Greenville County · Marker 23-50
Simpsonville Cotton Mill
corner of South St. & W. Curtis St., Simpsonville
Front inscription
This mill, opened in 1908, was built after several leading men of Simpsonville asked Edward F. Woodside of the Pelzer Manufacturing Co. to help them establish a textile mill. The Simpsonville Cotton Mill, with Woodside as president and his brother John T. as secretary, opened with 8,000 spindles and 200 looms, making several kinds of cotton cloth. By 1911 it boasted 25,000 spindles and 600 looms.
Woodside Mill
In 1911 this mill was merged with Fountain Inn Cotton Mill and Woodside Cotton Mill in Greenville to create Woodside Cotton Mills. This branch was Simpsonville’s largest employer until after World War II, with as many as 650 employees in the 1950s and 1960s. The mill village, with four streets of mill houses, included a company store, recreation building, and baseball field. The Woodside Gym, built in 1947, is now part of the Simpsonville Senior Center.