Seldom has a community been more thoroughly imbued with the true Christmas spirit than the Puritan Mill Village is today. To begin with, the Christmas holidays were started right and to close with they will end right.
Friday afternoon at 5 o’clock was payday. It is customary for the heads of families to call at the cashier’s window and they are given at the time tickets belonging to all of the members of their families that are employed at the mill. This is done in order to save time and it is a known fact that J.H. Leatherwood, the cashier, pays off the near 250 employes in from six to eight minutes.
Friday, however, every employe was asked to call for his own time check. When they called they were given the check and an extra envelope, upon which was printed “Christmas Greetings,” containing a new crisp $5 bill as a present from the Puritan Mills Inc. Two hundred and forty-nine people passed before that window and the name number were glad that they worked for a company which thought of them and remembered them so handsomely. That, though is not all that their company is to do for them, for today, every family of those who are employed there, will receive a basket containing apples, oranges, tangerines, bananas, nuts and candy. Not a stated amount in each basket but enough for the family, regardless of whether there are four or nine members.
Do not think that that was all that was done in that village, nor all that will be done. For, though, the management of the mill started it, the employes finished it.
As those 249 men and women walked past the cashier’s window and received their checks, others stood outside and as those who were being paid off came out they were asked for donations for two of their fellow workmen who are sick. One of the men is in the hospital where he underwent an operation for appendicitis, the other has the flu.
It was a merry, hale-met-fellow-well-met bunch that walked out of the door. Laughing, talking, joking with those that stood in line awaiting their turn. Many jibes were thrown back and forth between those who had received their extra envelopes and those who had not. One party who stepped out of the door with his Christmas envelope in his hand asked one of those who had not been in yet, if he was going to wait.
“I don’t think I will,” the latter one jokingly replied. “I’ve been waiting 25 minutes now. Believe I’ll go home.”
“Just bet you do,” came back the first one. “You’d have a fit if you didn’t get in there and get yours tonight.”
Overseers Remembered
Nor did the giving stop with the remembering of those who were sick. Every overseer was the recipient of a gift from the workmen in his room.
J.D. Watkins, overseer of carding, received an overcoat and two pairs of gloves. The committee who made the presentation explained that one pair was for Sunday, one for everyday. Mr. Watkins, following the presentation, thanked the committee, saying in part: “Boys, I thank you very much for these most appropriate gifts. For the overcoat, the two pairs of gloves—but I declare I believe you stole one pair of them.”
The committee took it as intended and sallied back with he opinion that it should make any difference how they got them just so he had them.
E.M. Spry, overseer of beaming and dyeing, W.R. Thigpen, overseer of finishing, A.D. McElhanon, Master Mechanic, all were remembered.
J.E. McElhanon, Superintendent, as a tribute to his popularity, received a gold Knights Templar watch charm, a present from the overseers.
L. Banks Williamson, Secretary and General Manager, Miss Mabel Jones, Stenographer, and J.H. Leatherwood, cashier, all were remembered.
Community Christmas Tree
Monday being Christmas, the people of the village are to have one good time. A community Christmas tree is to be placed in the Baptist church where all members of the Baptist, Methodist and Presbyterian churches will unite in the celebration.
At 2 p.m. Monday afternoon the exercises will begin. There will be singing of Christmas Carols by choirs from the three churches, short talks by the pastors, Rev. D.E. Deaton of the Baptist Church, E.C. Maness of the Methodist, and Rev. Cook Campbell of the Presbyterian church. Following, every child in the community, from babies to age of 16 years, will receive a package of toys, candy, nuts, fruits and other Christmas goodies. Others who attend will receive the same gifts with the exception of the toys. It is expected that nearly 1,400 people will attend.
These activities that are to be and those that were, Friday and Saturday, really makes this community stand out a bit from all the rest. Besides that, it is a known fact among every man, woman or child in the Puritan Mill Village that there are no objects of charity there. Every man works—works for good employers. Employers who, should he or his family get in tough luck, are ready that all times to lend a helping hand and help them get over the rough spots.
Contrary to the opinion of some of the “holier than thou” kind of people, these people though they “work in a factory,” and are “factory folks,” they are good citizens for they live from the sweat of their brow, pay their bills and are good citizens in every way.
Because those who live there know these things and are at peace with their consciences, is one of the big reasons that this Christmas is to be a merry, merry one there.
From The Fayetteville Observer, Dec. 24, 1922.
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