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Was a practical dreamer
The man gradually taking shape here was now master of the Cliffside Cotton Mills, but the mills proper were a small part of his practical dream. As circumstances had gradually fashioned him into what he was—so he was gradually fashioning his creation of Cliffside into what he had willed it to be. Even at his death, his creation had not taken final perfect shape as he had planned. So it
was that he chooses his trusted son, Charles, to see that all was done that he had dreamed before the work was laid down. He had figured that ten years more would be needed for the perfect work, and in his will, one of his lawyers tells me, he directed that his estate be held intact for 10 years in order that Charles H. Haynes, his sole executor, might be able to effect the final result. This young man, educated and having lived in close communion with his father, goes about the great labors left to him with a sort of worship, it seems to me, of the man where thoughts and plans he seems to be trying to translate, with conscientious care, into the performance that his father would have approved.
It is not necessary in this writing to go into the complete details of his undertakings. Many or most of these may be found on another page. My desire here, specially, is to bring out the man, Raleigh Haynes, whose mind seemed like a searchlight on a locomotive moving forward, always under high pressure. It must be noted, however, that in the Cliffside Mills are 900 employees and in the village of Cliffside about 2500 persons. It is with these we have, for the moment, to do. He had finished his mill; he was trying to finish his people into a community of thrift and kindliness.
The ample school building had a daily attendance of 350 children, with a principal and five
teachers.Mr. Moore, his lieutenant of all work, the man who built the mill, the constructing foreman of this unusual community, built not long ago an attractive residence of modern architecture, with rooms for the five women teachers and a married woman to look after their wants and comfort. Mr. Haynes planned this while he was in the residence he occupied in Asheville as a rest resort. His thoughts went to his young women teachers and their home above noted is the result. That was a part of the soul of this practical dreamer illumining the lives of his kind much as perfume comes pervasively, with every breath, from the lips of a flower.
Then there is the great brick structure, solid and spacious, the company store covering the range of essential human needs. The ice plant is finished. The movie theater is open two nights a week. The library is there with papers and books; the post office, the bank, the garage, the flourmill, the skating rink. But he was not yet done. He had said he wanted a steam laundry and a bakery. A house for the laundry is now building. The church edifices, three in number, Baptist, Methodist and Presbyterian, would be creditable to any town. They are picturesque and substantial. “I want a complete town,” he said in his soul, “not so much for the brick and wood of it as for the furnishings of comfortable facilities for a harmonious community pursuing happiness in the fear of God, and doing the full fair daily duties of womanhood and manhood.”
Copyright © 2008 The Cliffside Historical Society
