Federal Writers' Project – Life Histories/2020/Spring/Section25/Ed Rutledge

Ed Rutledge was a knitter for a textile mill in Burlington, North Carolina.

Early Life
Ed Rutledge was born near Fort Worth, Texas, on a cotton farm on August 18, 1912. Around the age of 10, he visited his uncle with his parents in Vera Cruz, Mexico. His uncle was a cotton broker who lived in a large stone house with his wife and they were both fluent in Spanish. His mother died from illness on March 21, 1924. Afterwards he graduated from grammar school and attended high school while his father tended to the farm. His father's health then declined in 1927 and he eventually died in February 1928.

Adult Life
Following his father's death, Rutledge rented his house and worked as a waiter in a nearby diner. In December 1929 his house burnt down, and the diner closed the following month. In April 1930 he set out with Sam Haines and other former waiters in search of work. They traveled in a Ford through Texas and Louisiana until it broke down in Monroe, Louisiana. After catching a freight train to New Orleans, he and Haines parted from their companions and traveled through Alabama. Haines was hired as a waiter in Birmingham, but Rutledge found no employment. He left a week later for Georgia and the Carolinas, encountering homeless families along the way. He was hired as a grease monkey (mechanic) on July 3, 1930, in Greensboro, NC. He made twelve dollars a week and earned extra money by advertising a fried chicken plate for a local diner. He heard that textile mills in Burlington, NC, were looking to knitters, which required a three-month apprenticeship. He arrived in Burlington in September 1930 and after learning began his career as knitter on January 1, 1931. In 1935 he married a looper (textile worker) and had a daughter. In 1938 he was interviewed by the Federal Writers Project. As a knitter for a silk hosier mill, Rutledge ran knitting machines during the morning shift from 7:00 AM to 3:00 PM.

Textiles in the Southeastern US
American textile mills were established in the North in the early 19th century. By the early 20th century, these textile mills had begun to move operations to the South. The "New South" provided a favorable business environment for the textile industry. Here textile mill owners did not have to pay for “unemployment insurance and workers’ compensation” to the same extent as in northern states.

Burlington Mills
Burlington Mills was founded in 1923 by Spencer Love with originally 200 employees. Since Gastonia, NC, proved too competitive, Burlington was chosen as the location due to cheap land costs. By 1933, Burlington Mills was producing 60 million yards of fabric and employing 4,000 people. In 1938, Burlington Mills entered the hosiery industry. Burlington Mills became the world’s largest textile company in 1954 and was renamed Burlington Industries.

1934 Burlington Dynamite Plot
The General Textile Strike of 1934 occurred across the East Coast. Textile mill workers went on strike since their working conditions had not improved as they hoped they would after the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933. In Burlington several thousand textile workers went on strike. On September 14, a stick of dynamite was tossed from a passing automobile towards Holt Mill, shattering windows but hurting no one. A bomb was discovered in the Stephens Manufacturing company building the following day, launching a police investigation. Ten men were arrested, four of which testified against the rest. Several of the suspects were members of the Union of Textile Workers. Several groups supported the defendants, ranging from the North Carolina Communist Party to the League of Southern Labor, a liberal group from Chapel Hill. The North Carolina Communist Party's Workers Defense Committee alienated non-communists and its lawyers offended the court with communist rhetoric. The jury found the six men guilty and sentenced them to prison.

Textiles in Mexico
While cotton was grown in Mexico since the colonial period, textile mills were first established in Mexico in the early 1800s. Tariffs encouraged the development of textile production in Mexico. Several ethnic groups gained predominant roles, such as French immigrants from the Barcelonnette valley. These Barcelonnettes were key businessmen who invested in the textile industry. These businessmen helped to modernize mills and ran departments stores in Mexico that sold clothes. The textile industry boomed, especially in Vera Cruz, from the 1880s until the 1920s. The political instability of the Mexican revolution and the Great Depression hurt production. However, in this decade unions were established and there was a relative increase in working conditions regarding shorter work hours.