The Dalton, Georgia, Tufted Textile Concentration

THE DALTON, GEORGIA, TUFTED TEXTILE CONCENTRATION John R. McGregor and Robert H. Maxey" INTRODUCTION. The tufted textile industry in the United States exhibits an exceptional degree of spatial concentration. Approximately 62 percent of the domestic value of tufted products is produced within 50 miles of the small city of Dalton, an industrial community in northwestern Georgia (Figure 1), and fully half of the national tufted textile output is produced within the immediate Dalton area. (1) With the 1971 tufted textile value of shipments at approximately $2.1 billion, (2) the industry is clearly substantial. An analysis of the basis of this industry's long-term concentration in northwestern Georgia, therefore, deals with a large proportion of a significant domestic industry. Further, analysis of the factors involved in the origin of the industry in the Dalton area and in the area's continued dominance of the tufted textile industry represents a case study of the agglomeration process which should be of interest to those concerned with location theory. DATA COLLECTION. Information on the development of the Dalton area tufted textile industry and the location factors which are significant to the industry proved to be available only from area sources. During 1968 and 1969, field interviews were completed at a stratified sample of 63 of the 106 area establishments found to be either directly engaged in tufted textile manufacture or linked to area tufted textile establishments (Table 1). THE ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE DALTON AREA INDUSTRY. The first Dalton tufted textile product was made in 1895 when a local girl, Catherine Evans, produced a tufted bedspread by copying a style of needlework from a family heirloom. (3) Tufting had apparently been practiced in New England as early as 1790 and the technique had subsequently spread to Southern plantations. However, tufted textile production effectively ended with the onset of the "War Between the States" and was not reestablished until the technique was once again used in the Dalton area. Although tufted products were initially made only for home use and not for sale, a commercial demand soon began to develop for the tufted spreads. The first known sale of a spread was in 1900 by Miss Evans, who shortly afterwards began to receive more orders than she could fill. She then arranged for other Dalton residents to begin tufting spreads in their homes to meet the demand and the cottage phase of *Dr. McGregor is associate professor of geography at Indiana State University and Mr. Maxey is senior planner, Northeast Georgia Area Planning and Development Commission . This paper was accepted for publication in June 1974. 134Southeastern Geographer the modern industry was begun. Soon men, women, and children were tufting spreads, first as a means of supplementary income and later as the prime source of family income. The arrangements were simple; yarn and sheeting were delivered to the workers and, after payment for completed work, the tufted spreads were collected. Both laundering and dyeing of the spreads was done in the local homes, but a final laundering was done in Miss Evans' Dalton plant before the products were packed and shipped to the purchasers. As demand grew, other tufted textile companies were formed and labor needs soon exceeded the Dalton supply. It became necessary to utilize the labor available in outlying communities; the automobile quickly began to be important to the growing industry. During the 1930 TABLE 1 MAJOR ESTABLISHMENTS WITHIN THE DALTON, GEORGIA TUFTED TEXTILE INDUSTRY COMPLEX 1968» Number ofNumber of Industrial SubgroupsEstablishments Employees 226Dyeing & Finishing Textiles5 620 227Floor Covering MiUs636,759 228Yarn & Thread Mills2 144 238Misc. Apparel & Accessories1 180 265Paperboard Containers & Boxes1 12 278Bookbinding & Related Work2 35 281Industrial Inorganic & Organic Chemicals 3 48 306Fabricated Rubber Products, NEC15560 307Miscellaneous Plastics Products2 32 355 Special Industry Machinery 12 433 TOTAL1068,823 •Subgroups found to be only incidentally linked to the tufted textile subgroups were excluded. Source: data collected by the authors. peak of the cottage industry phase of production, 'haulers" provided the link between Dalton area plants and an estimated 10,000 people producing tufted textile products in their homes in north Georgia, eastern Alabama, and southern Tennessee. (4) This peak foreshadowed a basic change from a cottage industry to a modern tufted...