.
R.B. Whitley, who was one of the first citizens of the town and is one of its leading citizens, owner of the general store, president of the bank, and owns a cotton mill nearby and a farm. He is a big land owner, owns Whitley-Davis farm and a cotton mill in Clayton. He said he cut down the trees and pulled the stumps out of the main street, and was the first man in that town of Wendell, Wake County, North Carolina: photo by Marion Post Wolcott, September 1939
Operator repairing break in thread in warp winding, Laurel Cotton Mill, Laurel, Mississippi: photo by Russell Lee, January 1939
Operator of spool winding machine making knot, Laurel Cotton Mill, Laurel, Mississippi: photo by Russell Lee, January 1939
Loom, Laurel Cotton Mill, Laurel, Mississippi: photo by Russell Lee, January 1939 
Spools of cotton thread with woman repairing break, Laurel Cotton Mill, Laurel, Mississippi: photo by Russell Lee, January 1939 
At the Mary Leila cotton mills in Greensboro, Georgia, October 1941: photo by Jack Delano, October 1941 
Company houses near cotton mill, Gadsden, Alabama: photo by John Vachon, December 1940
Mrs. W.T. Hendry and her children. Her husband works in the Mary Leila cotton mill in Greensboro, Greene County, Georgia: photo by Jack Delano, November, 1941
Interior of R.B.Whitley general store. A Negro who is president of an industrial school is trying to get a donation for its support from Mr. R.B. Whitley. Mr. Whitley owns a nearby cotton mill and practically runs the town. Wendell, Wake County, North Carolina: photo by Marion Post Wolcott, November 1939
Photos from Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Collection, Library of Congress
6 comments:
Tom,
Thanks for these, world in black and white, workers and owner(s) still going on as time going on, sun just now coming up over ridge. . . .
9.25
light coming into sky above still black
ridge, white circle of moon by branches
in foreground, sound of wave in channel
conceive time as temporality,
spatial can be anything
trees in air, how leaves are
transformed, still more
cloudless blue sky reflected in channel,
gulls flapping to the left toward ridge
Thank you, Stephen, that was definitely a moon to remember...
Tom, watched a documentary on the English cotton industry and its collapse in the 20th C; the US being the envy of England at the time.
And all things being relative, I can't but notice that Mrs. W.T. Hendry has a machine(a washing machine?) in her house; in Lancashire, I suspect that not all of the mill owners would have afforded that luxury back then.
Mreant to say watched that doc just last night!
Billy,
Whrat's up, doc?
Do you suppose Coketown has a Facebook page?
Keeping in mind that in these photos we are seeing the "best face" being put on things in locations where the assistance of government relief programs was crucial (thus naturally inclining the "subjects" to cooperate "positively" with the photographers, insofar as they may have been able).
About the box, yes, washing machine is a possibility. Cooler may perhaps be another. Some sort of basic refigerating unit?
About the machine as indication of relative luxury, the same point was made by a close observer here a few days back.
Not to suggest that she was experiencing a tinge of envy toward Mrs. Hendry.
"Back in the day," the circumlocutory term "appliance" covered so much territory.
Desolation being a term of general application.
The other side of the coin being that with the new technologies that were adopted in US cotton spinning and weaving, the amount of labour expected was greater. US weavers looked after eight looms to the UK's four.
But what killed the whole deal was selling Lancs looms to Indian and Japanese mill owners. The Japanese, of course, were more innovative and efficient and wiped the floor with the West. Who now remembers that Toyota started as loom makers?
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