Richwood’s Birth --- the early employersRichwood’s Birth --- the early employers Millie Hammonds Stinnett Nicholas Co. WV. pre 1940 Interesting Tidbits (newspaper excerpts)
9-5-1907 Raleigh Post
Richwood - graded public schools employing 18 teachers, 5 churches, 2 banks, 85 stores, 2 excellent hotels and a number of other smaller size and cheaper accommodations, a theatre, a hospital and more than the usual number of restaurants and small business establishments. In 1901 the Cherry River Boom and Lumber Company erected a Big Mill works 300 men with a mill at Camden on Gauley some 25 miles west works 100 men and one at Holcomb works 50 men, while the woods force which does the timbering for all the mills reaches 1,200 men. The Cherry River Boom & Lumber Co. employees in this neighborhood 1,650 men.
Next to the Cherry River Boom and Lumber Co the most important concern here is the Cherry Tanning Co. A Boston concern , its chief office in Massachusetts. Employees 300 to 400 men and turns out daily 900 sides of sole leather which is its only product. Hemlock bark is the kind principally used. The hides come from South America.
The Cherry River Pulp and Paper Company is another important concern. Established 4 years ago and turning out 50 tons of paper daily until a short time ago when its output increased to 75 tons daily. The product is heavy wrapping paper.
The Dodge Clothes Pin Co. has a factory here and one at Lincoln, NH. This company makes at its two mills half the clothes pins used in the world. It employs here about 75 people, more than half being women, who are engaged in packing the output. It is reported that the plant in Lincoln is to be closed down and the output here increased to double what it is now. In which case this town would enjoy the distinction of furnishing the world more than half the clothes pins. Half a car load of those very necessary articles of domestic economy are now manufactured here daily.
The Sherwood Manufacturing Co has here a hub factory which turns out hubs of five difference sizes. The best of wood for making of hubs both for buggies and heavy wagons abounds in this section. Employment is given to 50 men.
Richwood Store Co does more business in dollars and cents than any other retail store in WV.
Curtin - the Pardee & Curtin Lumber Co has two mills. The force of men employed on the mills and in the woods reaches 400.
Allingdale - Roane Lumber Co. has a big mill
Fenwick - The Fenwick Lumber Co. and the Laurel Manufacturing Co., the latter being the sawmill company and the former the lumber purchasing company, have a mill.
Tioga - on the waters of Birch River about 6 miles from the B & O Railroad at Allingdale, the Tioga Lumber Co is operating a big mill.
8-4-1910 Raleigh Herald
Richwood, a little town nestled in the mountains of Nicholas County, contains the largest lumber camp in the United States and probably in the world.
11-22-1921
Richwood - work began by Cherry River Paper Co. on building of mammoth new power house for its plant here. Smoke stack to be 225 feet high
4-22-1922 Daily Mail
The Wm. F Mosser Tannery of Richwood changed its name to the Parsons Tanning Co
12-2-1922 Daily Mail
Woodenware Plants at Richwood consolidate - the Fulton Manufacturing Co of Richwood and the Escanaba Mfg. Co of Michigan will result in the formation of the Steele Wallace Corp. - both companies manufacture woodenware
6-23-1923 Daily Mail
Richwood - Handle Factory Fire .. Lost 13 dry kilms - 40,000 broom handles, 20,000 chair rungs - neither the factory or warehouse were damaged
8-14-1923 Daily Mail
Richwood and surrounding territory cut off communication with the outside world for more than 36 hours. The North and South Forks of the Cherry River and Big Laurel Creek early Sunday morning threw a volume of water into the Cherry .. paving was torn up on Oakford Avenue, houses were washed from their foundation and about 25 miles of the Pittsburgh and WV Railroad tracks were either washed out or undermined.
12-4-1924
Richwood - fire destroyed the entire main plant of the Cherry River Boom & Lumber Co 1000 men temporarily out of work .. Worked stated immediately to rebuild.
9-21-1927 Gazette
Our Big Industries - following plants which are the largest in the world in their respective fields are located in WV: Vitrolite plant, Parkersburg - Hosiery mills, Martinsburg - Axe factory, Charleston - Natural gas gasoline plant, Hastings - Bottle Factory, Fairmont - Iron nail factory, Wheeling - Toy marble factory, Clarksburg - Deepest Well in the world, near Clarksburg - Longest coal tipple, Beard’s Fork - Thermos bottle plant, Huntington - Mono metal plant, Huntington - Proprietary remedies company, Wheeling - Electrical porcelain plant, Parkersburg - Sanitary pottery, Mannington - Stogie factory, Wheeling - Clothes Pin factory, Richwood - Shovel factory, Parkersburg - Sheet glass factory, Charleston - Only pressed prism glass factory, Morgantown - Tannery, Richwood - Iron Furnace, Weirton - Chinaware plant, Newell
7-16-1929 Gazette
Jackson’s Mill near Weston is becoming a greater mecca each year for the ingathering of the Four-H boys and girls of WV.. The camp was built of logs donated by the Cherry River Boom & Lumber Company and cut from the hills of Webster County and is a model of architecture and located in one of the beauty spots of the campus.
9-27-1930
Richwood - heavy rain broke the long drought, resulting in the reopening of the Cherry River Boom & Lumber Co and Westcott Handle Co plants - both have been shut down for nearly 2 months because of the low stage of the Cherry River.
10-28-1930 Daily Mail
Tapping of a large supply of water with a deep drilled well enabled the Steel Wallace corporation plant at Richwood, suspended by drought since June 27, to resume operations today. The Plant is used to manufacture clothes pins and butter trays. It resumed operations with 160 workmen.
7-31-1931 Daily Mail
Fire of undetermined origin early today partially destroyed the Richwood plant of the Parsons Tanning company .. The rolling, drying and storing rooms of the tannery were destroyed along with seven carloads of leather and three railroad box cars. One hundred and six company houses near the plant were without water or light because of the damage to the pumping machinery and destruction of power lines from the company’s power house. The bleaching room, dark room and power house were not damaged
2-21-1932 Gazette
Richwood - The J D Westcott company, manufacturers of handles and chair rungs here since 1913 plan to locate in Williamson, Mingo Co . The plant here will close out and move June 1 ..
3-17-1939 Daily Mail
Richwood - The Cherry River Paper company, Richwood’s second largest industry announced today that within the next eight months it will move its plant to Plymouth, NC. the pulp supply in the vicinity of Richwood has been exhausted and for a long time it had been necessary to import pulp to keep the paper plant operating. The company was located here about 30 years ago and has operated continuously since then. It has between 400 and 500 employees. The announcement of the decision to move in November or December followed shortly after disclosure the company had been purchased by the Cherry River Paper Company of Delaware which already is operating a sulphite plant at Plymouth ..when the paper mill leaves the Cherry River Boom and Lumber Co will remain as the only major industry in this Nicholas Co town of 7,000 population.
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Two of these employers endured floods, fires, droughts, the Depression, WWI , labor disputes and strikes, etc until the late 1950’s.
The Cherry River Boom and Lumber Co was first sold in Nov 1958, the site they sawed their first log on in 6-26-1901 part of that same site today is occupied by a modern Georgia Pacific Mill.. Richwood was built in The Shadow of the Big Mill.
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