Richwood Development

Richwood Development

Richwood Development

Introduction

The City of Richwood is situated 120 miles south of Clarksburg at the southern terminus of the West Virginia and Pittsburgh branch of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, in the eastern corner of Nicholas County, and is the largest city within 100 miles in any direction. The place where the city now stands was originally known as Cherry Tree Bottoms, and in the early bear-hunting and trout-fishing days was the home of the families of Spencer, Mullins and Hinkle. It became known as Richwood when the post office of that name was moved there from Hinkle Mountain about the year 1900 when Cherry River Boom and Lumber Company began its operations. The census of that year showed a population of 24, which has since grown to 7,000.

Analysis

The first store in Richwood was opened by Cam Griggs in 1899. The first hotel was the Aylor House, now the Yew Pine Inn. The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad was completed to Richwood in the spring of 1901. The first church was the Presbyterian, built on the present site in the same year. The Town of Richwood was incorporated November 13, 1901, and E. E. Deitz was elected as the first mayor. The first bank, Richwood Banking & Trust Co., opened its doors for business November 22, 1902. The Independent School District of Richwood was established in 1903. Developments came rapidly and Richwood has been a hustling place from the very beginning. It was granted a city charter in 1921.

Chief Industries

Richwood's chief industries are a large lumber mill owned by Cherry River Boom & Lumber Company, a paper mill owned by Cherry River Paper Company: the largest sole leather tannery in the world owned by Wm. F. Mosser Company; the largest clothes pin factory in the world owned by Steel-Wallace Corporation, and a broom handle and chair round factory owned by J. O. Westcott & Son.

Products

The annual output of these mills and factories is 4,000 cars or 60,000,000 feet of spruce and hemlock lumber; 1000 car loads or 30,000 tons of bleached and unbleached specialty papers; 300 car loads or 7,500,000 pounds of finished sole leather; 330 car loads or 300,000,000 clothespins; 240 car loads or 120,000.000 wooden dishes, and 100 car loads of broom handles and chair rounds. In addition to the 60,000,000 feet of logs cut into lumber by the big mill annually, 5,000.000 feet are consumed in the manufacture of clothes pins and wooden dishes, and 3,000,000 feet for broom handles and chair rounds, and 50,000 cords of pulp wood are used in the manufacture of paper.

Other Industries

Cherry River Boom & Lumber Company has in connection with its saw mill at Richwood a lath mill and large planing mill and a machine shop equipped to handle anything from a lawn mower to a locomotive. It has 18 locomotives and 140 miles of standard gauge railroad, and produces from its own electrically-equipped coal mine at North Bond, 9 miles out of Richwood, annually ...