Fort Wayne, IN: Wayne Knitting Mills

(Satellite, the buildings were across the former-NKP tracks from the park)

Kenneth Hilders posted
Wayne Knitting Mills. Ft. Wayne, Ind. no date [ACPL]
Darryl Lee Jennings Ward Pattern and Engineering / Ward Aluminum Casting now.

Wayne Thompson posted
Vintage Postcard of WAYNE KNITTING MILL.
[Obviously, an colorized version of the above photo.]

3D Satellite

chris shatto photo was removed because of a copyright complaint.

The business was started in 1891 by Mr. Theodore F. Thieme using technology he found in Germany that used a shophisticated machine that could knit the legs for fifty stockings. Business was still good in August, 1919. But 16 months later, after prices began to tumble, the workers went on strike and the whole works was shut down. I could not determine if the plant ever resumed production. [TheIndependent] It must have resumed production because it was sold to Munsingwear Corporation of Minneapolis in April, 1923. [Tom's History] But it did not make the transition from silk to nylon stockings and the mill was closed in 1960 when it moved its operations to Humboldt, TN. The buildings still existed in 1982, and they were leased for public and private use. [News-Sentinel Archives] Some of the complex is now an undeveloped (just grass) park. Some of the buildings got flooded in 1982. I wonder if that is why they were torn down.

Flood water from the St. Mary's River surrounds the Wayne Knitting Mill buildings on Runnion Ave off West Main Street. Date 03/15/1982. Photo by Donald A. Weber.

Flood water from the St. Mary's River surrounds the Wayne Knitting Mill buildings on Runnion Ave off West Main Street. Date 03/15/1982. Photo by Donald A. Weber.

Former Fort Wayne resident Peggy Seigel, who has written much about women’s history in Fort Wayne, noted in an article published in part on http://www.iub.edu/~imaghist/for_teachers/grwdvlp/lstmp/industrlgrls.html

“At Wayne Knitting Mills, the most highly skilled workers were male knitters, who were trained though apprenticeship programs to operate the complex machines that knit the legs of stockings. Male workers also took charge of the dyeing process. Most of the other jobs in the factory were semiskilled or unskilled and were performed by girls or women. Three or four ‘transfer girls' put the stocking tops onto quills that were then used to transfer the stockings onto simpler circular knitting machines, also operated by women. These operators, known as ‘loopers', sewed together the foot of the stocking. Other female workers shaped stockings by a process called ‘boarding.' Women and girls also worked as sorters, inspectors, folders, finishers and menders.”
Further on she explains, “Like female workers at Wayne Knitting, girls and women at GE and the Edison Lamp Works were not permitted to train as apprentices….”

[HistoryCenterFW]

FortWayneReader

Wayne Knitting Mills at West Main Street and Growth Avenue, known as Knitters’ Row, was another large employer in the early part of the century, employing up to 2,500. As early as the 1920s, most of its employees were female, and the company’s buildings included a dormitory for female workers who had come from rural areas and small towns. Wayne Knitting Mills’ union was the first to organize under the new National Labor Relations Board in 1935 in an election that grew out of a strike that had been called in June of that year.
Excerpt from Allen County History Book manuscript , essay “Fort Wayne in the Depression”
Photo courtesy of The History Center/Allen County-Fort Wayne Historical Society
302 East Berry Street, Fort Wayne, IN 46802
(260) 426-2882
www.fwhistorycenter.com
[FortWayneReader]

Kim Rhodes posted
My Mom worked here. Women's nylon stockings were like gold!
Nancy Parker They had dorms for the women
[A comment indicates that the Ward Corporation now uses the buildings.]

Renee Procise commented on a posting
Right behind my house

Robert Teusch Jr had seven comments on a posting:

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The seventh photo was removed because Robert violated the copyright of Ward Corporation #2.

Gary Phillip Sauers posted
My grandfather worked at The Wayne Knitting Mill for 30 years.
Carol Stolte Spallone Look how clean.
Gary Phillip Sauers Yea, they made paracshutes for the war. After the war they made nylon hosiery. Very clean and precise work for both fabrics. Everyone who did this in the mill had to have a professional manicure every week. I remember my grandpa having real good German clippers and files to keep his nails totally unable to snag any of this fine silk fabric. I still have part of his set of manicure stuff to this day. It still cut my nails too. lol

Tommy Lee Fitzwater posted two photos with the comment:

Located at West Main Street and Growth Avenue, Wayne Knitting Mills - manufacturer of silk hosiery from 1892 to 1960 - was not exempt from the floodwaters from the St. Mary's River. Some of the windows on this building have changed, but the awning with decorative brackets is still intact. Before and After Pics

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The awning is close to the overhead walkway.

Street View

Becky Osbun commented on Tommy's post
Standish photo, via ACPL

Charles Ervin shared three photos that are already included in these notes. But the text is new.

"For 70 years, Fort Wayne covered the legs of the world. In the days before hosiery turned into ``nylons'' and was packaged in cute little egg-shaped containers with cute little names, Wayne Knit silk hose had more than its share of the legwear market. Between 1892 and 1960, Wayne Knitting Mills at West Main Street and Growth Avenue was a busy place, with hundreds of employees - mostly women - scurrying over the cobblestone streets to take their places behind hundreds of humming sewing machines.
The intersection was known as Knitters’ Row, was another large employer in the early part of the century, employing up to 2,500. As early as the 1920s, most of its employees were female, and the company’s buildings included a dormitory for female workers who had come from rural areas and small towns. Wayne Knitting Mills’ union was the first to organize under the new National Labor Relations Board in 1935 in an election that grew out of a strike that had been called in June of that year.
Excerpt from Allen County History Book manuscript , essay “Fort Wayne in the Depression”

Timothy Jefferies I worked in the building when it was called Ward Aluminum.


A Facebook posting has more images and comments.