Robert Ragan Interview 3

 GEORGE STONEY: I'm going to be getting that later.

JUDITH HELFAND: You don't want (inaudible)

JAMIE STONEY: Rolling.

GEORGE STONEY: OK, sir. Start with the next day in the paper.

ROBERT RAGAN: The next day after the strike -- the strikers hit the Ragan Spinning Company, if I can find it here, there was an article in the Gastonia Gazette that just verifies a little of what might have happened and the head is dated October the 15th, 1934, and the headline is "Ragan Mill Folks Work" and I don't have all the headlines there. "Contentment abides is this neat village. Operatives satisfied many long-time employees. No stretch-out here, workers declare." And if I may just read a couple sentences out of it that are particularly maybe pertinent to the strike. "Not one of the Ragan 00:01:00employees joined the union and all were at work on Labor Day and the following day when closed by flying squadron of strikers from Shelby and Gastonia. On Friday of this week the same crew was at work as before the strike. Not one missing and not one (inaudible)." Then down a little further there's, "Closes up. Caldwell Ragan, manager and treasurer is the eldest son of the president, has learned the mill business from the ground floor getting his start at the Groves Mill in 1916 when he was as boy. He is one of Gaston County's able young executives, excellent business man and takes a keen interest in everything that will help the people who work for him. He is now in charge of one of the many local textile industries that give the lie to Northern and union 00:02:00propagandists that gloat in publishing the pitiable conditions of Southern cotton mill workers and hold up for public ridicule such men who zealously guard the welfare and well being of their employees." So, obviously, the Gazette is reporting that conditions were much better than were being reported by the union. The stories that I've heard from my father and others that on the day after this general strike in 1934, what my father did was he deputized several local farmers who -- the farmers and the employees were very independent and most of my people down here were of Scotch-Irish and German ancestry and historically had been a very independent type of people and they -- they were 00:03:00not union sympathizers, they did not like what was going on with the unions. So what my father did was he deputized several farmers in the area out near the Ragan Mill and paid them to guard the mills. In other words, we were -- people were still thought that the strikers would be back and would destroy the mills if given the opportunity. So Dad took half a dozen farmers from the community downtown in Gastonia -- and later we can look at downtown and see the setting, it's all the same -- to the courthouse, which was on South Street, had these farmers deputized. Now they had vividly remember that outside the courthouse unemployed workers had already gathered, were probably up there every day and they were saying things to my father and calling him names and calling the 00:04:00farmers that he was taking in to be deputized names. So it was not a very pleasant thing. But anyway, my father remembered that -- and had them deputized. Then right across the street was the Standard Hardware. The farmers had their own guns, they didn't have to buy them, but Dad -- one of them, had bought them ammunition and all of this was being seen thereafter by the town or reporters or anybody else who wanted to report. It wasn't just the Ragan Mill, it was other mill owners were doing exactly the same thing and the way they protected the mills is they would back on to the railroad tracks on the side tracks, which is how cotton arrived at the mill. They would go and empty one or two railroad cars, put them near the mill. These farmers with their 00:05:00shotguns would be both on top and inside and they worked in shifts and stayed out to protect the mills over 24 hours. Now how long this went on I don't know that -- whether it was a day, a week or a month or two months or what, but for some time these farmers with shotguns protected the mill property. Normally, it was -- the mill owner's trying to do it in a way that wasn't real noticeable. They wanted people to know that there were policemen to speak there to protect the mills. Now, one mill owner in particular, who was a good friend and customer of our family over in Lincoln County went a little bit further. It was said that he had someone with a machine gun on the top of his mill building protecting -- there were two or three mills, big mills, and my father among others being a close friend of that family, he was asked to call 00:06:00the headquarters of the company in Philadelphia to bring it to the attention of the manager's father that this was not what we wanted to do down there. We didn't want to have it look like that we were having the National Guard and machine guns on top that just suggests that he had his sons to remove those and do something a little less conspicuous and I think that was probably done, but this was the way they tried to protect their property during this time because they didn't know what the next step would be. And one of your associates asked me what people did and how they talked about it. I understand that meetings were held at the old First National Bank board of directors meeting room by the Southern Combed Yarn and Spinners Association and the North Carolina 00:07:00Textile Manufacturers Association and they would get together and talk over the problems and try to decide what was the best thing to do. I don't know what was involved in these meetings, but just like anybody else with problems they did try to address those problems and to do what was right for themselves and for their employees.

GEORGE STONEY: Could you -- what was your impression as a young boy about the -- the attitude of the workers towards the unions?

RAGAN: The impression that I had and the impressions that learned were that most -- because all the management were against the unions, but most mill employees were not being union sympathizers. There were some and normally the ones that were out of work. And much of it goes back to the 1929 strike from everything 00:08:00I've studied and heard that most employees thought that they were doing pretty well. Wage scales in Gastonia and Gaston County had come up. They had nice houses and things and then these outside people came in and told them, hey, you guys, it's not as good as you think. And as a matter of fact, it's bad. In the case of the Loray Mills the people began thinking, well, maybe it's not so good. And the Loray was a special case. The other mills and operatives were better treated, but anyway, getting back to what you're asking -- the impression that I've always had is that most of the employees liked working for the family-run mills and received decent wages and received decent treatment and everything. There were only one or two examples in Gaston County. One was 00:09:00in Bessemer City where employees were treated very poorly. I think it's a matter of record of who it was and what mill it was. I don't care to go into that, but the vast majority, and we have to remember they were over 100 mills in Gaston County at this time, were family-owned and family-operated and the people were God-fearing, good people and they might not have made the most money in the world, but they were treated like decent human beings.

GEORGE STONEY: Now they -- I don't want to push you if you don't think that -- but, you mentioned it was like being against Christianity. That's the -- if you feel comfortable --

RAGAN: Well, I think that anyone who studies, yes, -- listen, I was not there. I can only say what I've studied and what I've heard. The people that made up the populace of Gaston County were Scotch-Irish and German settlers and their 00:10:00descendants, who were noted for being very fiercely independent people and they're very religious people. This was part of the bible-belt of the South. That's however -- it stretches North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia and particularly talking about the first strike, the '29, the communist-inspired strike. The people felt that once they learned what it was and what they really wanted and some of these books I have quote some of the things out of the papers that were said about communism. This was not what the people of Gaston County wanted from the employee to the mill owner and it was basically against their Christian ethics of what they learned in church. You know, there were the uptown churches and the mill churches and that's a whole different thing. But as far as communism, they thought -- believed the same 00:11:00thing that communism was wrong, communism was against God and Christianity. So, I think that was one of the things that came into it and these -- most people in this area were very a religious type of people, and this was part of their heritage and their being and communism had no place in that and what communism taught.

GEORGE STONEY: Now, would they and of course cut out my question here, did they equate unions with communism?

RAGAN: I think definitely. In the early days, and here again I'm going back to the '29 strike -- I don't know that it was brought into the matter as much in the 1934 strike, but I think definitely they did equate those two.

GEORGE STONEY: Sorry, I want to cut off my question.

RAGAN: All right. They did not believe -- they thought that communism was anti-Christian, that there was no place for it.

GEORGE STONEY: Did they think unionism is anti-Christian? That's what I was wondering.

RAGAN: Well, I think they were looking at unionism being communist-inspired at that time. I don't know later if you can really say that they thought unionism by itself without the communist influence was anti-Christian. I can't say that. I think they did have a feeling that it took away from their God-given right of independence, that it somehow took something away from them that or a decision that they were to make for themselves.

GEORGE STONEY: OK, now one other thing here -- you know the book Millhands and Preachers?

RAGAN: I know it well. I haven't read it in some time.

GEORGE STONEY: There's a clear accusation there that the mill owners were 00:13:00using religion to fight the unions. Do you have anything to say about that?

RAGAN: I don't know of any specific case where mill owners were using religion. Religion was there. I don't know that the mill owners brought it. The mill owners went to church and they were religious people, too, and probably compared to businessmen in other sections of the country they were considered very religious people. All of them that I knew were religious people. The employees had the same type of religion but they went to a generally different church and they have presented that religion in somewhat of a different texture or a different manner. You're going to need to maybe ask me some specific questions and I'll be glad --

GEORGE STONEY: (inaudible) in that book is that the mill owners were supporting the churches to fight unionism and I just wondered if you -- if there's 00:14:00anything [from that?] from your standpoint?

RAGAN: From my standpoint I don't know of it, but of course the mills did contribute to the churches. They were -- like in the case of the Ragan Spinning Company there was a church on the proper -- in the area of the Ragan village and that was the one that they supported. There was a church connected with the Trenton Cotton Mills that I know was not on the village property, but it was the church probably where 70 percent of the people from the mill attended and just because the mill people attended there, that was the one that they would contribute to. As far as I know, there was no connection between -- I mean, they were just given free of any entangling circumstances. But --

GEORGE STONEY: OK, that's -- because --

RAGAN: That's an area that I'm weak on and I don't --

GEORGE STONEY: I wanted to get a very clear statement from your standpoint. This wasn't --

JAMIE STONEY: (inaudible) Can you -- when you were talking about these folks you were putting your hand [on them?]. I just want to get a cut away of you putting your hand --

RAGAN: Uh, she has the book, I think, that I was talking about and I don't remember what I was talking about.

JAMIE STONEY: You were talking about (inaudible) in these books it's described and so forth.

RAGAN: Do I say anything or you just want to --

JAMIE STONEY: (inaudible) you were just putting your hand on (inaudible) Just put your hand down and bring it back towards you.

RAGAN: Like this?

JAMIE STONEY: OK, one cut away (inaudible).

GEORGE STONEY: Now, Judy? I'm through here. I want to make sure that Mr. Ragan is through. And then you may have notes there that you want to -- before we break and and do stuff over here.

RAGAN: OK, I'm trying to think what else we need to talk about. I'm sure there's things that I've forgotten.

HELFAND: I have (inaudible) I was just talking to Mr. Wetzel last night. He made a --

RAGAN: Charlie Wetzel.

HELFAND: Right. That he went to school and I have a feeling that you're on the same page.

RAGAN: No, Charlie is older than I am, but I know him very -- I know his family very well and --

HELFAND: I wonder if you also went to school like he did with the mill workers' children.

RAGAN: Oh, yes.

HELFAND: You might talk about --

RAGAN: So did my father going back to the earliest days when there were schools in Gastonia. My father was -- well, being born in 1898, he was in school in the early part of the century was really when schools began -- like the public school system began in 1901. The main school that I knew was called the old Central School -- Central School. In the early days there was a full grade of schools, the primary up through high school. When I went there it was just grade one through six. But that's where we all started and everybody in the 00:17:00town went to the same school. There's some -- I'm trying to think which books that I've been looking at most recently. There's one that I have downstairs that shows mill owners' children and the workers all going to the same school, the same classroom, the same teachers, you know, some people later on either went, you know, went off to prep school or to college, but most all that I knew in the early grades, grade one through six, probably grade one through twelve through the high school, went to the same school and everybody was in the same classroom. I think we never thought anything particularly unusual about that.

GEORGE STONEY: Anything else?

HELFAND: I just wondered if we do -- we might interview Mr. Gray -- J. Gray. I 00:18:00wondered if you could just tell us a little bit about his family's mills as (inaudible)

RAGAN: I sure can. Before we got started, that the picture that I was talking about in the book that I have downstairs I think has Jake in it sitting up on-- You know, I have these memories from your school days and everybody has a picture sitting up on the front steps of the central school of your whole group. And I have one of me and Dad -- I do have one of my father in the early 1900s and his class, which I'm sure I can find -- will find -- very shortly here, and Jake Gray, I think, is in one downstairs. If not, his cousin Joe Separk. (inaudible)

(break in video)

GEORGE STONEY: OK, describe what we're looking at.

RAGAN: What we're looking at here is a copy of a script used at the old McAden 00:19:00Mills in 1881-82. The script being good in merchandise of the general store of McAden and Ragan, which was -- this is the same thing, the McAden Mills will pay to their employees 10 cents in merchandise at the McAden and Ragan store. The next two photographs are of the three mills in McAden, which are still there and really very beautiful mills. This is mill number two, the center part with the pretty bell tower and the turrets -- the gorgeous turrets and the old mill village on the hill is in the background and these are -- this one is mill number three and this was the first mill, mill number one at McAden Mill that was started in 1881. I don't believe --

GEORGE STONEY: Do you have a picture of the place where the flying squadron came?

RAGAN: I do [later?].

GEORGE STONEY: OK, fine. (inaudible)

RAGAN: Very small. I did not have the have the blown up. We may have to stop and work them, let you have a close up.

JAMIE STONEY: (inaudible) close up.

GEORGE STONEY: (inaudible) not you.

RAGAN: Well, this is only leading up -- it's between McAdenville and Gastonia, like my grandfather moved to Gastonia shortly after his McAdenville venture and this was the general store that he first had before he went into the banking and the textile business.

GEORGE STONEY: Now hold it just again. Now, could you identify any of the people?

RAGAN: Yeah, the people that are in this -- it is his old store but the people that are in it now are the people that bought the store from him, so it's not his group. This is Captain J. D. Moore and some of his associates. But these are people that went into the textile business shortly or at the same time my grandfather did. This is Captain J. D. Moore who was one of the pioneers and 00:21:00this is, I believe, Mr. J. O. White, who was Captain Moore's primary superintendent. The same relationship between George Ragan and George Gray is the same relationship that there was between Captain Moore and Mr. White.

GEORGE STONEY: OK, next.

RAGAN: This is the first cotton mill in Gastonia. It is the old Gastonia Cotton Manufacturing Company which was called the old mill. It was -- began operations in 1888. It was -- the prime mover was [Greer?] Love. RCG Love who was the grandfather of Spencer Love who founded Burlington Industries.

GEORGE STONEY: OK, next.

RAGAN: And also associated with the same mill is Captain Moore, George Gray, and 00:22:00George Ragan who had parts in it also. This is the second cotton mill in Gastonia that was started in 1893, the Trenton Cotton Mills and thus the primary mover. This mill is my grandfather George Washington Ragan, and he had associated with him as the superintendent Mr. George Alexander Gray, both were the primary importance in the early development of the industry in Gastonia. It's a very interesting picture. This building is still standing on Main Street in Gastonia but it's not an operating mill anymore. This is the same Trenton Cotton Mills from a different location. It shows the old tower and the mill office and smokestack. This is a photograph of the Arlington Cotton Mills, which is still in business and still running. It doesn't look anything like this now. It had a beautiful tower and one of the pretty smokestacks of Gaston 00:23:00County which has just been taken down in the last few years. My grandfather, George W. Ragan, also built this mill at the turn of the century, 1900, and it was in this mill, excuse me, that the first combed yarn, this one is a little bit clearer, where the first combed yarn in the entire South was produced. And this was the sixth mill built in Gastonia. And this is my grandfather and this was L. L. Jenkins who was president of the First National Bank. He and my grandfather were in several business transactions together. This is the Ragan Spinning Company that was built later in 1922. It was my grandfather's money but my father, Caldwell Ragan, was the primary and just graduated from Georgia 00:24:00Tech and New Bedford Textile School in New Bedford, Massachusetts. And this was primarily his venture that was built at that time. It was built in two stages. It was Ragan mill number one and then several years later and number two was added onto it. And the village, a pretty village, was behind it and that's still in operation for many years. It was operated later by J. P. Stevens and I think [Delta?] Woodside Mills owns it today. This is an old photograph of my grandfather in his uptown office and probably if I had I to put a date on it, it would be the late teens or early '20s. You can just sort of tell from the type of fixtures and we still have his giant roll top desk.

GEORGE STONEY: We're going to have to do that again because we're getting that flare Jamie.

JAMIE STONEY: OK, right there?

GEORGE STONEY: We're getting some (inaudible) response-- Just hold it there, Mr. Ragan.

RAGAN: Do you want me to tilt it any way to help with the --

GEORGE STONEY: That's good. OK, Jamie.

RAGAN: Do you want me to say anything about it again?

GEORGE STONEY: I don't think so.

RAGAN: OK. Let's come back to these are some of the association pictures. See if anything -- this is a book on Gastonia. It's a copy of a book on Gastonia that was produced for its twenty-fifth anniversary in 1906 and it shows some really interesting things here from that time. I don't know if it was six or seven mills, the earliest starts with the Arlington Cotton Mills that my grandfather built. And then Avon Mills that the Love family built and the old Gastonia Cotton Manufacturing Company, the Gray Manufacturing Company that Mr. George A. Gray, one of the real pioneers in the industry built. Colonel 00:26:00Armstrong who was one the later pioneers was just getting started and this was his very first mill that he had built in 1906. This is the giant Loray Mill, which today is known as Firestone and Textiles. That was the Modena that Captain J.D. Moore started. He died early and I think at this time J.L. White was running it. And that was the Ozark Mills, one of the early ones it was built in 1899. This is the Trenton Mill that we've already talked about. My grandfather sold it to J.K. Dixon by this time when he built the Arlington. That was how it looked in 1906. And these are just different pictures of things around town. Can we cut off for a minute and sort of find what else we might 00:27:00want to show.

GEORGE STONEY: You see that picture of the grandfather (inaudible)

RAGAN: Yes, that's what this one was taken from. I don't --

GEORGE STONEY: Now see if you could hold that -- yeah, we're not getting the (inaudible) pattern off of that. So -- yeah, give us a little wider shot on that. But that's nice. OK. Good.

JAMIE STONEY: (inaudible) focus it's about as thick as a piece of paper. Could you turn it slightly counter-clockwise? Right there, perfect.

GEORGE STONEY: Fine, OK?

RAGAN: Let's see, I don't know what –

(break in video)

GEORGE STONEY: That's good. Take it and then go down. Good, OK?

RAGAN: You see the double railroad tracks and there's another mill back on the right hand side which is the mutual -- the official name was really The Arlington Cotton Mills -- it doesn't have it on here. It just says Arlington mills.

GEORGE STONEY: Good, OK?

RAGAN: Gastonia Cotton Manufacturing Company. Let's see what the rest of these are.

(inaudible)

RAGAN: This -- (inaudible) you brought in the school situation, this is my father's, Caldwell Ragan, grammar school picture I'm going to have to guess, I haven't got it right in front of me, this is my father right here. That's Caldwell Ragan.

GEORGE STONEY: We're getting a flare there. If you don't mind --