White Furniture Company

When 22-year-old Dave White and his 19-year-old brother Will pooled their assets of $275 and started making furniture at Mebane, N. C., in 1881, the Richmond & Danville Railroad found itself in need of two telegraphers to fill the vacancies left by the young railroaders about to turn manufacturers.

But as it developed, it was a fair enough trade; for while losing two good men, the R&D and its successor -the Southern Railway Company -gained a steady customer in the White Furniture Company, today one of the South's leading manufacturers of high-quality household furniture.

The association that began those 80 years ago with the White brothers buying their first carload of lumber, for delivery over the rails of their former employer, the R&D, continues today in precisely that same form. Now it is the Southern, organized from R&D holdings in 1894, that is White's artery of supply.

African mahogany received through Norfolk and hackberry, sycamore, magnolia and gum forested in that vast area south of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi come to White over the Southern.

And so pleased is White with the way its lumber arrives, that stamped on the company's purchase orders in bold, red letters is the direction to "Ship Via Southern Railway's Long Haul."

The parties to this relationship are today vastly different from their originals, of course.

When the White brothers launched their venture, the railroad right-of-way alongside which they located had been in existence since 1856. As the North Carolina Railroad, however, it had been until 1871 only an intrastate connection between Goldsboro and Charlotte by way of Raleigh, Durham and Greensboro.

The White Furniture Company plant at Mebane, N. C., is located on its original site within several hundred feet of Southern trackage. At right a buffet manufactured by White.

In 1871, its 223-mile length, part of which had been originally surveyed by the White boys' father, had become part of the larger Richmond & Danville system. It was not unti11894, some 14 years after Dave and Will started in business, that the R&D was reorganized into the Southern Railway Company, bringing the old North Carolina Railroad under our system's operating hand. Today it is part of our Danville division.

The White Furniture Company has also grown and now employs 462 persons, not only at Mebane, on the original site, but also at a Southern-served plant in Hillsboro, nine miles east. Floor space in both plants totals over 300,000 square feet.

A far cry indeed from the operation founded by two men whose only piece of mechanical equipment was a second-hand planer. That planer would not be much help to the White Furniture Company today in turning out the 150,000 board feet of lumber it has in production each week.

That production process begins with the lumber being dried in hot-air kilns capable of holding 200,000 board feet at a time. Dried, the lumber is cut into manageable lengths and is "sliced" and planed so as to remove imperfections. The pieces which result, two inches wide and various lengths to specification, are machine-glued into "core units" -the base to which the veneer is applied -about three feet square.

After more trimming and planning, the cores are covered with glue and veneers are applied to them, made to adhere in hot presses for flat pieces, cold presses for curved.

Cabinetmakers using precut patterns cut furniture pieces from the veneered cores. The pieces are assembled onto the skeletal framework of the furniture units, which after careful fitting and hand work by highly trained craftsmen is readied for the finishing department.

It is here in the finishing process that the natural beauty of wood is heightened and made secure against the assaults of time.

At the White company plant, it is a patient, step by-step process which begins with the wood being sprayed with several coats of stain. This is hot-air dried and covered with a wash coat, which is hand-sanded and sprayed with a filler coat designed to make:,,:" the surface uniform. Rubbed with lamb's wool and dried under controlled-humidity conditions, the piece is sprayed with a sealer coat which in its own turn is hand-sanded.

A coat of glaze is then sprayed on the furniture unit, and while this is drying, the piece is hand brushed and blended to a soft, pleasing color. Oven dried, the piece is given a lacquer coat which ~. sanded and oil-polished by hand to a satin-smooth surface.

With the White Furniture Company plant as it was in 1906 in the background, this Southern Railway System train was photographed as it started a load of furniture on its way to Panama Canal construction men.

Hardware such as mirrors and locks are then installed and the piece is ready for packing and shipping to the White company's nation-wide market.

Six weeks elapse between the drying of the lumber and the crating of a finished product described by one White official as being "right at the top of the heap in commercial quality ."

The dining room suites and bedroom suites White has manufactured in the past half-century have been mostly reproductions and modifications of Louis XIII and Louis XVI patterns, and Hepplewhite, Sheraton and Chippendale designs furniture made in France and England during the l7th and l8th centuries. At present most of the furniture being made by the company is of contemporary design, catering the public taste of today but still showing l8th century French, English and Italian influence.

While always high in quality, the line was not always so impressive in design.

In fact, the unit that got the White brothers' venture off the ground w~,s a suite consisting of a bed, a dresser and a wash stand -all of which sold for $9. The suite was ~.o popular with hotels and hospitals that more help was needed and by 1896," two years after Southern had taken over the tracks which served it, White employed 32 persons.

That was also the year of the firm's incorporation. WiIl became president and remained in that position until his death in 1935. It was then that I. S. White, a younger brother of the founders who had been secretary-treasurer of the firm since its incorporation, became president.

Now 84 years old, i. s. White is stiIl president. S. A. White V, his son, is vice-president and secretary; S. H. MiIlender, first-cousin to S. A. White, is treasurer and vice-president .!n charge of sales.

Vice-president in charge of production is Phonse Bean, not related to the Whites but a long-time employee of the firm.

In fact, there are many who are long-time employees of the Whites. Of the 462 persons on the payroll, 229 have been there for more than 10 years. One of the reasons for this loyalty is doubtless White's profit sharing plan, whereby 25 per cent of the company's earnings before federal taxes of 52 per cent and state taxes of 8 per cent have been deducted is distributed among employees at Christmas-time.

But another reason for this loyalty is no doubt due to the fact that twice in its 80-year history, the White Furniture Company has shown it can roIl with the punches of misfortune and continue to provide jobs.

Arriving at the White Furniture Company plane in Mebane, N.C., in a railroad box car, this lumber will soon be started on a six week trip through a manufacturing process which will end with a finished piece in one of the South's high quailty bedroom and dining room furniture lines After unolading, the lumber is stored under roof in this yard at Mebane plant. The yard is capable of holding some two million board feet of lumber . The machine pictured here travels on rails and reduces materials handling.

The first opportunity to prove how tough it was came to the company in 1923, two days before Christmas. Flames from a dust explosion somewhere in the plant -then a sprawling structure of wood -were sucked into the air ducts and spewed throughout the building. In minutes, the fire was out of control; within a few hours, the plant was leveled.

But while the mess was still being cleaned up, company officials were making plans for the modern, brick structure which was opened in August of 1924 and which White occupies today.

The second serious threat to the business was the depression, when losses mounted steadily.

The company followed the depression-years policy of the furniture industry generally and cut back some on its output. It also borrowed heavily.

What it did not do was cut back on its quality; nor did it cut back on the wages paid its employees. Indeed, company officials sliced away at their own salaries until the highest paid among them was taking home little more than "day wages."

So the White Furniture Company was still around when the national economy began to improve.

As one of the moves along the road of its own post depression recovery, White bought the Orange Furniture Craftsmen Company at Hillsboro, which was operated by two brothers as a sideline to their sawmill business. When it took over January 1, 1940, White began a planed program of expansion and physical improvement, which by the end of World War II had added 40,000 square feet of floor space to the original structure.

During the war itself, White turned 80 per cent of its productive capacity over to defense work, manufacturing beds' and footlockers for the military services and tool cribs and sheds for bomber plants.

It was during that war that the railroads of the United States were called upon to move 90 per cent of all the freight covered, by government bills of lading, and all such freight originating at the White Furniture Company moved via the Southern.

And now in peace again, it is the Southern still which moves the White products over its long haul.

"Ship Via Southern Railway's, Long Haul" means that the long haul of 80 years 'has proven a fruitful association for both parties -the customer and the railroad.

This photo was posted to alt.binaries.pictures.rail by Bil Blomgren