Historic Charlotte

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The Atherton Mill (1893) spurred
development in the Dilworth neighborhood
in the 1890s. Its renovation and adaptive
reuse spurred redevelopment and growth
again as part of “South End.”
COURTESY BRUCE R. SCHULMAN.
HISTORIC CHARLOTTE
46
tion for his sales office, which opened on
March 27, 1883. Tompkins chose Charlotte
because of its railroads. On May 17, 1873, the
Carolina Central Railroad Company had
acquired the right of way and had undertaken
the task of completing a continuous track
from Wilmington to Rutherfordton. This job
had been completed on December 15, 1874.
By 1873 the Atlanta and Charlotte Airline
Railroad had finished laying track between
Charlotte and Spartanburg, South Carolina
and on to Atlanta.
In 1884 Tompkins established the D. A.
Tompkins Company. This enterprise was “at
the forefront of machinery manufacturing for
the southern textile mills,” writes historian
Brent Glass. D. A. Tompkins remained in
Charlotte until his death in 1914 and helped
build a virtual cotton mill empire in the Tar
Heel State. As were the other powerful industrialists
of his type and time, Tompkins was
committed to laissez-faire capitalism and
opposed public reforms for better industrial
working conditions including the regulation
of child labor. He was also a devoted defender
of what he called “Anglo Saxon values,” a
code name for White Supremacy.
The first factory in Mecklenburg County
devoted exclusively to the spinning of cotton
fiber was the Glenroy Cotton Mill. Founded by
E. C. Grier and his son, G. S. Grier, the mill
was located about halfway between Matthews
and Providence Presbyterian Church, in
southeastern Mecklenburg County. It contained
350 spindles and produced bale yarn. It
was established in 1874 and operated for
approximately eighteen months. The building
was demolished in 1899.
The founder of the first cotton mill in
Charlotte was Robert Marcus Oates, a native
of Cleveland County and a Confederate veteran
who also served on both the County
Commission and the Charlotte Board of
Aldermen. “He was strong in his convictions,
conservative in his ideas, and these two characteristics
together with his mental ability and
correctness of life made him a tower of
strength to the community,” declared a
Charlotte newspaper. Named the Charlotte
Cotton Mills, the plant opened in December
1880 and went into full operation the next
year. “The opening of the Charlotte Cotton
Mill represented the beginning of a new
industrial era in Charlotte’s history,” writes
historian Janette Greenwood. Parts of the
Charlotte Cotton Mills still stand at West Fifth
and North Graham Streets.
D. A. Tompkins built and equipped three
cotton mills in Charlotte in 1889 – the Victor,
the Ada, and the Alpha. Called “hummers”