FRED H. WHITE
Story by David Shaw
Nobody knows of a New England man as a business failure in the south—certainly not in Charlotte. Two fundamental facts shall establish soundness of the foregoing premise: One is, there downeasters who come to live with us belong to the sagacious class of men that never wait for “George” to do it. They function eight hours upon all cylinders with coats off, and play the same way. Secondly, ideal conditions are established in Charlotte, which warmly appeal to the man of nerve and courage and price and business ability. Unusual banking facilities accommodate business development; building and loan plans offer seductive features; churches, schools, fraternal orders, social clubs of efficient and democratic type satisfy soul, mind and body. Another fact, a gracious fact, worthy of emphasis, is Charlotte’s tolerance of opinion. So long as one has faith in God and loves America he may advocate here what he pleases, with all the delightful freedom in the world.
Miss Opportunity here not only flirts with such manly fellows, but she suggestively stands with outstretched crystal arms and puckered-up Cupid lips set in peachbud face, in glowing welcome to them!
Thus we have Fred H. White, “in our midst” today—a stout and rugged product of the state of Maine. When a little fellow, Fred sold newspapers and went to school at night up there in the Pine Tree state—improving each hour of his boyhood. Any discouragement Fred met with in growing-up days, only developed a dogged determination to buck the line with redoubled force, and “over the top” Fred would go. A natural fondness in knee-pants days for machinery and its marvelous workings, carried him into great factories where the whirr and roar of the mechanism was as music to his ears. When 13 years of age, Fred was making himself an indispensable factor as office boy in one of the big plants at Three Rivers, Mass., broadening his mental capacity during the night hours. After earning his business spurs, he headed for Charlotte at 38, stepping off the train here in April, 1900, to sell and distribute cotton mill machinery from the center of the Carolinas.
That’s that! Today, there in a suite of offices, 815 to 819, in Independence building, Mr. White is making the same intense application to business that characterizes his work back there in his New England home. He is factory superintendent and general sales manager for North America of the Abington Textile Machinery Trustees, Abington, Mass., maintaining also an office in Boston, spending part time there; southern agent for the following manufacturing enterprises: Delahunty Dyeing Machine company, Pittston, Pa.; Tolhurst Machine Works, Troy, N.Y.; C.G. Sargent’s Sons Corp, Graniteville, Mass.; Cohoes Iron Foundry & Machine Co., Cohoes, N.Y.
Mr. White is actively interested in these going Charlotte businesses: President Easymake Cocoa Pudding company, making a widely popular food delicacy on South College street; treasurer, Hawley’s Laboratories, Inc., manufacturing a sizing compound, two miles out on Derita road.
Membership in following societies and clubs fixedly identifies Mr. White with Charlotte and Mecklenburg: Oasis Temple, Mystic Shrine; Charlotte Consistory 32nd Degree Masons; Phalanx Masonic Lodge No. 31; Southern Manufacturers’ club; Red Fez club; Charlotte Country club; Myers Park club.
November 13, 1877 was Fred H. White’s natal day, and Saco, Maine, the place. July 22, 1903, Mr. White went to Mooresville and took the heart and hand of a good woman there for his helpmate, he and Miss Ethel Stevenson plighting their troth “for better or worse” unto the end. To this union one son has been born, Fred H. White Jr., 12 years of age.
In that “Ideal” Dilworth, where family happiness blends with golden southern sunshine and harmonized with silvery moonlight, Mr. White and family, in their own home at 707 East Boulevard, enlist the affectionate interest of the good people who live in Charlotte’s sapphire suburb.
From the front page of The Charlotte Observer, July 8, 1922
No comments:
Post a Comment