TABLE OF
CONTENTS

VALDESE HISTORY: 1893 - WORLD WAR II

IMPORTANT
INFORMATION

The history of Valdese is closely tied to the history of the Waldenses who settled the town in May 1893.

After crossing the Atlantic on the Netherland ship Zaandam, the original settlers arrived via train on the Salisbury-Asheville line of the Southern Railway. Eleven families formed the first group, led by Reverend Charles Albert Tron, a pastor and philanthropist. Rev. Tron did not come to settle, however, but to lead the immigrants and help launch their enterprise.

Within a few days, the contract for the purchase of land from the Morganton Land Improvement Company was complete, and with a charter granted by the State of North Carolina, the Valdese Corporation was founded. It provided for a system of life in common, each sharing the burdens, the interest, the duties, and the privileges. The corporation was controlled by a Board of Directors.

About ten thousand acres of land were purchased at a cost of $20,000, mortgaged by the Piedmont Bank of Morganton (NC) with 250 bonds of $100 each, representing also the purchase of farm implements and food. The tract extended southward and south-westward of what is now US Highway 70. It was a vast extension of hills and forests for eleven families but the hardy mountaineers from the Italian Alps set immediately to work clearing, digging, plowing, cutting timber, and working a sawmill.

The original settlers were soon joined by their fellow countrymen. In June, eighteen more settlers arrived from Utah. On August 23rd, six families of fourteen persons came from Italy aboard the SS La Bretagne and on November 23rd, fifty-two families of 161 joined the original group after crossing the Atlantic on the SS Kaiser Wilhelm II. Others would follow in later years.

Initially, things went fairly well, though not without hard work and sacrifice. On June 20, 1893, the first bread was baked in the community oven. On July 1st, the locations for church, Manse, school, and cemetery were chosen. The church was located where it stands now and dedicated in 1899. During the early years, services were held in the house above the railroad station (built in 1903) on the corner of Massel and Faet streets. The school was a wooden frame house and stood where now is the new Sunday School building of the Waldensian Church. On May 30, 1894, the Corporation elected a Legal Board and a Moral Board, the former with certain limitations under the latter to handle the affairs of the colony. One July 16th of that year, it was decided to hold, beside the regular services in French, one service a month in Italian.

Difficulties were forthcoming. The land did not prove to be as fertile as first thought, petty jealousies and administrative difficulties arose, helped by lack of knowledge of language (the Waldenses, in their daily conversation, speak patois, a dialect imported from the Waldensian Valleys of Italy, varying slightly from town to town and derived from the old French. They understand and speak French and Italian) and business; the expense of the Corporation constantly exceeded its receipts; and the people living further away (more than five miles from the center of the colony) wished to come closer. To save it from bankruptcy, the Corporation was dissolved at the close of 1894, and C.A. Tron, to save his brethren, paid out of his own pocket a deficit of about $6,000.

After the dissolution of the Corporation, Mr. Meir, along with Mr. John Garrou, started in 1895 a hosiery factory in a small, one-room house. In 1896, the year that saw Valdese's first grocery store, they moved to Newton, North Carolina, then to Manning, South Carolina, only to later return to Valdese. On May 8, 1901, they opened the first hosiery mill in Valdese which after a few years of hard labor, was housed in a larger building. It was the Waldensian Hosiery Mill. In 1910, the cotton mill (Valdese Manufacturing Company) was established. In 1908, the flour mill was started by Mr. Frederic Meytre. Destined to become one of Valdese's leading industries, The Waldensian Baking Company was also borne of this era. John P. Rostan and Philip Ghigo, after business ventures in New York, came to Valdese and opened on the corner of Colombo Street and U.S. Highway 70.  As the town grew and roads expanded, trade increased and the Waldensian Bakery erected a new building in 1929 to meet increasing demand.

In 1910, the Waldensian Clubhouse was constructed, later purchased by Le Phare Des Alpes, a mutual assistance society exclusive to Waldenses. Behind the clubhouse are boccie courts a favorite pastime of the early settlers.

The post-WWI period witnessed the best years for  Valdese, during which it earned renown as the "fastest growing town in North Carolina." The town was incorporated in 1917. Trade grew, business improved, and mills were established (Martinat Mill - 1919, Pauline - 1924, Pilot Full Fashioned - 1930, Pineburr - 1931, Blackstone - 1936, John Massey and the Francis Louise - 1938, and the Dolly - 1939.)

With the growth of industry came the necessary growth of retail. In 1917, the Valdese Cooperative store was organized by a group of Waldenses who pooled their savings. The first store of it's kind in Valdese, it carried a complete stock of the best merchandise in Burke County. In 1923, August Pascal decided to construct a meat market in the Cooperative Store building. He would later move his market and restaurant to Main Street in a building that still stands and houses Mister Clothes. Eventually the Cooperative was forced into bankruptcy in 1938. The old landmark was purchased at auction by J.M. Brinkley and Son for $7,500.

Education was always of importance to the Waldenses, and until the 1920s, their facilities lagged behind their needs. Most were one room / one teacher schoolhouses and countywide there were sixty schools to educate an enrollment of 2,993 children. In October of 1923 a new building was constructed for the public school. This school, now known as the Old Rock School, would not only house Valdese students, but those from Drexel and Rutherford College would be bussed in as well. Innovations included hot lunches served at the school and an auditorium that would seat seven hundred. Legend has it that some visitors were heard muttering, "Way to big for the number of children they've got. Must be gonna educate their pigs too!"

By 1938, the twenty-two rooms of the Old Rock School could no longer house the number of students attending. so Francis Garrou High School, bearing the motto "Education is the True Foundation of Civil Liberty" was constructed. Named for a local representative to the General Assembly in Raleigh. The new High School would serve until 1974 at which time it was converted into a junior high school and high school students attended the newly constructed East Burke High School in nearby Icard.

In the 1930s, traveling to a town even as close as Morganton was time consuming, a journey those seeking  entertainment were often forced to make. This was soon remedied with the construction of the Colonial Theater in 1931 and the 1938 joint effort of local mills to build the Valdese Community Center.

With the influx of non-Waldenses into Valdese, other churches began to establish themselves. Among these new churches were: Abee's Grove Baptist (1914), First Baptist (1920), First Methodist (1928), Valdese Church of God (1932), Valdese First Christian (1930s), Mt. Calvary Baptist (1938), and East Valdese Baptist (1949.)

In 1939, the Northwestern Bank established a branch in Valdese. The same year, the Valdese General Hospital was organized by Drs. Palmer, Lynn, Ford, and Building, using the buildings of the old Rutherford College, three miles east of Valdese.

As business grew, so too did civic activism. The Chamber of Commerce was established in 1930, the Masonic Lodge and Eastern Stars in 1932, the Lions Club in 1936, and the Pilot Club in 1939.

In December of 1938, the Valdese News was established.

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The following are some images of early life in Valdese.