Kentucky's Clothing Industry Unravels

CARLISLE - In this town, tears are no strangers to the men and women who have found dignity working with their hands.

Terry Trussell once considered himself lucky. For 35 years, starting when he was just 17, he held a steady job bleaching fabric at Jockey International.

Even when 300-pound pressure rollers tore off his right thumb for good, Trussell never doubted his future at the factory.

But in the days since Jockey announced the closing of the Carlisle knitting plant, he has cried alongside supervisors and co-workers who have never had a job outside bleaching underwear cloth.

When the biggest manufacturing employer leaves Carlisle by the end of this year, it will devastate every sector of the local economy and sting the psyche of the people who live there, community leaders say.

Four years ago, Jockey closed its Carlisle sewing plant, moved jobs offshore and laid off 326 people in a town of about 1,692. That spiked the county's unemployment to about 12 percent.

Ties to the textile industry run throughout Carlisle, described by its entrance sign as "The Little Town With the Big Heart." Both of Trussell's parents made their living at Jockey for decades, and Trussell's wife works at Kentucky Textiles in Paris, which makes Olympic swimwear.

Recently, Trussell was told he had skin cancer and would need to undergo surgery. At 52, with no other skills, all he can hope for is work at another factory.

"It's just sad," said Trussell, who has a 9-year-old daughter. "I thought I'd retire after 50 years."

Jockey's once-bustling factories used to complement the community's work force. Women sewed the underwear, while their husbands worked at the knitting plant or grew tobacco.

For about 11 couples -- such as Paula and John Watkins -- both husband and wife will be laid off by year's end from the Carlisle plant. Paula lost her original job at the sewing plant four years ago, and thought it fortunate to get transferred to the factory next door.

Now she's reliving the fear of not knowing what's next -- this time, joined by her husband.

The Watkinses, who had a baby boy just four months ago, can't rely on their backup income: burley growing. Nicholas County was once one of the top three tobacco-producing counties per capita in the state. But like everywhere else in Kentucky, people here have watched the production fade.

Patty Irvin said her husband, Phillip, may also turn to tobacco farming when he gets laid off. But their 13-year-old son, Leonard Phillip, can't do without the health insurance his father's factory job provides.

Leonard Phillip has cystic fibrosis and a heart disease that would cost the family about $3,500 a month in premiums and prescriptions without the benefits, said Patty Irvin, who works at a local beauty salon.

Her husband, who makes about $15 an hour after 10 years with Jockey, will probably have to start over in a factory outside of town for less pay.

"There's nothing in Carlisle for nobody," Garnetta Letcher, Phillip Irvin's grandmother, said as Patty filed her nails.

"What are we going to do if they keep letting our jobs go overseas?" said Debby Ecton, a knitting plant mechanic. "Everybody can't be doctors or lawyers or nurses, and not everyone wants to be. I was perfectly content working my 40 hours a week and coming home."

A week before the layoffs were announced, many employees say their supervisors praised their work and handed out 3 percent pay raises.

But as Trussell recalls, every--one was gathered into a cafeteria on Tuesday to hear the bad news. He watched as grown men choked on tears, surprised by the closure.

Jockey will expand production in Millen, Ga., and Coolee-mee, N.C. It will also transfer some of the work to its Carib-bean factories.

The company, which many residents described as a good corporate neighbor, said it will grant severance pay and benefits and will help the employees find new jobs. Jockey officials say they will continue to meet with local leaders in search of a business to replace the knitting factory.

But a new company isn't always the antidote. The last business to move into the former Jockey sewing plant fell into a financial pit before going out of business.

"We didn't look at them as a quick fix," Nicholas County Judge Executive Larry Tincher said of the now-abandoned Panel-Master Industries, which continues to be mired in debt. "We looked at them as an opportunity and a chance."

Where other communities have the luxury of asking how they can diversify the economy, Carlisle's most immediate solution is to recruit another manufacturer, said Craig McAnelly, an economic-development specialist at the Bluegrass Area Development District. The community has little industry, other than farming and local government, to fall back on.

"They're back to square one," McAnelly said. "You're building a whole community, a whole economy out there."

City and county leaders are starting to meet with state officials to see how they can secure money that would pay for needs ranging from job development to improved infrastructure.

When the sewing plant closed, many workers seized the chance to learn something new. Through federal job-training money, garment inspectors and seamstresses learned to become medical assistants and bookkeepers.

But while some found work in Nicholas County, others had to commute or fall back on other jobs. "There's very little jobs you can train someone here to do if they want to stay in town, other than a waitress in a restaurant or a secretary at a doctor's office," Kelley said.

That's not stopping Ecton, the plant mechanic, from dreaming. One of the first women "to go into a man's world" -- the knitting plant -- she started her job 17 years ago loading yarn onto machines and hauling 40-pound rolls of cloth.

Even though she's never taken a college course, she wants to be trained as a teacher, or maybe a landscaper. "I hope I'm not over the hill at 46," she said.

"I feel I have something to offer," said Ecton, one of four women in her family to work at the plant. "I go to work, miss very little, and do the very best that I can."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reach Laura Yuen at (859) 231-3309 or 1-800-950-6397, Ext. 3309, or lyuen@herald-leader.com.

Jockey contributed about $80,000 annually to Carlisle and Nicholas County in payroll taxes and accounted for about a third of the purchases from the gas and water utilities, said Mayor Gene Kelley. The area's biggest employers, the schools and the government, have relied on those taxes.

City and county leaders are starting to meet with state officials to see how they can secure money that would pay for needs ranging from job development to improved infrastructure.

I wonder to what degree "city and County leaders" made it more expensive to have a business in there little corner of the world?

Wonder what their encore will be?

he has cried alongside supervisors and co-workers who have never had a job outside bleaching underwear cloth. Not to be too cold, but this kind of thinking is what's wrong with this country. How about some good ole American pioneer, can-do spirit there, Bub. You'll think of something.

How about some good ole American pioneer, can-do spirit there, Bub. You'll think of something.

Maybe he can load the clan in the Conestoga wagon and hit the trail - is it still legal to squat and forage along the way?

Maybe he can load the clan in the Conestoga wagon and hit the trail - is it still legal to squat and forage along the way?

There's no shortage of sqauters in Kentucky, or most places in America these days. But a better approach would be to find a job (or create his own)other than bleaching underwear, and that may indeed require loading the clan in the wagon and moving on.

No doubt Kerry will try to capitalize on this type situation. I do know the state-level economic development people will (no doubt are) work to find companies that can use the facilities located in Carlisle, fill the gap. Automotive components for Toyota is one that seems a possibility.

We hope they are successful in getting something located there.

I wonder to what degree "city and County leaders" made it more expensive to have a business in there little corner of the world?

Exactly. They think the earth is flat and big business would fall over the edge if it tried to move. Thus they tax and regulate and large employers eventually move. It's the little towns who are left teetering on the edge.

I come from a long line of people who have had to pick up and move on, never having the luxury to remain in the ancestral village.. so to speak. My parents took the hillbilly highway to find work in factories in the north, and I took the education highway that has taken me all over the country. I could still be hanging in the hollar, but I'd be collecting a crazy check or maybe a lazy check.

"...At 52, with no other skills, all he can hope for is work at another factory."

If Jockey had stayed, this should read "At 52, with no other skills, all he can hope for is to continue to bleach underwear."

So whose fault (besides his) is it that this guy can't do anything but bleach underwear? What did he do before he was promoted to underwear bleacher?

He must have been pretty content bleaching underwear, if he did it for 35 years. (He's been bleaching underwear since the Kennedy assassination!)

Not to worry. It's all part of the Bush administration and other elitist's 'losing your job to foreigners is good for America' plan.

Walmart will come to town and build a stadium disguised as a grocery store and run all those greedy little high priced stores out of town...If they just hang in there, their standard of living should increase to CEO status anytime now.

Her husband, who makes about $15 an hour after 10 years with Jockey, will probably have to start over in a factory outside of town for less pay.

I got news for you folks...The grass is not greener on the other side of the hill...

But then mabye all of you can become brain surgens...'Course the brain surgen students that come here form India won't like much having to compete with you for the jobs...

It's sad that you people only learned to bleach underwear...I mean, we can live with yellow underwear, can't we? But heh, you have to do your part to do what's good for America...After all, now that these unmentionables will be made offshore, we can buy our "longhandles" for about $ .35 a set...Right??? Right???

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