The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1902-11-02


Earning 10 and IL Per Cent.-Fine
Schools Built. Electric Railways Laid
Wonders Of Towns Awakening
From siunnber a Century Ions.
SPABTANBrRG, s. G., Oct 3i,-With every
mile travelled in this Piedmont region
OF North and South Carolina the marvel OF
the prosperity that reigns here grows
upon you. No man, no matter how much
he may have been prepared for it by things
he may have heard or read. can look for
the first time upon the reality without a
sense Of amazanent.
Even to this day il is impossible for
many people in the North Eastern and
Western States to dissooiate in their minds
the new South from the old, the South of
to-day from the South, If not Of ante-bellum
days, at least of the days within the de-
cade or fifteen years Immediately sue
ceeding the war. Lot them have heard
what they may or have read what they
may, any reference TO the South brings
to their minds some vague idea of drowsy
plantation homes and somnolent country
towns
of the North know that the great Southern
cities like Atlanta. Nashville, Norfolk.
Richmond and others have walked UP
and are moving But even "a 70 these
there is little general idea Of how very
wide awake they are and of how very rapid
are the strides with which they are moving
onward. OF interior towns, bearing less
well known names, but the most rudi-
- L.. x,,,.,
ties exists among many patriotic people
who would rejoice to know, but could hardly
believe without actual ocular demonstra-
ton, the splendid fact of achievement as it
actually il.
II Is THE SUNS wish to let the light Of
this great prosperity 40 shine that all the
people Of the nation shall see the good
works these robust fellow citizens of ours
In the South are doing, so far as poor words
can give reflection Of the same.
NORTH cARoLISA's BUSY FACTORIES.
or course the only way to get anything
like an adequate notion Of what has been
done and is under way down in this Pied
mont region of the twin Carolinas, is TO
come and look at IT, " would not be
necessary even to leave the train TO see
enough fairly To bewilder a man from
the North with preconceived ideas Of
Southern development-ideas based on
what the South actually was not more than
fifteen, or at the outside twenty, wears
ago
Starting in al Greensboro in North Caro-
lima, the Southern Railway passes through
such a chain Of manufacturing towns and
villages as even New England can hardly
ebOw In is GalI
great factory centre after another all the
way down through Salisbury. Charlotte,
this beautiful city Of Spartanburg and SO
on to Greenville and beyond For upward
OF two hundred miles the Southern Rail-
way from Greensboro on toward Atlanta
may be said to run through factory lane.
BY night the electric glare from factory
windows is constantly flashing into sight
as the train goes past by day il rs a series
Of fitting glimpses Of whirling machinery
and swarms Of operatives busy at their
tasks Within a radius Of 100 miles Of
Charlotte there are now fully 900 cotton
mills operating nearly three million and
quarter spindles and more than 10000
looms
Charlotte is only one Of the great growing
centres which this bewildering industrial
development has brought into being This
dashing young-old city of Spartanburg ia
another. and Spartanburg is destined 10 be
one OF the Wealhiest and most populous Of
the cities in all this great New England az
the South
Not community in all South Carolina is
moving forward to-day at a swifter pace
or with a more absolute confidence in a
great future than is Spartanburg In
general outline it's story ia the story Of
several other OF the village of the two
Carolinas that have been awakened by the
whirr Of cotton mill machinery from their
trance OF a century.
Just as there was not one Of them deader
to the world than was Spartanburg before
the change set in, 50 there is not one to-day
that is wider awake than is she There is
not one Of them in which the contrast Of
the past with the present is more startling
The transformation, for that matter, applies
TO the whole Of Spartanburg county, 1t has
oil taken place within twenty years and
most Of IL in ten.
FAST VILLAGE, PRESENT CITY.
To anybody who ever saw the old South,
Il Ia not difficult to imag CINE what Spartan.
burg was before her heart began to beat
with the new life Spartanburg did not
stir. did not even snore in her sleep. She
hadn't sufficient vitality. Buried in very
wilderness OF heavy forest, with the mar
row. crooked tracks and trails that led
through it all, 80 impossible in certain sec
tions that hardly an effortwas made TO take
wheeled vehicles over them. Spartanburg
had had technical existence from away
back in he last century.
n was the county seat There was a
court house and JAIL and there were ono
or two frame stores with high piaz:1s and
here and there frame dwelling. The
pride of Spartanburg, the biggest building
in the place, and for that matter in all the
country for miles around, was the Pal
metto Hotel.
A great business block now covers the
site Of the Palmetto Hotel. but it's memory
Is green even with men of the post -belum
generation here. IL is not difficult to pic
ture It. Long and low and ramshackle,
OF dirty. dingy white with long veranda
at Its front wherein the citizens sat and
whitfield pine sticks and smoked and chewed
tobacco like men in dream. while the flies
buzsed somnolently about them, and that
ardent son OF toll, the South Carolina darby
dozed peacefully in the shade nearby.