Covington losing factories; site Hemingray among lost businesses

Covington Losing Factories,

Open Letter Of Leader Shows;

City "Sold Out," ls Complaint

Dr. Charles W. Reynolds, President of the Covington Board of Education, yesterday in an open letter declared that industries are leaving Covington, and unless conditions change the city soon will become merely an "agency town," and that "civic pride is at a standstill."

His letter follows:

"Is Covington dying of dry-rot?

"Civic pride is at a standstill, just where it has been for a generation or more.

"It is true that we have the finest school system of any city in the state and almost as good as any city in the land; but there we must stop.

"It is true that we have grown in population so that we are three times as numerous as we were 50 years ago; but we are not three times as great in our industrial line as we were then — when America was not a great in­dustrial nation like it is today.

"Fifty years ago Covington had large shops and factories, which were known the length and breadth of this land.

"Hemingray Glass Works, Mitchell Tranter Founders, Lovell & Buf­fington, the old Stanwood Engine Company, the Hudson Tobacco Manufacturing Company, American Nail Works, Droege Rolling Mills, and others.

"What can she show today? What will she have left in a year or two?

"Take stock, citizens before we cease to be an industrial city and be­come a rendezvous for handbooks, gentlemen of the easy fraternities, questionable establishments, slumping downward.

This slump has kept pace with the development of civic selfishness manifested by the citizens in the progress of the years and the decay of its civic pride.

"Civic pride is the ginger of our existence. Do not lose sight of this.

"This decay began long years ago in its crooked politics. The seed was being sown; sowing the wind and we shall reap the whirlwind, if steps be not taken to break the continuity of conditions.

"Our industries have, like the army of life, folded their tents and crept away. There is a reason.

"“Fifty years ago one of the city's big industries was the Mitchell & Tranter Rolling Mill Company, Like others it has been gathered to the dim and misty as well as musty past.

"They, like other industries of this city, cried out in vain for help — not charity, but plain demands for relief, that not only would have helped them but also would have been of decided assistance in maintaining for Covington its industrial eminence.

"What did they want? They wanted switching facilities would relieve them of much double handling, save the wear and tear on the streets and enable them to cut costs and permit them to carry on business against outside competition and enable them to go out into this country’s markets and capture busi­ness that would mean more employ­ment for the men of Covington.

"The owners of the Mitchell & Tranter Co. realized that they could get absolutely nothing from the City Fathers in those days without a lib­eral amount of 'sop or soap' being of­fered.

"They went to a prominent politician and gave him $25,000 for the experiment. It went readily through the lower body of the then city government. It stalled in the upper body, which also had received a share of the $25,000. It was stalled as the ones in on the game though [sic] thought that they had a nice bird to pluck and that more would be forthcoming.

"The firm in disgust sold out to the Republic Iron & Steel Co., who sent a man on to look over the plant and junk the works. This man was a personal friend of the writer, and the information above was given by him. He said his firm was not going to be held up by any set of crooks, nor by any man, who might by his power force others to do his bidding and place them in the unenviable position of doing such hold-up prac­tices.

"The works were junked and Cov­ington lost one of its industries. The Hemingray Glass Works moved away. They needed shipping facilities, but could not get them. They had to re­duce handling expenses and finally went into the gas fields of Indiana.

"And so the tale of woe might be carried on down through the years. Covington is losing its industries as fast as it is possible.

The Cambridge Tile Works are moving to Cincinnati. They have been with us for years and have a weekly payroll of thousands. They spend $200 a week for outside haulage in addi­tion to their own trucks.

"The Twine Works are going to Xenia, Ohio, carrying with them their many employees.

"What switching facilities has Cov­ington? Has any effort been made to have a switch run to the north end of Covington to utilize that part of Covington for the founding of new industrial plants and to save for Cov­ington what industries she still has there?

"What encouragement has there been to attract new industries to this city?

"Trade journals carry news of dif­ferent firms leaving cities and mov­ing elsewhere.

"Some will still be blind to the sit­uation and say this deduction is all wrong. Look at our thriving business section.

"We have a thriving business sec­tion — which consists largely of chain stores, and more to come, combining every known commodity from safety pins to wigs; from tin cans to canned tins; from plain paper to adorning wall paper; from credit clothes to creditable clothes.

"And yet our business activity is built upon the newer business of busi­ness agencies, not controlled by our local business men but by outside owners, who are located in Coving­ton during the daytime for what they can take out of Covington, and at the close of business hours remove them­selves forthwith, Covington is fast becoming an agency town.

"The purpose is not to discourage outsiders coming into Covington; it should be to make Covington so at­tractive that we shall sell Covington to the outsider — not body and soul, but the spirit of Covington, to such a degree that these present outsiders will come in with us and be of our­selves instead of remaining outsiders.

"Covington has not in the past been sold in the higher sense. She has been sold out."