Aliceville Cotton Mill

Aliceville Cotton Mill. . In 1928-29 the Aliceville Chamber of Commerce and Alabama Power Company persuaded Alabama Mills. Inc. to locate one of their ten proposed cotton mills in Aliceville. A precondition to the location was that local citizens be required to purchase $150.000 of Alabama Mills bonds, which they did in ten days. Construction of the 10.000 spindle mill began in April 1928. Paul A. Redmon served as president of Alabama Mills and J.V. Parks Sr., of Aliceville, served on its board of directors, followed by John A. Somerville Jr. In November 1928, the St. Louis San Francisco (Frisco) Railroad arrived in Aliceville. Adjoining the mill, a village of 35 modern, family-type homes were erected by Alabama Mills to house worker families. This was part of a national trend in the textile industry known as "from farm-to-mill village.", Reverse Side , In 1933, a restored church building was erected as a community center. Later, it housed a church that evolved into West End Baptist Church in the 1940s. Businesses found that the mill employees were a stimulus to their operations. These businesses were sustained by the mill payroll for more than seven decades. In 1948, the mill employed 438 workers, with an annual payroll of more than $900,000. During World War II, the plant produced 25 million yards of textiles. In the mill, raw bales of cotton were transformed into finished, woven textile. A total of 78 male employees served in World War II and three, Clayton Trull, James Carver, and Lincoln Perkins, gave their lives. In the early 1970s, the mill became the first Aliceville business where white and black employees worked together on the same production line. In the 1990s, under Fruit of the Loom, the mill was modernized. It closed in 2000.