The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1922-05-26

crowds, he said, and in after life he
preferred to be far away from the
maddening throng.
After his visit to New York, along
with his partner, he. opened store
in Maine under the style of Deering
Milliken & Co., which soon became
business factor in that city. The
firm moved to New York in little
while where it began business in a
small way. Mr.. Milliken, it is stated,
had a dry goods box for his desk an
acted as his own porter, office boy,
salesman and bookkeeper. He was
not afraid of work and the business
grew. In time William Deering, his
partner, retired from the firm to be-
come the head of the harvesting ma
chinery business in Chicago, which
bore his name. Hither he would have
had Mr.. Milliken also 60 and a great
merchant he would have become in
the windy city Of the Golden West,
but in his mind he had visualized the
career of a great merchant in the
greatest city in the world and he
chose to remain for the accomplish
ment of his vision.
1t was about this time that the
hum of the spindle began to be heard
in the South. The great product
of our fields had then begun to be
used and to be made into cloth at the
edges of the fields whence it was
gathered. Mr.. Milliken at once de-
vined the possibilities of the young
enterprises of this section and he de-
Icided to become and did become a
pioneer in Southern textile manufac-
turing.
1t was about this time as already
indicated that Mr.. Stephen Greene
directed his attention to the Abbeville
! Cotton Mill. An investigation was
made and he determined to help the
enterprise. And though it had many
storms to weather and much rough
roads to travel, he guided it from
that day to the day of his death un-
erringly toward success. 1t was his
enterprise and its success was all his
accomplishment. 1t was his vision
that foresaw the way to success and
it was left to him to blaze the way
out. He bought largely of the COM
mon stock of the mill and urged 9TH
ers to buy. He caused the first issue
of preferred stock and then the sec.
ond issue to be offered to the pub
Ilic, offering to loan to worthy stock
holders, on long time and at easy
terms, the money with which to pur-
chase their share of each issue, and
finally bought himself all of both is
sues which others would not buy. l
recall that some of the directors at
the one time or the other doubted the
wisdom of issuing more preferred
stock and that at other times some
doubted the wisdom of other
plans which he made for the
mill. That has been a con-
siderable time ago, and looking back
now over the road which the mill has
travelled, as the oldest director now
on the Board, in point of service
only, it is a pleasure for me to say
as others who know would gladly say
that his advice always proved sound,
that his plans always worked out to
maturity and that with US he made
no mistakes. In his dealings with
US, he was never over-enthusiastic
but he was never pessimistic. When
he had blazed road to travel he
knew that it led up the hill to prog
ress whatever the difficulties en-
countered. And having blazed a road
to travel, he travelled it.
While Mr.. Milliken was doing so
much for the Abbeville Cotton Mill,
he was all the while directing his
own large business in New York City
and was likewise interested in many
other Southern mills similar to ours,
as we'll as in Northern mills. And as
he directed the destinies of these
corporations in the North and in the
South and continued to manage the
affairs of Deering, Milliken & Co.,