cause for survival

Union Chapel Sunday School minutes

The Charlottesville Woolen Mills not only escaped the fate of many of its Southern counterparts but managed to avoid the extremes of prosperity and depression which frequently rocked the industry in the North. Before 1882 the company had developed in a pattern typical of the American wool manufacture, but after that date its history bore little relation to the apparel-producing mills which dominated the industry. Foreign competition, changes in styles, and the appearance of worsteds did not create the disturbances that worried many manufacturers. Only in one respect did the mill follow a major pattern after 1882. That was in its almost complete specialization of product. It was this event which moved the company to a lightly populated fringe of the industry and made it relatively immune from the diseases afflicting woolen mills after 1893. Perhaps, too, it was the major cause for its survival in an unfavorable location. --Harry Poindexter