. Banks

A modern photo of the Grantville Hosiery Mills’ Yarn Mill. This displays the mill after the many rounds of expansion under Nathaniel and William Banks respectively. Photo Courtesy of Jarrett Craft.

By 1920, Grantville Hosiery Mills boasted 10,000 ring spindles, 150 latch needle knitting machines, 30 ribbing machines, and 12 looping machines, with the number of employees rounding off at around 300. Just seven years later, these numbers rose significantly to 15,000 ring spindles and 200 latch needle knitting machines, as well as the addition of 3,400 twister spindles employing 300 people. W.N. Banks was directly responsible for this period of growth and was duly recognized for his success within the textile industry when he was elected president of the Cotton Manufacturers’ Association in 1936. By this point, he was a textile executive with 25 years of experience and had even gone so far as to rebrand his company as Grantville Mills.

The honors did not stop there for Grantville’s most prominent citizen. By the end of his career, he served on the boards of The Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills, Bibb Manufacturing Company, West Point Manufacturing Company, and AMCO Mills. He also served as president of the Montgomery Knitting Mills of Moreland, the McIntosh Mills of Newnan, and the Habersham Mills of Habersham. To firmly cement his family’s legacy amongst the people of Grantville, Banks founded the Grantville Mills Foundation to benefit the people of his hometown. In 1950 the Grantville Mills Foundation built a new recreation center for Grantville’s African American community. The foundation also contributed to scholarship funds for textile education.

William N. Banks passed on the day-to-day leadership of Grantville Mills to his brother in 1956, promoting himself to chairman in a sort of quasi-retirement. In his nearly four decades as president, he doubled the capacity of the hosiery mill and tripled that of the yarn mill. He took a small firm with 210 employees and tripled it to 600 by 1957.

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Resources to Explore

Click on the following links to learn more about this region.

Facts for Kids
Digital Library of Georgia
Georgia Archives Virtual Vault
Georgia Historical Society
Coweta County, New Georgia Encyclopedia

Back to Community List

Email the Trail at wgtht@westga.edu or visit our Contact Us page for more information.

Dallas

This town began as a gold-mining community but soon made its way into the textile industry with a cotton mill and a hosiery mill.

The city of Dallas started as a gold rush town, but quickly expanded into housing a textile industry. This community boasted both Dallas Hosiery Mills and Dallas Cotton Mills.

Visit

Things to Do

Paulding County Historical Society, 296 North Johnston Street: Visit Dallas’ local museum to learn more about the city’s history!
Liberty Cotton Mill/Paulding County Cotton Manufacturing Company Mill and Mill Village, 398 West Memorial Drive: Come shop in a piece of Paulding County’s textile history! The Liberty Cotton Mill/Paulding County Cotton Manufacturing Company site is now home to Old Mill Antiques. Two new buildings have been built around it, but the original mill building still stands. The mill village, clustered mostly along Memorial Drive in front of the mill and Victory Drive behind it, were built by the mill to house its employees. They are good examples of traditional mill village architecture.

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Dallas Hosiery Mill and Mill Village, 493 Main Street: The mill has been demolished and a new structure built in its place, but the village still exists. This mill village is a little scattered and has likely been partially demolished and replaced with newer buildings. Mill houses can be viewed from the street heading south on S. Johnston Street and East on S. Main Street.

History

Mill Village Homes. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling.
Outside present-day Whitefield Spinning Mill. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling.

Dallas, the seat of Paulding County, began as a gold-rush town with its incorporation in 1854. By the early 1880s, both the railroad and the textile industry came to Paulding County, bringing with it a new wave of economic prosperity.

The community’s first textile mill, Paulding County Cotton Manufacturing Company, opened in 1900 with the erection of both a cotton factory producing soft hosiery yarns and a cottonseed oil mill. This company initially operated 3,100 ring spindles and employed 50 people; the number of spindles increased to 5,040 in 1907 and doubled to 10,140 only three years later. The mill was sold and the name changed to Liberty Cotton Mills in 1917.

Not long after beginning operations, the Liberty Cotton Mills ran into contracting issues. On November 27, 1918, the company sent a telegram to the United States War Department concerned about the cancellation of a subcontract with the Signal Corps it held through a Boston firm. The owners of the mill noted that their entire company was on this contract, and its abrupt cancellation would put many people out of work. The war department responded noting that it was impossible for them to intervene in such subcontracts.

Despite this setback, Liberty Cotton Mills was able to continue operations until 1927, when the mill was yet again sold. The Dalla-Noval Yarn Mill purchased the mill and operated 7,300 spindles by 175 employees. Sometime between 1936 and 1942, the mill was sold for the third time to A. D. Juilliard and Company, which was based in New York, to be the Dallas division of the company. By 1948, they had completely vacated their mill here.

The Whitfield Spinning Company, incorporated in 1946, purchased the mill in 1950. This company made shade covers for the tobacco industry through the 1970s when they were forced to close down due to foreign competition.

The second textile mill established in this community was the Dallas Hosiery Mill, which began operations in 1905. By 1910, the mill was producing cotton seamless hosiery with 107 knitting machines, 19 ribbing machines, 28 looping machines, and three sewing machines operated by 100 workers. The Douglasville Hosiery Mill purchased controlling interest in the mill by April of 1920. The mill kept its name but became an adjunct to the mill in Douglasville. The Douglas County Sentinel reported that the Douglasville Hosiery Mills had plans to enlarge the Dallas plant and add more machinery.

Dallas Hosiery Mill moved to Cedartown in the early 1960s. The mill was struggling by 1965 and was seized and losing workers due to a failure to pay $60,000 in back-employee payroll deductions. If the mill did not pay the money, it would be put up for sale. According to textile directories, it was around this time the mill shut down for good.

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Bowdon

This community’s textile industry started later than most, but it grew rapidly and eventually created suits for President Carter!

This small town served a big name within the United States in that President Carter’s suits were crafted here. While it’s textile industry began a bit later than in other communities, it is currently still dominant within the town of Bowdon.

Visit

Things to Do

Bowdon Area Historical Society, 105 Collegeview Street: Located behind Bowdon High School, the Bowdon Area Historical Society is home to the Heritage Walk, Whatley Memorial Park, and Shelnutt House Museum. Their mission statement is “to preserve the heritage of the Bowdon area and instill an appreciation of the past in both present and future generations.” While you’re here, you are able to view clothing worn by President Carter. The Shelnutt House Museum, where the Bowdown Area Historical Society has its headquarters, is open to the public by appointment only.
Copeland Hall, 103 Barr Avenue: This location is Bowdon’s Cultural Arts Center, where concerts, plays, educational shows, and more are offered.
Warren Sewell Memorial Library, 450 West Avenue: This library is named after the founder of the Warren Sewell Clothing Company, Warren P. Sewell.
Bowdon Station, 140 City Hall Avenue: These original LaMar Manufacturing Company buildings are now used as stores along Commerce St. and City Hall Ave. in downtown Bowdon. As these businesses are owned independently, their hours of operation may vary.
Sewell Bowdon Location, 152 City Hall Avenue: This men’s clothing store can be contacted at (770)258-5567 for hours of operation and pricing.

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Bremen-Bowdon Investment Co., 141 Commerce Street: This business is privately owned and is not open to the public. The historic Bremen-Bowdon Investment Company is still in operation producing garments for the United States military. Originally, this company was opened by Warren Sewell as the manufacturing arm of his company; however, these two companies split in 2008.
Ava Sewell Hall, 504 West College Street: The old Bowdon High School gym was built entirely with local donations and labor in 1955 and dedicated to Ava Sewell. It can be seen on the left off College View and is still used for community events.

History

Outside for lunch at Sewell Mill. Photo courtesy: CPH Collection
Woman at work. Photo courtesy: CPH Collection
Plunkett and President Carter. Photo courtesy: CPH Collection
Outside picture of Sewell Mill. Photo courtesy: CPH Collection

Bowdon’s apparel industry began during the Depression years, after brothers Robert, Roy, and Warren Sewell moved their small clothing business from Atlanta to Bremen in 1928. In 1934, the Sewell Manufacturing Company built the first apparel plant in Bowdon.

After World War II, when Warren Sewell split from Sewell Manufacturing to establish the Warren Sewell Clothing Company, he acquired the Bowdon plant and opened the manufacturing arm of his company, the Bremen-Bowdon Investment Company (BBIC). Warren Sewell’s success greatly expanded apparel manufacturing in Bowdon. While not a traditional “company town,” the apparel industry dominated the community through the second half of the twentieth century until its peak in the 1980s.

The Sewell family controlled the west Georgia region’s apparel industry through the 1990s with their many business expansions, partnerships, and new companies. Warren Sewell’s son-in-law and daughter, Lamar and Frances Sewell Plunkett, founded LaMar Manufacturing Company in Bowdon around 1955. This company made suits for President Jimmy Carter for twenty years, from his time on the Georgia senate through his presidency in the 1970s. Each of the president’s suits were made with care and lined with fabric embellished with Carter’s initials.

The apparel industry is still active in Bowdon. In 2008, BBIC and the Warren Sewell Clothing Company split. Although many of BBIC’s original buildings are now gone, the company maintains manufacturing operations on the original site, producing garments for the U.S. military. Today, you can visit the Bowdon Area Historical Society to view a blazer worn by Carter and original apparel company photographs and documents, as well as visit many of LaMar Manufacturing’s original buildings that are now home to locally owned businesses in Bowdon Station.

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Resources to Explore

Click on the following links to learn more about this region.

Bowdon Walking Tour
Carroll County Driving Tour
Facts for Kids
Digital Library of Georgia
Georgia Archives Virtual Vault
Georgia Historical Society
Carroll County, New Georgia Encyclopedia

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Email the Trail at wgtht@westga.edu or visit our Contact Us page for more information.

Trion

Come and visit one of the oldest cotton mills in Georgia!

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Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Trion Manufacturing Company/Mount Vernon Mills and Mill Village, 91 4^thStreet: This massive facility can be viewed from the street. The historic mill has been expanded several times since its original construction after the 1875 arson attack. By 1935, the mill was a massive facility that operated 102,354 spindles and 2,358 looms and employed 1,600 people. While other mills in the region have declined or collapsed, the Trion mill has thrived and is still operated by Mount Vernon Mills. While the whole town is based around the mill, and therefore basically serves as a mill village, there are certain neighborhoods that feature historic architecture which is consistent with mill villages across the region. The neighborhood directly across the street from the mill makes up a sizeable portion of the historic village. Directly to the south of the mill, across the Chattooga River, another section of the historic village can be viewed.

History

Early aerial view of Trion Mill and housing. Photo courtesy: Trion Public Library
Eels trapped in the water works. Photo courtesy: Greg McCollum
Mount Vernon Mills. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling
Mount Vernon Mills. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling
Mount Vernon Mills. Photo courtesy: Kymberli Darling

Incorporated in 1869, the textile industry in Trion began with the first cotton mill in northwest Georgia, Trion Factory, in 1847. The original mill included 600 spindles and employed 40 people to produce yarn and osnaburg sacks for the local wheat crops.

During the Civil War, Trion Factory had a contract with the Confederacy to manufacture coarse woolens for the soldiers. Spared from the destruction of the war, Trion Factory later burned in 1875 possibly due to an arsonist. Forming a new company, Trion Manufacturing Company, the mill owner constructed a new two-story brick building and began producing indigo denim. In 1889, the company added a second mill and a third mill in 1900.

By 1912, the mills belonging to the Trion Manufacturing Company were in decline. Benjamin D. Riegel, a New York businessman, purchased the mills and renamed the company Trion Company. Both the mill and the town prospered during this period. In 1931, a glove mill employing over 900 young girls opened prompting the building of Leila Riegel Hall in 1934, a dormitory to accommodate any single girls working for the company. Later the building became the Trion Inn.

In 1934, the plant closed for a third time in its history due to the General Textile Strike of 1934. “Flying Squadrons” of union activists, traveled to Trion to encourage other textile workers to join them. Met with violence from local authorities, on September 5, a deputy opened fire on two strikers. In Trion at least 22 people died or received injuries during the strikes. The mill remained closed for six weeks.

Presented with the prestigious Army-Navy E Award in 1943, Trion Company and its employees produced 50 million yards of herringbone for use in making fighting uniforms, 4 million yards of tent twill, and over 7.5 million yards of material for gun patches, during World War II. The Glove Mill also produced over 7.5 million dozen gloves for the armed forces.

In the late 1940s, the Trion Company and Ware Shoals Manufacturing Company became Riegel Textile Corporation. Various machinery upgrades and mill expansions are made through the 1950s and 60s. In 1971, the mill began producing denim fabrics.

Unlike other textile mills, Mount Vernon Mills business was still steady in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1985, R. B. Pamplin Sr., owner of Mount Vernon Mills purchased the Riegel Textile Corporation. In 1991, the company modernized and still produces over a million yards of denim a day as of 2015.

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Rossville

Visit a community whose textile industry is older than the town itself!

Rossville’s textile industry began in the late 1800s with the construction of the Richmond Hosiery Mill. This mill is considered one of the oldest and largest mills in the region. Soon after the hosiery mill was constructed, Peerless Woolen Mills was established, and it eventually led the textile industry in woolen products. This mill shut down in the late 1960s.

Visit

Places to See

The following properties are not open to the public, but you can view them from the exterior to learn more about the buildings that supported the textile industry here.

Park Woolen Mills/American Textile Woolen Company, 108 West Gordon Avenue: This hundred-year-old mill is still intact and can be seen from the street.
Peerless Woolen Mills, 555 McFarland Avenue: This location is now privately owned and is not open to the public. Peerless Mills can still be viewed safely from the street. The mill was purchased by the Hutcherson family in 2012.

History

Group of young mill workers. Photo courtesy: Library of Congress
Group of young mill workers. Photo courtesy: Library of Congress
Group of young mill workers. Photo courtesy: Library of Congress

Rossville’s textile history began in the late 1800s. Richmond Hosiery Mill, established here in 1898, was one of the largest and oldest textile mills in Northwest Georgia. The mill produced socks for men, women, and a unique section of the mill was dedicated to making hosiery for “misses”. The mill employed 400 men, women, and children in 1910 and 700 by 1922. Richmond Hosiery Mill and the many young children whom the company employed were the subjects of Lewis Wick Hines’ historic pictorial survey of child labor in American industry.

In 1905, the same year that the city of Rossville was incorporated, John L.
Hutcheson Sr. established Peerless Woolen Mills. Peerless Woolen Mills was the primary manufacturer for blankets for the armed forces during World War II. Peerless claimed to be the largest single-unit mill in the world by the 1950s, leading the textile industry in woolen products.

In 1952, the Hutcheson family sold Peerless Woolen Mills to Burlington Industries. Textile workers in Rossville began to feel the strain from competition in overseas markets and voted to unionize in August of 1961. Strongly against organized labor, Burlington Industries made plans to close the plant by the end of 1961.

In an attempt to save one of Rossville’s largest employers, local businessmen tried to identify one large company to buy the plant but their efforts proved unsuccessful. Instead, dozens of smaller textile-related companies purchased the plant and leased out the space. A large part of the plant burned in 1967 after a fire broke out from a short-circuiting piece of equipment.

Charter Trail Members

Resources to Explore

Click on the following links to learn more about this region.

Facts for Kids
Digital Library of Georgia
Georgia Archives Virtual Vault
Georgia Historical Society
Walker County, New Georgia Encyclopedia

Back to Community List

Email the Trail at wgtht@westga.edu or visit our Contact Us page for more information.

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