Museum Reopening on January 20th!

We're pleased to announced that the Museum will be back open on Tuesday, January 20th featuring the "Spinning A Legacy: Newberry Cotton Mills" exhibit!

The fourth cotton mill established in Newberry County was Oakland Mill by Colonel Walter H. Hunt, a local attorney, businessman, and civic leader. The construction of Oakland Mill began in 1910, located just north of Newberry College, as the rail line of the Columbia, Newberry and Laurens Railroad was rerouted to pass by the mill site. The mill was designed by the engineering firm Lockwood, Greene and Co., with W.D. Milne as the supervising architect. This four-story brick mill featured a wooden south façade for easy expansion, which occurred four years after originally opening on March 12, 1912.

In 1925, The Kendall Mills, Inc. of Massachusetts acquired the Oakland, and a year later Mollohon Manufacturing Company also in Newberry. In the early 1950s, the Oakland Plant of Kendall Mills, Inc., would double in size and guarantee the county would have at least one modern textile facility. For the next 14 years, the mill produced tobacco cloth, curtain cloth, meat cloth, cloth diapers, and surgical gauze, with the fabric being bleached and packaged at various company locations.

In 1986, J.J. Kiser and E.C. Shotwell acquired the mill and rebranded it as American Fiber and Finishing. The mill continued operations for another 23 years until its closure in May 2009.

Oakland Cotton Mill remains the only mill in Newberry County standing thanks to the Oakland Cotton Mill Development Group, LLC., led by the West Family of Newberry. The building was renovated in 2010 into luxury apartments, dormitories for Newberry College, commercial office and retail spaces, and five leased industrial warehouses.

Postcard, Oakland Cotton Mill, Newberry, SC

Donated by Larry Cochcroft, 2022.0345.05

Museum Hours: Tuesday – Saturday from 10am – 4pm.