Almost none of the leading business concerns of 1885 remain in the towns of this section, a comparison of present-day businesses with those of 38 years ago today showed. Henry Archbell, long a resident of Kinston, dug up a well-preserved volume of “Industries and Resources of North Carolina,” published at Charleston in ’85. The volume was number 2 of a series dealing with the State’s mercantile concerns, manufactures, etc. Samuel H. Abbott, Prigen & Whitehurst, the Home Mutual Livestock Company, Henry Archbell, a candy manufacturer at the time; Bryan McCullen Jr., D.R. Jackson, John E. Parrott, Rouse & Uzzell, S.H. Loftin, Dawson & Mewborne, W.F. Stanley, L. Harvey, the Kinston Machine Works, G.L. Hodges, Mewborne & Atbritton, Jackson & Perry, and A.R. Miller were the principal concerns and individuals in business here at the time, most of them having passed off the stage in the intervening years.
The very few survivors include N.J. Rouse, prominent attorney, and Mr. Archbell. The house that L. Harvey built endures as one of the largest establishments in the State. Samuel H. Abbott, among the most prominent of the business pioneers here, died only recently. Kinston in 1885 had barely more than a tenth of its present population.
From the front page of the Kinston Daily Free Press, Friday, April 13, 1923
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