Showcases a number of themes through which the common story of Georgia, its people, and its quilting legacy can be told in a comprehensive record of the diversity of quilting materials, methods, and patterns used in the state. Simultaneous.

Although dating back to Egyptian antiquity, carpet as we know it is relatively new. Prior to the 1950s, the means for making carpet was expensive and time-consuming, unaffordable for most homeowners. During the '50s, tufting - a process previously used to create bedspreads, bathrobes and throw rugs - was adapted for carpet manufacture. Over succeeding decades, machines advanced dramatically in speed, efficiency and patterning capabilities. Tufting Legacies recounts the history of the tufting machine industry, as well as legacies forged by the hard work, diligence and determination of true pioneers - Joe Cobble, Lewis Card, Sr., and Roy Card - who viewed problems and obstacles as opportunities to achieve the inconceivable. It's also a story of the American dream embodied in real life, boys growing up in the Depression era that had little materially but, "we just thought that was the way it was, and how it was supposed to be." Those humble beginnings helped motivate these young men as they honed their skills in making machine parts and later applying that expertise to build tufting machines. If someone in 1950 had asked Lewis and Roy about how to develop those into the huge, computer-controlled machines used worldwide throughout the carpet industry today, they might have responded, "You can't get there from here." But they did get there, one small step, one giant step, one minor modification, one major breakthrough at a time. Tufting Legacies tells how it happened.

After World War II, the carpet industry came to be identified with the Dalton region of northwest Georgia. Here, entrepreneurs hit upon a new technology called tufting, which enabled them to take control of this important segment of America’s textile industry, previously dominated by woven-wool carpet manufacturers in the Northeast. Dalton now dominates carpet production in the United States, manufacturing 70 percent of the domestic product, and prides itself as the carpet capital of the world. Carpet Capital is a story of revolutionary changes that transformed both an industry and a region. Its balanced and candid account details the rise of a home-grown southern industry and entrepreneurial capitalism at a time when other southern state and local governments sought to attract capital and technology from outside the region. The book summarizes the development of the American carpet industry from the early nineteenth century through the 1930s. In describing the tufted carpet boom, it focuses on Barwick Mills, Galaxy Mills, and Shaw Industries as representative of various phases in the industry’s history. It tells how owners coordinated efforts to keep carpet mills unorganized, despite efforts of the Textile Workers Union of America, by promoting a vision of the future based on individual ambition rather than collective security. Randall L. Patton and David B. Parker show that Dalton has evolved in much the same way as California’s Silicon Valley, experiencing both a rapid expansion of new firms started by entrepreneurs who had apprenticed in older firms and an air of cooperation both among owners and between mills and local government. Their close examination of this industry provides important insights for scholars and business leaders alike, enhancing our appreciation of entrepreneurial achievement and broadening our understanding of economic growth in the modern South.

Southern Tufts is the first book to highlight the garments produced by northwestern Georgia’s tufted textile industry. Though best known now for its production of carpet, in the early twentieth century the region was revered for its handtufted candlewick bedspreads, products that grew out of the Southern Appalachian Craft Revival and appealed to the vogue for Colonial Revival–style household goods. Soon after the bedspreads became popular, enterprising women began creating hand-tufted garments, including candlewick kimonos in the 1920s and candlewick dresses in the early 1930s. By the late 1930s, large companies offered machine-produced chenille beach capes, jackets, and robes. In the 1940s and 1950s, chenille robes became an American fashion staple. At the end of the century, interest in chenille fashion revived, fueled by nostalgia and an interest in recycling vintage materials. Chenille bedspreads, bathrobes, and accessories hung for sale both in roadside souvenir shops, especially along the Dixie Highway, and in department stores all over the nation. Callahan tells the story of chenille fashion and its connections to stylistic trends, automobile tourism, industrial developments, and U.S. history. The well-researched and heavily illustrated text presents a broad history of tufted textiles, as well as sections highlighting individual craftspeople and manufacturers involved with the production of chenille fashion.