The commonwealth. (Greenwood, Miss.) 1896-1923, 1899-07-07
COTTON MILLING IN THE SOUTH,
Short Address By Mr.. Charles &. Hooker,
Jr.. to the Mississippi Cotton
Manufacturing Co.

Short Address By Mr.. Charles e.. Hookel
Jr.. to the Mississippi Cotton
Manufacturing c..
Mr.. Charles E. Hooker Jr., addresse
the Mississippi Cotton MANUFACTURER
Company last night. In the curse O
his remarks, which We're OF practica
and suggestive value, he said:
The press and public speakers 0
this State have been hammering tn
idea OF cotton milling for thirty year
as a safe investment and means of dit
fusing earnings and benefits among tn
whole people, as well as being reall,
in the interest of self-protection.
"One would suppose that the objec'
lesson furnished by the success of til.
Wessou and Meridian mills, would have
given snch impetus to the industry a,
to have lifted the State out Of the ruts.
Mississippi grew in 1890. 1,154,7 25
bales of cotton which would have this
year only about a value of 1923, 094, 500.
This is all the farmer gets and hence
it is all that every other avocation has
to draw from. II this was manufac-
tured at home and the wages paid ont
left here to help our communities this
would bring into local use 500, 2s3, 500
instead of some S2a3, 900, 900, the pro-
ceeds merely of raw cotton produced at
a cost greater than the market price.
Then too, there is the decentralization
and the wear and tear of land life con,
nected with it. Say for convenience,
that the jackson trade consumes of cot.
ton manufactures such as shifting,
sheeting, o%snaburgs, drilling, checks,
cotton Irvine, meal and flower sacks,
equal to | 900, 900 pounds of cotton or
1000 bales. This cotton would pay in
freight charges to the Eastern %spinners
agent 81, 800, the cotton goods coming
back here would pay s., 200 making a
freight charge Of Sl4, 100 to get it to the
factory and back to us for consumption.
The South s raw cotton crop has reach
ed II 900, 600 bales worth now only SEQ.
DOC, coo, its manufactured value would
be S66o, 600, 600, Of which the South is
throwing away $40, DOC, 600 annually.
When the laws Of trade force conpeti.
until the problem of production
t the lowest cost shall be fully solved
hen the natural and inherent advan
ages Of the South Will be given her the
ED in new and old England and she
'ill clothe the 400, coo, 600 subjects of
British empire. Banks and cotton
nils run together in the State of North
arolina. The mill involves $50 where
bank employs 81. Mr.. J. NJ. Odell
president of a national bank and
resident Of the Odell Cotton Mill at .
oncord, N. G. His bank is capitaliz. .
| at *50, 900, and his mill at 81, 800. 900. .
| Spartanbnrg, s. e., there are thirty n
70 mills which consume all the local j..
Nv cotton. There is II paying mill at =,
harleston run exclusively by negro .
Dor.
These Carolina mills originally, in !.
rye measure situated as Mississippi !.
respect of Il single money crop, a =,
liked population and reverses of war, :,
I'VE lifted the incubus of hard times :,
ID despair from the hearts of all 4
asses and conditions of that people. -.
he rust of enforced idleness has been :,
cceeded by the shining steel of the ~
rift and industry. The new life -
Dod which flows from the union of
r%iculture, manufactures. trade and J..
flowing in all the arteries of !,
9 social organization has given to q,
ese states a broad. sound material !,
d financial stamina. These Carolina ::
lis have been the genii OF industrial h,
owth and expansion as well as the :,
'gnet Of those great moral forces -,
'ich both stimulate and are preserved
the momentum Of progress.
They have marvelously increased
rsonal and land values, engendered N
,h. wholesome benetlcent public "
rit, restored the temper and raised tn
tone of the people and brought be
that content and happiness is
ong them which always finds ex- n
.SSinn in the imnulse of nroSnaritr %