Talk:Rainelle, West Virginia
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Rainelle, at one time, had the largest hardwood sawmill in the U.S. One big claim to fame, was the flooring that went into the Waldorf Astoria in NYC, came from Rainelle. The mill also was a manufacturer of heels for womens shoes for years. The owners of the mill were the Gray family. They later sold out to Georgia Pacific who closed the mill and demolished the facility. A very sad day for the town. It was the major source of employment for this town, other than coal mining. The sawmill ,under the Gray's hand, handled the cutting of hardwood very ecologically without stripping the land of all the trees. When Georgia Pacific came in, they stripped and felled trees by the acre. The replacements were pines not hardwoods. For those of us that were from Rainelle, it was heartbreaking to hear the chainsaws felling trees by the thousands. Were the mill once stood is just an empty grassy field. Many lives benefited from the this sawmill and felt the Gray's were fair and able employers. To this day, the mill is missed by those of us who knew it, experienced it's activity and benefits to our family.
