Glen Raven Mills Records (#4914) 1781-1993

Summary

Creator:
Glen Raven Mills Inc.
Abstract:

Glen Raven Mills Inc. was owned by John Quentin Gant (ca. 1847-1930), who established John Q. Gant Mfg. Co. in Burlington, N.C., in 1900 and began using the name Glen Raven in 1902. Gant had entered the retail dry goods business in Company Shops, N.C. (renamed Burlington in 1893) in 1872, with Lawrence and Banks Holt as inactive partners. He had been employed since 1867 by Edwin M. Holt in the E. M. Holt & Sons Mill, the first in the South to manufacture colored cotton goods. The collection contains family correspondence and other family papers, as well as business records relating to Glen Raven Mills Inc. and other mills. Most of the family letters, 1879-1890, are from Corinna Morehead Erwin Gant to her husband, John Q. Gant, when he was at Company Shops and she was visiting at the Erwin family farm near Morganton, N.C. Family letters, 1903-1930 and later, are about relationships among family members and family history. Also included are copies of 18th- and 19th-century wills of ancestors of John Q. Gant and genealogy materials relating to the Gant and Erwin families. Business correspondence, 1900, includes letters to John Q. Gant about day-to-day mill operations in Mt. Airy, N.C., and about the possible sale of the mill there. Business letters, 1914, discuss attracting South American clients; letters from the 1930s are about awning and cloth prices. There are also Glen Raven Mills record books detailing some of the production, sales, and delivery of mill textiles, 1904-1962.

Extent:
200 items (1.5 linear feet)
Language:
English.
Library Catalog Link:
View UNC library catalog record for this item

Background

Biographical / historical:

John Quentin Gant (ca. 1847-1930) entered the retail dry goods business in Company Shops, N.C., (renamed Burlington in 1893) in 1872, with Lawrence and Banks Holt as inactive partners. He had previously been employed for six years by Edwin M. Holt in Alamance Mills, owned by E. M. Holt & Sons. Gant's brothers-in-law, William and Locke Erwin, successively came down from Bellevue, their family farm near Morganton, N.C., to work for him after he opened John Q. Gant & Co. In 1880, Gant sold his interest in John Q. Gant & Co. to William A. Erwin.

In 1880, with Berry Davidson as partner, John Q. Gant entered the cotton mill business, opening Altamahaw Cotton Mills. In 1884, the Holt brothers bought out Davidson's interest. Edward Knox Powe, who married Claudia Erwin, came from Morganton to work there.

John Q. Gant established John Q. Gant Mfg. Co. in 1900 and, in 1902, began using the name Glen Raven Cotton Mills.

Lawrence and Banks Holt were the sons of Edwin M. Holt and nephews of William R. Holt. William Holt's daughter Elvira J. Holt married Joseph J. Erwin and was the mother of Margaret L. Erwin, who married Lawrence Holt, and of Corinna Morehead Erwin (1854-1932), who married John Q. Gant in 1879. Corinna M. Erwin and John Q. Gant had ten children: Joseph Erwin (b. 1880), Kenneth (b. 1881), Jessamine (Jesse Minerva, b. 1883), John Q., Jr. (b. 1885), Roger, Corinna Harper, Edwin Holt, Russell, Cecil, and Allen Erwin.

For more information about the Gant family and Glen Raven Mills, see Margaret Elizabeth Gant, The Raven's Story (1979).

Scope and content:

The collection contains family correspondence and other family papers, as well as business records relating to Glen Raven Mills Inc. and other mills. Most of the family letters, 1879-1890, are from Corinna Morehead Erwin Gant to her husband, John Q. Gant, when he was at Company Shops and she was visiting at Bellevue, the Erwin family farm near Morganton, N.C. Family letters, 1903-1930 and later, are about relationships among family members and family history. Also included are copies of 18th- and 19th-century wills of ancestors of John Q. Gant and genealogy materials relating to the Gant and Erwin families. Business correspondence, 1900, includes letters to John Q. Gant about day-to-day operations of Hazelhurst Cotton Mills in Mt. Airy, N.C., and about the possible sale of the mill. Business letters, 1914, discuss attracting South American clients; letters from the 1930s are about awning and cloth prices. There are also Glen Raven Mills record books detailing some of the production, sales, and delivery of mill textiles, 1904-1962.

Custodial history:

Received from Roger Gant, Jr., in February 1998 (Acc. 98034) and January 1999 (Acc. 98290).

Sensitive materials statement:

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Access and use

Restrictions to access:

No restrictions. Open for research.

Restrictions to use:

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

No usage restrictions.

Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], in the Glen Raven Mills Records #04914, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Special Collections Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Location of this collection:
Louis Round Wilson Library
200 South Road
Chapel Hill, NC 27515
Contact:
(919) 962-3765
wilsonlibrary@unc.edu