Sayles Finishing Plants

In the first two decades of the 20th century, there occurred a gradual consolidation of the various finishing plants owned by Frank A. Sayles. To the original bleacheries at Saylesville were joined administratively the various branches of the Glenlyon Dye and Print Works and the National Tracing Cloth Company. The first indication of this trend came in 1906, when the records start referring to the Sayles Bleacheries as Plant A - implying the existence of a larger organization of which it formed a part. In the decade that followed, the various finishing units were increasingly linked by central departments - e.g. the Central Purchasing Department, the Efficiency Department, the Rate-Fixing Department, the Superintendent's Office - that came to coordinate more and more of their activities. This process was formalized in March 1917, when Frank A. Sayles set up Sayles Finishing Plants as an unincorporated trust that owned and operated the various finishing subdivisions. Under the plan of organization that emerged, the Sayles Bleacheries were known as Plant A, Glenlyon's Saylesville operations as Plant B, its Phillipsville operations as Plant C (and later E) and its Valley Falls operations as Plant D.

While heading the Sayles Finishing Plants as President, Frank A. Sayles took in his principal subordinates, Charles O. Read and Kenneth F. Wood, as fellow-trustees. Read, who had been with the firm since 1863, had managed the bleacheries as Superintendent since 1894. That same year, Sayles hired Wood, a recent graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who became instrumental in introducing concepts of "scientific management" to the company. When Frank A. Sayles died in March 1920 without any sons to carry on the business, control of the Sayles Finishing Plants passed to the Trusteed, Read, Wood, James R. MacColl, and their successors. Even after they incorporated the firm as Sayles Finishing Plants, Inc., in January 1921, it was the Trustees of Frank A. Sayles' Estate who directed the affairs of the company throughout the remainder of its history. As President of the concern, Sayles was followed by a succession of long-time employees: by Charles O. Read in January 1922; by John W. Manley in February 1926; by George E. Sinkinson in 1944; and by Elliot Broadbent in January 1958.

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