Pickens, South Carolina

I was preparing to make a business trip to Pickens, South Carolina to the Singer plant for my company. I had been working with the purchasing agent there for several years and we had formed a close working relationship. The company I worked for made the trigger controls (the button you pushed) for Craftsman Power Tools. This Singer plant assembled the tools for Craftsman.  This is also the same plant that the Singer Sewing Machine Company opened in the 1920’s to assemble sewing machines in cabinets. Singer even purchased the railway lines after they became the biggest business the railway had in the state.  I was going to visit a place that had history written all over it and I was very excited.

I had my hair permed and bought the perfect dress just for this occasion. I would go by air part of the way, be picked up by a sales rep, and travel by car to Pickens. If you have ever had your hair permed you know how dicey the first week or so can be – especially in humidity. I had never been to South Carolina.

The sales rep picked me up and we stopped for a quick lunch. The car trip would take a little more than an hour for travel to Pickens. Somebody broke into our car, while we ate, by breaking out the entire passenger side window. It was a very humid day. When we arrived at the Singer plant the left side of my hair was still perfectly coiffed, but on the right side I looked like Albert Einstein. I tried to keep the left side of my hair turned toward the purchasing manager during our meeting, but it was very difficult since she was sitting on my right.

Being a history buff, I was ecstatic to be in an old Singer Sewing Machine plant. It was a low, sprawling red brick building. The actual manufacturing side of the building was the most fascinating. The flooring was made of railroad ties that had been placed end on end when the building was built. It was explained to us that the theory was of a cushion feeling to walk upon and that any oil could seep into the wood. The square ends of the ties had been smoothed down over the years, from employee traffic, but you could still make out the squares of the ends. The smell of history oozed from the oil soaked wood.  If I had closed my eyes I am sure I could have envisioned what it had been like during the booming Singer heyday. But I didn’t close my eyes and was very surprised to see robots assembling vacuum cleaners. The arm stretch on these machines was about fifteen feet and they moved from one part to the next as the robotic fingers fitted parts and screwed the vacuums together. The precision of the movements made the left side of me looking awestruck and the Albert Einstein side looking like I had been the one to program the precise robotic measurements.

I will never forget that trip for being able to stand in an American plant that was instrumental in changing the sewing world for millions of women. The robots made it feel exactly like stepping back to the future. I will also never forget that day for looking so chic and highly intelligent at the same time.