Notes

Prologue: The Dusty Road to Dalian

Interviews: John Bassett, Wyatt Bassett, Rose Maner

The largest migration in human history: By 2008, 130 million Chinese people had moved from the country to the cities, according to Leslie T. Chang, Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China (New York: Spiegel and Grau, 2008). By 2010, that figure was 150 million workers, according to Yuyu Chen, Ginger Zhe Jin, and Yang Yue, “Peer Migration in China” (NBER Working Paper Series, vol. w15671 [January 2010]). In 2012, nearly 160 million migrant workers were living in China’s cities (“The Largest Migration in History,” Economist, February 24, 2012).

Chapter 1: The Tipoff

Interviews: Naomi Hodge-Muse, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, Joel Shepherd, Jared Soares, Wanda Perdue, Kay Pagans, Delano Thomasson, Maury Hammack, Octavia Witcher, Mary Redd, Wayne Withers, Marcia Bailey.

Jared Soares’s work on Martinsville: http://jaredsoares.com/index.php?/project/martinsville/.

Top-down coverage of the financial crisis: “Covering the Great Recession,” Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, October 5, 2009.

Most millionaires per capita: Undocumented but widely held local belief and often repeated in Virginia media, from the Martinsville Bulletin to Blue Ridge Outdoors to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Unemployment figures: Virginia Employment Commission and Mark Heath, Martinsville–Henry County Economic Development Commission, interview with the author, February 9, 2012.

Crane’s crimes: Crane pleaded guilty and was convicted in June 2012, sentenced to one year and one month in prison, and fined nearly $970,000: Alison Parker, “Silas Crane Pleaded Guilty in Court Wednesday Morning,” June 13, 2012, WDBJ7.com.

Property- and drug-related crime: Henry County assistant commonwealth’s attorney Wayne Withers described an increasing number of cases involving copper thefts from abandoned factories and even churches. Shoplifting and drug-related break-ins were also on the rise.

Cedar hope chests: At its peak in the 1960s, the Lane Company, based in Altavista, Virginia, operated seventeen factories in five states. Its promotional mini-cedar-chest program was once so popular that nearly two-thirds of young women graduating from American high schools received certificates for them.

“It’s the Real Love-Gift”: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1948-Lane-Cedar-Hope-Chest-Wanda-Hendrix-vintage-2pg-ad-/150536985049?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item230cb419d9.

“creative destruction”: Joseph Schumpeter (1883–1950) coined the term to describe the free market’s messy way of delivering progress. He called capitalism “the perennial gale of creative destruction.”

The World Is Flat: The benefits of globalization appear on page 143 of Friedman’s The World Is Flat (New York: Picador, 2005); he is quoting a study by Morgan Stanley that was originally reported in Fortune magazine on October 4, 2004.

Background on Grimes Manufacturing: Sarica Manufacturing Company, a circuit-card assembly supplier for Honeywell based in Urbana, was started by former Honeywell employees when Honeywell announced it was going to begin outsourcing the circuit boards. Sarica employs ninety workers, according to Urbana economic development coordinator Marcia Bailey.

Chapter 2: The Original Outsourcer

Interviews: Pat Ross, Jane Bassett Spilman, John Kern, Mary Elizabeth Morten, Spencer Morten, John Bassett, Pat Bassett

The history of Bassett: Bassett, Virginia, was built on land that was known as Horsepasture before the magisterial districts were divided in the late 1800s. Bassett land is now part of the district of Reed Creek.

Mr. J.D. buying the little kids ice cream: Recounted in a 1935 letter by Mabel Coleman of Mayodan, North Carolina, on file at the Martinsville–Henry County Museum. She wrote to him for a school assignment, asking him to buy her a bike for Christmas. It’s unknown whether he bought the bike, but he did save the girl’s letter.

Flood description of J.D. Bassett: Howard White, longtime plant manager who grew up in Bassett and started working for BFI in 1939; interview with the author, July 30, 2012.

Description of flood scene: Malcolm Donald Coe, ed., Our Proud Heritage (Bassett, VA: Bassett Printing Corporation, 1969).

Slave population: According to 1840 census figures, Henry County had 2,852 slaves, which was 41 percent of the population. One in four Virginians owned slaves, and the largest slave owner in the state—as well as one of the largest in the South—was Henry County’s Samuel Hairston, whose family owned 1,600 slaves on several tobacco plantations according to Henry Wiencek’s remarkable book The Hairstons: An American Family in Black and White (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999).

“Race is entwined”: John Kern, interview with the author, June 15, 2012.

Hairston pronunciation: Beth Macy, “Lingering Racial Divide Clouds Foundation’s Efforts,” Roanoke Times, March 18, 2012.

Patrick Henry’s presence in the county: “Martinsville & Henry County—Historic Views” (Martinsville–Henry County Women’s Club, 1976).

Nonwhites as new majority: From the 2010 U.S. Census, the first census in which whites were a minority in Martinsville. The Hispanic population is 3.9 percent.

Land begetting more land: Detailed in Anne Bassett Stanley Chatham, Tidewater Families of the New World and Their Westward Migrations (Austin, Texas: Historical Publications, 1996), 627–30.

Largest slaveholding state: In 1860, Virginia had 490,865 slaves, accounting for 31 percent of its population. See “Slavery in Virginia: A Selected Bibliography,” edited by David Feinberg (Library of Virginia, 2007).

John Henry Bassett’s two young slaves: Chatham, Tidewater Families, and the 1860 Henry County slave schedule.

John Henry Bassett’s holdings: 1860 Henry County slave schedule and census records.

Protecting the family assets: Chatham, Tidewater Families.

Role model of relentlessness: J. L. Scoggin’s description of J.D. Bassett’s work ethic in the Bassett Journal, 1932.

Mr. J.D.’s ambition theorized: Chatham, Tidewater Families, 665.

Role of plug tobacco: In 1900, four tobacco factories made chewing tobacco in the city, according to “Martinsville & Henry County—Historic Views.”

Moonshining practices in southwest Virginia: Henry County is directly south of Franklin County, which inspired Matt Bondurant’s novel The Wettest County in the World (New York: Scribner, 2008) and the subsequent film Lawless, about illegal moonshining activities in the region.

How the town of Bassett got its name: “Memories of Grandma and Grandpa Bassett,” recorded by Mary Elizabeth Bassett Morten and reprinted in Chatham, Tidewater Families. According to the original post office deed, the town was initially called Bassetts (with an s), and the original postmaster was John Henry Bassett, not his son.

J.D. Bassett as a young adult: “Big Oaks Prompted Industry,” Martinsville Bulletin, 1964.

Casket-selling business: J.D. Bassett obituary, Martinsville Bulletin, March 1, 1965.

Splitting four hundred rails a day: Ann Joyce, “J. D. Bassett Sr. Notes His 92nd Birthday,” Martinsville Bulletin, 1959.

Miss Pokey and the founding of Bassett Furniture: John Bassett III, Pat Ross, Jane Spilman, Mary Elizabeth Morten, and various grandchildren, interviews with the author.

First North Carolina furniture makers: Thomas Wrenn organized the High Point Furniture Company in 1888, and by 1900, High Point claimed twelve furniture makers. Bernhardt Furniture began in Lenoir, North Carolina, in 1889, and Lexington Furniture in Lexington, North Carolina, in 1901, according to John James Cater, “The Rise of the Furniture Manufacturing Industry in Western North Carolina and Virginia,” Management Decision 43 (2005): 906–24.

Lots of timber but no roads: Account of Mary Elizabeth Morten in Chatham, Tidewater Families, 675.

J.D. Bassett selling his brothers on becoming partners: Dorothy Cleal and Hiram H. Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude: The Growth of Industry in Martinsville and Henry County, Virginia (Bassett, VA: Bassett Print Corporation, 1970).

J.D. bossing Reed Stone around: Chatham, Tidewater Families, 666.

Work ethic of early factory workers: Historian Liston Pope noted that workers “took it for granted that all members of the family would work as early as possible… and began notoriously large families, even surpassing the immigrants who populated the East with a plentiful supply of workers”; see Liston Pope, Mill-hands and Preachers (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1942).

Selling price of first Bassett Furniture: Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude.

Initial designs of Bassett Furniture: From Bassett corporate history and Rob Spilman, interview with the author, May 2, 2013.

Demand for mass-produced furniture: Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude. “By offering cheaper labor costs in a union-free environment and abundant capital, the South enticed hundreds of textile mills to move,” wrote Michael K. Dugan, a retired industry executive and business professor, in The Furniture Wars: How America Lost a Fifty Billion Dollar Industry (Conover, NC: Goosepen Press, 2009).

J.D. Bassett’s money for his children: Spencer Morten, interview with the author, June 29, 2012.

Hardscrabble workers: When the original Old Town plant caught fire in December 1917, the entire town formed a bucket line to the Smith River, but the heat was too intense and the factory burned to the ground. The company rebuilt the building—in brick—immediately. Henry Bulletin stories, 1918.

Five hundred employees: History of Virginia, entry on John D. Bassett Sr. (Chicago and New York: American Historical Society, 1924).

The South as a dominant furniture-making region: Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude.

“I pay Pete twenty-five cents”: John Bassett, interview with the author, April 26, 2013.

J. D. Bassett Jr.’s exclamation upon having a son: Recollections of Minnie Lane Bassett, J.D. Bassett’s granddaughter, recounted in Chatham, Tidewater Families.

Letter from John D. Bassett Sr. to John D. Bassett III: Dated June 14, 1938, the letter now hangs on JBIII’s Vaughan-Bassett office wall in Galax, Virginia.

Chapter 3: The Town the Daddy Rabbits Built

Interviews: John Bassett, Tom Word, Frosty Landon, Ward Armstrong, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, Spencer Morten, Joe Philpott, Jerry Epperson, Robert Jiranek, Jane Bassett Spilman, Sonny Cassady, Bettie Alley

Factory coping strategies during World War II: Among the Southern furniture companies that limped through the war years, Bernhardt Furniture Company made airplane parts, and the Kittinger Company built PT boats, according to Michael Dugan in The Furniture Wars: How America Lost a Fifty Billion Dollar Industry (Conover, NC: Goosepen Press, 2009).

Hams instead of bonuses: Dorothy Cleal and Hiram H. Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude: The Growth of Industry in Martinsville and Henry County, Virginia (Bassett, VA: Bassett Print Corporation, 1970).

“Mr. J.D. had personally surveyed”: Bettie Alley, interview with the author.

Bonce Stanley’s puppetry: This was documented for decades by Roanoke Times journalist Frosty Landon, who—full disclosure—is my husband’s uncle. When Stanley died, in 1970, Frosty, a young editorial writer, opined that “the Stanley years would go into the history books as a shameful period that, by design or otherwise, crushed anti–Byrd Organization forces (Democrat and Republican) by raising, in Biographer [J. Harvie] Wilkinson’s words, ‘false hopes for an eternity of segregation.’ ” Frosty’s stinging observations—published almost before Stanley’s body had grown cold—had the Families of Henry County lighting up the newspaper publisher’s phones. It resulted in Frosty’s being transferred to the newsroom, where he manned the night copy desk for years before he managed to work his way back up the editorial ladder.

Virginia’s circumvention of Brown v. Board of Education: The term massive resistance was coined by Senator Harry Byrd, who said: “If we can organize the Southern States for massive resistance to this order I think that in time the rest of the country will realize that racial integration is not going to be accepted in the South” (“Brown v. Board of Education: Virginia Responds,” exhibition, Library of Virginia, 2003).

Governor Stanley’s announcement of massive resistance: See WDBJ7.com civil rights archives, August 1956.

J.D. Bassett wasn’t brilliant: Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, interview with the author, August 24, 2012.

Family squabbles: Spencer Morten, interview with the author, echoed in Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude, 49–51.

Martinsville real estate magnate: Heck Ford’s great-grandfather Colonel Joseph Martin led the area’s Colonial forces during the Revolutionary War (and gave Martinsville its name). Ford began selling real estate at twenty-one, and by thirty he had brokered the deal that lured in the region’s first textile plant, according to Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude.

Origin of W.M. Bassett factory: Spencer Morten, interview with the author.

$1.5 million sold in 1929 by the W.M. plant: Thirty Years of Success: A History of Bassett Furniture Industries (Bassett, VA: Bassett Furniture Industries, 1932).

Ernst and Ernst brought in to inventory assets: Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude, 51.

“just build another plant”: Found in the archives of Desmond Kendrick at his Martinsville–Henry County Museum; written by Crawford Remsen in the early 1930s, publication unknown.

Conveyor-belt lessons: Wilson was executive vice chairman of the War Production Board. He later served as the secretary of defense under President Eisenhower.

“printin’ money”: Joe Philpott, interview with the author, June 29, 2012.

$1 million of furniture sold in a month: Documented in a photograph at Martinsville–Henry County Museum, archived by Desmond Kendrick.

Waterfall furniture description: Jerry Epperson, e-mail to the author, and paper, “The Forty Year Styling Study with a Review of Changing Merchandising Concepts,” Furnishings Digest, February 2002.

Price of waterfall: Ozzie Osborne, “Family-Owned Firm Has Had Many Good Years of Business,” Roanoke Times, July 31, 1983.

Strengths of designer Leo Jiranek: Robert Jiranek, interview with the author, September 17, 2012.

“you’re only the damn crumb”: Oft-repeated story recounted by Carolyn Blue in an interview with the author.

“Daddy Rabbits” reference: Thomas O’Hanlon, “5,350 Companies = a Mixed-Up Furniture Industry,” Fortune, February 1967.

No Bassett furniture in Jane Spilman’s home: Jane Spilman, interview with the author, June 18, 2012.

Perle Mesta: Known as the original “hostess with the mostest” for her lavish Washington, DC, political society parties, Perle Mesta was an American socialite and the U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg from 1949 to 1953.

$33 million in annual sales: Bassett Furniture Industries corporate history, 1952; the number of employees comes from Cleal and Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude, 55.

$6 million in factory modernizations: Ozzie Osborne, “Family-Owned Firm Has Had Many Years of Good Business,” Roanoke Times, July 31, 1983.

Chapter 4: Hilltop Hierarchy

Interviews: Junior Thomas, Mary Thomas, John Redd Smith Jr., John Kern, Jane Bassett Spilman, Pat Ross, Coy Young, Spencer Morten, Mary Elizabeth Morten, Howard White, Carolyn Blue, Mary Herford, John McGhee, Naomi Hodge-Muse

Nabs: Southern slang for the Nabisco-made packets of orange peanut-butter crackers and other cellophane-wrapped snacks.

Tobacco to textile: When R. J. Reynolds acquired many of the Martinsville tobacco companies and relocated them, the town’s fathers had enough money to turn the old tobacco plants into textile mills, according to “Martinsville & Henry County—Historic Views” (Martinsville–Henry County Women’s Club, 1976) and local historian John Redd Smith Jr.’s interview with the author, December 11, 2011.

Black working conditions: John Kern, “Bassett Historic Context,” Roanoke Regional Preservation Office, interviews conducted 2008–2010.

Blacks excluded from work in North Carolina plants: Blacks in North Carolina were relegated to the lower-paying lumberyards, according to Bill Bamberger and Cathy N. Davidson, Closing: The Life and Death of an American Factory (New York: W. W. Norton, 1998), 31.

Black worker versus white worker pay: Pay stubs found at the Bassett Historical Center showed a white worker making twenty-two cents an hour around the same time.

Pay disparity in 1960s: John Kern, interview with the author.

Employment of black women: Fayette Street, 1905–2005: A Hundred-Year History of African American Life in Martinsville Virginia (Fayette Area Historical Initiative and the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, 2006). Though white women and some African American men worked in the first two Jobbers plants, black women weren’t hired until the opening of Jobbers’ third plant, located in a building the locals dubbed Pneumonia Hall because of its single woodstove.

J.D. Bassett’s advice to hire blacks: John Kern, “Jim Crow in Henry County, Virginia: ‘We Lived Under a Hidden Law,’ ” lecture delivered at Virginia Forum, April 16, 2010.

Mary Hunter’s disability: Oral history gleaned by Bassett family servant Gracie Wade for a school research paper by Mona Clark and Anne Marie Ross, “In Search of Mary Hunter,” collected in the archives of Bassett Historical Center, 1978.

Naming of Mary Hunter Elementary and Mary Hunter’s age: Jane’s father, John D. Bassett Jr., known as Mr. Doug, was chairman of the Henry County school board when Mary Hunter Elementary was built, according to interviews with Jane Bassett Spilman and Pat Ross. Mary Hunter’s reported birth year ranges from 1861 to 1868; it was recorded differently from census to census. “Mary Hunter School,” a history on file at the Bassett Historical Center that documents the $40,000 gift, was written by John B. Harris, who was the first principal of Mary Hunter Elementary.

Jane Spilman’s maid: Account of Dorothy Menefee’s relationship with the Bassett family relayed in author interviews with Carolyn Blue and Mary Herford, August 14, 2013; Jane’s gift of house to family servants confirmed by Rob Spilman.

Children of furniture cofounder and maid: Interviews by the author with several Henry County residents past and present, including Naomi Hodge-Muse, whose father was a Bassett family chauffeur and whose grandmother was a Bassett family cook; Coy Young; Pat Ross; Spencer Morten; Mick Micklem; and Junior and Mary Thomas.

Henry “Clay” Barbour obituary: Martinsville Bulletin, December 12, 1993.

Not shunned but not invited to dinner: Coy Young, interview with the author, July 6, 2012.

Ed Bassett getting Carver Lane finally paved: Junior Thomas, interview with the author, January 28, 2014.

“The Negroes made me”: The recording of J.D. Bassett Sr. saying this was destroyed when Spencer and Mary Elizabeth Morten’s house burned, but both of them reported the quote, word for word, in separate interviews. “I never heard the word nigger in our house,” Mary Elizabeth added.

Boats built by workers to get across the Smith River: Howard White, interview with the author.

Mary Hunter’s exclamation at seeing the beach sand for the first time: This story is recounted in Anne Bassett Stanley Chatham, Tidewater Families of the New World and Their Westward Migrations (Historical Publications, 1996), by the author’s brother Tom Stanley, the son of T.B. and Anne Bassett Stanley.

Description of Jane and father checking on the factories: Jane Bassett Spilman, interview with the author.

Chapter 5: The Cousin Company

Interviews: John Nunn, Howard White, Pat Bassett, John Bassett, Nelson Teague

Galax poaching: Galax is sold for more than a dollar a leaf in the international floral trade, part of an illegal $200 billion global natural-products industry, according to the National Park Service.

Hillbilly music origins: Blue Ridge Music Center and Sarah Wildman, “On Virginia’s Crooked Road, Mountain Music Lights the Way,” New York Times, May 20, 2011.

“the area was growing so fast”: John Nunn, interview with the author, July 26, 2012.

Early outreach from town to business investors: Galax Gazette, rotogravure special section, 1937.

Original lots sold in Galax: Ed Cox, golden anniversary souvenir booklet “Pioneers, Ghosts, Bonaparte and Galax,” 1956.

Black population still comparatively small: U.S. census estimate, 2011, shows blacks make up 6.7 percent of the Galax population.

Early businesses served multiple purposes: The post office housed a school, a casket company, and a furniture store. The Chevrolet dealership sold Frigidaires and offered electrical-wiring installation in homes, according to John Nunn and Judith Nunn Alley in Images of America: Galax (Charleston, SC: Arcadia, 2010).

Need for furniture post–Civil War: David N. Thomas, “Getting Started in High Point,” Forest History 11 (July 1967).

Decline of furniture factories in the Northern states: William Stevens, Anvil of Adversity: Biography of a Furniture Pioneer (New York: Popular Library, 1968).

Northern furniture makers’ inability to keep up with the times: Frank E. Ransom, The City Built on Wood: A History of the Furniture Industry in Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1850–1950 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1955).

Bassett Furniture’s careful money-management style: Howard White, interview with the author.

Wyatt Exum’s rescue story: The movie Fighter Squadron, starring Robert Stack and John Rodney, is said to be loosely based on Wyatt Exum’s dramatic World War II rescue per Pat Bassett, interview with the author, August 2, 2012.

Exum’s Silver Star: Ibid.

Difference between working in Bassett and Galax: Ibid.

Mao Tse-tung’s Great Leap Forward: Dennis Tao Yang, “China’s Agricultural Crisis and Famine of 1959–1961,” Comparative Economic Studies 50 (2008): 1–29.

Suicides off tall buildings in Shanghai: “High Tide of Terror,” Time, March 5, 1956.

Taming of the Smith River: Since its completion in 1953, the Philpott Dam has prevented an estimated $350 million in flood damage, per the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Wilmington district.

John Bassett’s wild behavior in college: Nelson Teague, interview with the author, August 13, 2012.

Washington and Lee’s mock-convention history: Nikki Schwab, “At Mock Convention, Washington and Lee Students Showcase Their Uncanny Knack for Picking Presidential Candidates,” U.S. News and World Report, January 17, 2008.

Mr. Doug took his car away as punishment for bad grades: Nelson Teague, interview with the author.

Chapter 6: Company Man

Interviews: Pat Ross, Coy Young, Joe Meadors, Mary Elizabeth Morten, Jerome Neff, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, John Bassett, Bob Jiranek, Spencer Morten, Colbert “Mick” Micklem, Betty Shelton

Company growth under W.M. Bassett: When Bassett announced the opening of a new fifteen-acre, two-and-a-half-million-dollar Bassett Table plant, the Henry County Journal boasted, “There was no architect nor contractor for the mammoth new plant. W.M. Bassett himself… designed and superintended the job” (Henry County Journal, November 7, 1957).

Five hundred Bassett-owned homes: Bassett homes rented for a quarter a room a week, and deductions for rent and power were taken out of employee paychecks, according to worker interviews and Jerry Bledsoe, writing in the Carolina Cavalier. For twelve dollars a year each, white employees could also use the $386,000 community center built by W.M., which included a pool, playground, and bowling alley. Smaller separate facilities were later built for black workers (Martinsville Bulletin, June 10, 1960).

Selling the excess power: Barber Coy Young and longtime sales manager Joe Meadors, interviews with the author, August 16, 2012.

W.M. Bassett’s trademark fedora and his relationship with employees: Mary Elizabeth Morten and Jerome Neff, interviews with the author, August 6, 2012 (Morten), and April 24, 2013 (Neff).

Company size in late 1950s, early 1960s: “Bassett: Furniture Giant of Virginia,” Commonwealth, December 1961. “Bassett Deals in Mass Production for the Mass Market,” Milton J. Elliott wrote. He quoted Mr. Doug as saying, “We produce more than 2,000 rooms of furniture a day and hope to keep it that way.” (A 1959 article in the Virginia Record had a different number; the claim there was that Bassett was sold in 35,000 stores.)

W.M. Bassett’s bonds with workers: Pat Ross, interview with the author, July 26, 2012.

W.M. Bassett’s death: “Death of W.M. Bassett Mourned Throughout Va.,” Martinsville Bulletin, July 18, 1960.

Meeting of Bob Spilman and Jane Bassett: Bunny Wampler, interview with the author, August 27, 2012.

Bassett men impressed with Spilman: Spencer Morten, interview with the author.

J.D. Bassett’s hospital home: Asked why J.D. Bassett Sr. lived in the hospital for so many years, Junior Thomas, who still chauffeurs Bassett family members around, said, “He wanted curb service, head to toe!”

Annual birthday fishing outing: J.D. Bassett’s grandson Doug Bassett Lane, a former Lane Furniture executive turned fishing-supply retailer, strongly disputes my assertion that his grandfather may not have caught the fish. Told that the man was wearing a three-piece suit in the picture, he insisted, “I don’t care; he caught it!”

J.D. Bassett Jr. instructed to be friendlier: Jane Bassett Spilman, interview with the author.

The largest furniture maker: Fortune’s O’Hanlon called it the second-largest, behind Broyhill Furniture, but conceded that Bassett seed capital accounted for one-eighth of the entire industry’s volume (factoring in the cousin companies and spinoffs) (Thomas O’Hanlon, “5,350 Companies = a Mixed-Up Furniture Industry,” Fortune, February 1967).

“$60 MILLION IN 60 YEARS”: Home Furnishings Daily, July 19, 1961.

World’s largest chair: The chair shipped from Bassett to Washington in 1958 while J.D. Bassett’s son-in-law Thomas B. Stanley (Uncle Bonce) was governor of Virginia.

Company’s hottest-selling collection: Bassett’s bread-and-butter line was the Mayfield, an Early American design that “blends with America’s new times and desires but represents all the grace and charm of our heritage,” according to an advertisement.

Defining the furniture belt: O’Hanlon, “5,350 Companies.”

State-controlled industrialization in China: Wayne M. Morrison, “China’s Economic Rise: History, Trends, Challenges, and Implications for the United States,” Congressional Research Service, September 5, 2013.

Mao’s order to melt down furniture and other household items: Benjamin A. Valentino, Final Solutions: Mass Killing and Genocide in the Twentieth Century (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2004).

Mr. Doug’s treatment of Mr. Ed: Bob Jiranek, interview with the author.

Chapter 7: Lineage and Love

Interviews: Pat Bassett, Jane Spilman, John Bassett, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, Joe Meadors, Fran Bassett Poole, Spencer Morten, Mick Micklem, Delano Thomasson

J.D. Bassett’s sexual escapades: Story related by Bunny Wampler, who heard it directly from Mr. J.D.’s grandsons George Vaughan and Tom Stanley Jr.

Hollins College history: Ethel Morgan Smith, From Whence Cometh My Help: The African American Community at Hollins College (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1999). The school is now called Hollins University, and it’s acclaimed for its fine-arts curricula, particularly its creative writing, theater, and dance.

Shenandoah Club history: The Shenandoah Club was a white men’s club that didn’t admit women, blacks, or Jews until the late 1980s; Justin McLeod, “Woman Who Helped Change Roanoke Club’s Racist History Is Retiring,” WDBJ7.com.

Mao Tse-tung’s exaltation of communism: “Red China: The Arrogant Outcast,” Time, September 13, 1963.

Wharton School graduate Larry Moh: Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania alumni magazine (2007).

Company’s overarching emphasis on sales and employment: Joe Meadors, interview with the author.

J.D. Bassett’s house falling into disrepair: Mary Jane Osborne, interview with the author, May 15, 2013.

Never-married company secretary: Georgia Witt recalled in a 1966 newspaper article, “You came here to work and that’s what you did, six days a week, ten hours a day.” At the time, she had been with the company more than fifty years, had the number one parking space, and had no plans to retire.

J.D. Bassett’s obituary: “John David Bassett Sr. Leaves Great Heritage to Our People,” Martinsville Bulletin, March 1, 1965.

Chapter 8: Navigating the New Landscape

Interviews: Anna Logan Lawson, Coy Young, Jane Bassett Spilman, Bill Young, Frank Snyder, Mick Micklem, Spencer Morten, Howard Hodges, John Bassett, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler

Gallaudet University controversy: New York Times stories, March 1988; Jace Lacob, “ABC Family’s ‘Switched at Birth’ ASL Episode Recalls Gallaudet Protest,” Daily Beast, February 28, 2013; “A New President Signs on a Gallaudet as Deaf Students Make the Hearing World Listen,” People, March 28, 1988.

Jane Spilman’s invitation to join the Gallaudet board: Rob Spilman e-mail with the author, January 27, 2014.

Aftermath of the controversy: Ben Beagle, “Gallaudet Decision Defended,” Roanoke Times, March 17, 1988.

County deputies driving Bob Spilman to Market: Bob Spilman, interview with E. L. Briggs, American Furniture Hall of Fame Foundation Oral Histories, April 4 and 7, 2005.

Bob Spilman’s cost-cutting acumen: Frank Snyder, interview with the author, September 21, 2012.

Flexibility to make big acquisitions: SEC records; Thomas O’Hanlon, “5,350 Companies = a Mixed-Up Furniture Industry,” Fortune, February 1967; and Estelle Jackson, “Sweet Ole Bob: The Furniture Industry Is No Game for Patsies,” Virginia Business, February 1987.

“so many damn plants”: Bob Spilman, interview with E. L. Briggs.

Chapter 9: Sweet Ole Bob (SOB)

Interviews: Frank Snyder, Maury Hammack, Naomi Hodge-Muse, Reuben Scott, Garet Bosiger, Bob Merriman, Howard Altizer, Joe Philpott, Jim Philpott, Junior Thomas, Bill Young, Coy Young, James Riddle, Rob Spilman, Jerry Epperson, Carolyn Blue

Segregated factory departments: Bassett wasn’t alone in its discriminatory practices. According to a 1998 analysis by Harvard sociologist Frank Dobbin, at the time, just 20 percent of American employers had established affirmative-action policies. By 1976, more than 80 percent of large firms had equal-employment policies, according to the Bureau of National Affairs.

First to make alcohol and “do it legal!”: Dwayne Yancey, “Hey, Sugar, She’s No Average Republican,” Roanoke Times, October 20, 1991.

Naomi Hodge-Muse family: Her husband, William Muse, got his Imperial Savings and Loan federal insurance during the Nixon administration—via a connection with a White House cook (Naomi Hodge-Muse, interview with the author, September 18, 2012).

Nixon’s redwood-sapling symbol: “Richard Nixon, Remarks Upon Returning from China, Feb. 28, 1972,” from the archives of the University of Southern California–China Institute.

Mr. Ed worked at fourteen: Bassett Furniture was found to be guilty of violating child-labor laws as far back as 1915, when it was fined twenty-five dollars (Bureau of Labor and Industrial Statistics, State of Virginia, 1916).

Spilman’s feet on John Bassett’s desk: Garet Bosiger, interview with the author, November 22, 2012.

“My brother-in-law is still a child”: Bob Merriman, interview with the author, November 26, 2012.

Lunchtime poker with Bob Spilman: Frank Snyder, Howard Altizer, and Joe Philpott, interviews with the author, November 27, 2012 (Altizer).

“Bifold” doors: Bill Young, interview with the author, July 25, 2013.

Spilman’s charitable deeds: Jim Philpott, interview with the author, October 15, 2012.

Prisoners on work release in factory: Joe Meadors, interview with the author, September 12, 2012. He said some of the prisoners were such good workers that the company hired them after they got out of prison.

Bob Spilman on union-busting: Bob Spilman, interview with E. L. Briggs, American Furniture Hall of Fame Foundation Oral Histories, April 4 and 7, 2005.

Barbs exchanged between Bob Spilman and Smith Young: Estelle Jackson, “Sweet Ole Bob: The Furniture Industry Is No Game for Patsies,” Virginia Business, February 1987.

Increasing output just to break even: Frank Snyder, then secretary of the BFI board, interview with the author.

Chapter 10: The Mount Airy Ploy

Interviews: Reuben Scott, Brent Carrick, Ruth Phillips, Russ Ashburn, Mick Micklem, George Fricke, Eddie Wall, John Bassett, Pat Bassett, Duke Taylor, Sherwood Robertson, Frank Snyder, Bob Merriman, Howard Hodges, Linda McMillian, Spencer Morten, Jerry Epperson

Mount Airy plant closing: Bassett closed the plant in November 2005, putting three hundred out of work (Furniture Today, July 23, 2006).

Bassett textile plant sold for an eight-figure sum: In 1984, Bassett-Walker Knitting Company was sold for $293 million to VF Imagewear, which was then Henry County’s largest employer, with 2,300 workers. It closed in 2001, a year when 91,000 American textile workers lost their jobs.

Executive office layout: Over coffee at a Bassett Forks McDonald’s in September 2012, retired lawyer Frank Snyder drew me a sketch of the Taj Mahal suites before and after John Bassett’s stint in Mount Airy.

Chapter 11: The Family Elbow

Interviews: Frank Snyder, Claude Cobler, John Bassett, Jane Bassett Spilman, Jerry Epperson, Spencer Morten, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, Junior Thomas, Joe Meadors, Howard White, Pat Bassett

“To get rich is glorious”: The quote is widely attributed to Teng Hsiao-p’ing, but there’s no proof he actually said it (per Evelyn Iritani, “Great Idea But Don’t Quote Him,” Los Angeles Times, September 9, 2004).

Offshoring model pioneered at Taiping Handbag Factory: Recounted in Leslie T. Chang, Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China (New York: Spiegel and Grau, 2008).

Growth of Chinese exports: Ding Qingfen, “Evolving Export Strategy,” China Daily, June 1, 2011.

American occasional tables to become extinct: “Bassett Expects No Business Increase,” Roanoke Times, January 5, 1985.

Wages in China and the United States: Estelle Jackson, “Sweet Ole Bob: The Furniture Industry Is No Game for Patsies,” Virginia Business, February 1987.

Record sales of $301 million: “Bassett Reports Sales and Income Gains,” Roanoke Times, December 30, 1981.

Cause of death was pneumonia, not choking: Chuck Burress, “Crib Deaths Haunt Bassett,” Roanoke Times and World-News, December 10, 1978.

Stinging rebuke for crib deaths: Jack Anderson, “Baby Cribs Investigated,” syndicated column, April 30, 1980; Jackson, “Sweet Ole Bob.”

Warning posters issued: U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission news report, February 1980 and February 1984.

$1 million cost to company to send warnings: Mag Poff, “Bassett Beginning Campaign to Warn of Dangerous Cribs,” Roanoke Times, February 14, 1980.

Nine deaths associated with cribs: U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission news report, revised June 21, 2001.

Spilman has “got to know”: Gregg Jones, “A Long Slowdown? Bassett Furniture Chief Strives to Minimize the Effects of Recession,” Roanoke Times, March 14, 1982.

Press coverage of John Bassett’s move to Galax: “Bassett Resigns Posts,” Martinsville Bulletin, December 29, 1982.

Chapter 12: Schooling the Chinese

Interviews: Jerry Epperson, Laurence Zung, Michael Moh, Joe Meadors, Michael Dugan, Buck Gale, Jim Philpott, Paul Fulton, Steve Kincaid, Joe Philpott, Tom Word, Reuben Scott, Richard Bennington

“A businessman setting up shop”: Quote from a 1977 Economist article recounted in “End of an Experiment: The Introduction of a Minimum Wage Marks the Further Erosion of Hong Kong’s Free-Market Ways,” Economist, July 15, 2010.

17 percent of the Chinese population in cities: United Nations Development Programme, Rapport mondial sur le développement humain 1999 (Paris: De Boeck Université, 1999), 198.

American embargo and government attitudes toward China: Martin Jacques, When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order, rev. ed. (New York: Penguin, 2012), 176. The United Nations imposed a similar Cold War embargo on China in 1951. The United States didn’t recognize the People’s Republic of China as the legitimate China until 1979.

China was half a century behind Virginia: By the 1950s, for the first time in Virginia’s history, most Virginians lived in towns, cities, or suburbs, as people moved from farm to factory. Charles F. Bryan Jr., “Manufacturing a New Virginia, One Box at a Time,” Richmond Times-Dispatch, June 17, 2012.

Moh borrowed $80,000 to start his business: Lee Buchanan, “Man of the Year: Laurence Moh,” InFurniture, December 2002.

Wage differentials: Bureau of Labor Statistics figures, “International Comparisons of Hourly Compensation Costs for Production Workers in Manufacturing,” 1997.

Imports “will be with us forever”: George Kegley, “Bassett Upgrades Products, Enters Motel and Office Markets,” Roanoke Times, February 5, 1987.

Factory closures in 1986: Ibid.

Estelle Jackson, “Sweet Ole Bob: The Furniture Industry Is No Game for Patsies”: Virginia Business, February 1987; and Jim Philpott, interview with the author.

A family-controlled industry: Michael Dugan, The Furniture Wars: How America Lost a Fifty Billion Dollar Industry (Conover, NC: Goosepen Press, 2009), 17.

Conglomerates acquired furniture companies: James Flanigan, “Merger Mania Strikes Again in Furniture Field,” Los Angeles Times, February 27, 1987.

Raiders mainly pursuing high-end furniture makers: “Bassett Denies Takeover Rumors,” Roanoke Times, September 9, 1988.

Sales down from previous year: American Association of Furniture Manufacturers data, quoted in George Kegley, “Furniture Outlook Drab, Prospects Worst in 35 Years, Bassett Stockholders Told,” Roanoke Times, February 8, 1990.

Chapter 13: Bird-Doggin’ the Backwaters

Interviews: Pat Bassett, John Bassett, Tom Word, Garet Bosiger, Hope Antonoff, Jerome Neff, Bob Merriman, Eddie Wall, Sheila Key, Spencer Morten, Joyce Phillips, Duke Taylor, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler, Jill Burcham, Joe Meadors, Joe Philpott, Linda McMillian

Dick Cheney: Daily Show correspondents and others mocked the absurdity of a sitting vice president shooting a seventy-eight-year-old friend in the face while hunting quail that had been raised in a pen and were released mere seconds before they were shot.

Bassett couple’s hunting prowess: Pat Bassett was named to the 1973 All-American team by Sports Afield magazine in recognition of her being one of the top ten women gunners in the country. In one statewide competition she hit 99 out of 100 shots, according to “Bassetts Are Top Guns,” Martinsville Bulletin, March 3, 1974.

Company losses in 1982/1983: Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Company financial statements, December 3, 1983.

George Vaughan’s lobbying for highway: John Vaughan, interview with Roy Briggs, American Furniture Hall of Fame Foundation Oral Histories, November 26, 2001.

Chapter 14: Selling the Masses

Interviews: Garet Bosiger, John Bassett, Bob Merriman, Wyatt Bassett, Laurence Zung, Michael Moh, Hugh McLarty

Business prospects for selling paper-on-particleboard furniture: Tom Word, The Price of Admission: Reflections on Some Personal Heroes (self-published, 2011).

Civil War heritage of Sumter region: Sumter was home to Potter’s Raid, a series of battles that happened after the war ended (but before word of its ending reached the town). Sumter was also an hour away from Columbia, which was burned by Union troops in 1865, an event that still resonates as an act of Northern malice, especially in the South Carolina midlands.

Webb Turner’s rise and fall in furniture: Michael Dugan, The Furniture Wars: How America Lost a Fifty Billion Dollar Industry (Conover, NC: Goosepen Press, 2009), chapter 9.

Borax as slang for flashy, cheaply made furniture: The term derives from furniture acquired by saving Kirkman’s Borax Soap wrappers, according to Richard R. Bennington, Furniture Marketing: From Product Development to Distribution (New York: Fairchild Publications, 2004).

Sumter wages: Garet Bosiger, interview with the author; Galax wage information came from Doug Bassett and industry average from Steve Walker, furniture expert at North Carolina State University.

Background on the Market: The semiannual trade show occurs in April and October in High Point, North Carolina. Sales representatives and sales managers try to win orders for placements of the new goods in stores nationwide while retailers try to get access to as many lines as possible without ceding valuable floor space (as described in Dugan, The Furniture Wars).

Vaughan-Bassett’s sales figures: By 1996, the company was selling $108 million and had a net annual income of $5.7 million, according to the Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Company annual report, 1996.

Fears about NAFTA: Anthony DePalma, “Clear Today; Tomorrow, Who Knows?; Culture Clash,” New York Times, January 2, 1994.

Asian work ethic: Richard Burkholder and Raksha Arora, “Is China’s Famed ‘Work Ethic’ Waning?,” Gallup, January 25, 2005.

Cowboy capitalism: China joined the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in 1986 and was granted observer status in GATT in 1982. In the early 1990s, the American brand of capitalism exerted growing influence there, and was heightened by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the growing dynamism of Silicon Valley; see Martin Jacques, When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order, rev. ed. (New York: Penguin, 2012), chapter 11.

Chapter 15: The Storm Before the Tsunami

Interviews: Garet Bosiger, John Bassett, Pat Bassett, Wyatt Bassett, Tim Prillaman, Michael Moh, Doug Bassett Lane, Joe Meadors, Warren Zirkle, Bob Merriman, Bernard “Bunny” Wampler

Hurricane Hugo damage: “Hurricane Hugo Today Would Cause $20 Billion in Damage in South Carolina,” Insurance Journal, September 22, 2009.

Hurricane Hugo severity: Jesse Ferrell, “Remembering Hugo from 1989,” AccuWeather.com, September 22, 2011.

Container lines building larger ships: Heightened competition among ports and the economics of global shipping are detailed in Marc Levinson, The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006).

Popularity of Victorian Sampler: From closing arguments in the case Lexington Furniture Industries v. Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Co., in the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina, June 3, 1996.

Size of Lexington Home Brands: Scott Andron, “Lexington Furniture Loses Lawsuit,” Greensboro News and Record, June 6, 1996.

Size of Masco: In 1996, Masco sold a majority stake in the furniture and fabric companies that made up its home furnishings division for $1.1 billion (Jay McIntosh, “LifeStyle Value Plummets,” Furniture/Today, November 4, 2001).

Deconstructing the Lexington suite: Wyatt Bassett, interview with the author, December 18, 2012. Court transcripts indicate Lexington’s suite sold for 32 percent more than Vaughan-Bassett’s.

“nullify our whole design program”: Doug Bassett Lane, interview with the author, October 8, 2012. Doug Lane is the son of Minnie Bassett Lane (John’s sister), who was the daughter of a Bassett CEO and the wife of a Lane CEO. Lane recorded the quote from his uncle Edward Lane Jr., a longtime executive with Lane Furniture, as he lay dying in a Roanoke hospital in 2004.

Leo Jiranek’s fending off of Lane lawsuit: Joe Meadors, interview with the author.

Lexington’s patent-pending claim: Scott Andron, “Furniture Copying Still Unclear,” Greensboro News and Record, June 9, 1996; and Wyatt Bassett, interview with the author.

One dollar in damages: The judgment was later overturned when the judge ruled that the jury couldn’t properly award punitive damages without also awarding actual damages. Vaughan-Bassett had not presented a firm figure on how much Lexington’s unfair competition cost in terms of lost sales (“$1 Judgment Against Company Overturned,” Greensboro News and Record, July 24, 1996).

Chapter 16: Trouble in the ’Ville

Interviews: John Bassett, Wyatt Bassett, Spencer and Mary Elizabeth Morten, Rob Spilman, Joe Philpott, Paul Fulton, Joe Meadors, Coy Young, Dave Phillips, Mike Micklem, Ralph Spillman, Frances Kissee, Buck Gale

“giant sucking sound”: The phrase was coined in 1992 by presidential candidate Ross Perot during his debate with President George H. W. Bush and Governor Bill Clinton. Perot opposed NAFTA and predicted it would lead to jobs being shipped to countries where young workers would be paid minimally by companies that could operate without regard to employee health or environmental controls. Transcript available at http://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/16/us/the-1992-campaign-transcript-of-2d-tv-debate-between-bush-clinton-and-perot.html

CalPERS proposal to separate positions of CEO and chairman: “CalPERS Seeks to Divide Top 2 Posts at Bassett,” Bloomberg News, May 13, 1997.

“little more than a claque of the CEO’s cronies”: John A. Byrne, “The Best & Worst Boards: Our New Report Card on Corporate Governance,” Businessweek, November 25, 1996.

Bob Spilman’s efforts to keep the Market in High Point: “Natural Born Leader,” High Points, March 1997.

Bob Spilman’s contributions to the Port of Virginia: Al Roberts, “The Men Who Put the Port on Track,” Virginian-Pilot, November 26, 1990.

Paul Fulton’s influence: Douglas C. McGill, “At Sara Lee, It’s All in the Names,” New York Times, June 19, 1989.

Imports making up a third of all wood furniture sold in America: Scott Andron, “Furniture Imports the Talk of Market,” Greensboro News and Record, May 3, 1998.

J’Amy Owens’s marketing acumen: “Sales Guru to the Stars,” Inc., October 1999.

Bassett Furniture strategizes to court women buyers: James R. Hagerty, “Showing Furniture Makers the Softer Side,” Wall Street Journal, July 18, 1999.

Closing of W.M. plant: Ginny Wray, “Bassett to Close City Plant,” Martinsville Bulletin, May 22, 1997.

Bassett Furniture tries to cut its losses: Megan Schnabel, “Bassett Takes a $19.6 Million Beating in 1997,” Roanoke Times, January 10, 1998.

Apparel and textile job losses: Nearly a million were lost between 1976 and 1996, primarily due to the growth of imports; technological advances in transportation, communication, and production; and the worldwide search for markets, according to Mark Mittelhauser, “Employment Trends in Textiles and Apparel, 1973–2005,” Monthly Labor Review, August 1997.

Local reaction to W.M. plant closing: Ginny Wray, “Amid Shock, Few Expected Plant Closing,” Martinsville Bulletin, May 22, 1997.

Bassett Furniture sales in decline: In 1996, Bassett reported a net income of $18.5 million on sales of $450.7 million, according to Schnabel, “Bassett Takes a $19.6 Million Beating.”

Twenty-eight Bassett Furniture factory closures over three years: Megan Schnabel, “Bassett Furniture Industries Has a New Chief Executive Officer, But He’s an Old Hand at the Company,” Roanoke Times, March 29, 2000.

TAA participation rates: Government Accountability Office Studies, and Beth Macy, “The Reality of Retraining,” Roanoke Times, April 22, 2012.

Cost of razing the W.M. factory: Jessie Weston, “Plant Razing Tops $840,000,” Martinsville Bulletin, March 11, 1998.

Unemployment rate in Martinsville: Jeff Sturgeon, “Hampton Plant Cuts 120 Jobs,” Roanoke Times, December 30, 1999.

Chapter 17: Stretching Out the Snake

Interviews: Wyatt Bassett, John Bassett, Linda McMillian, Allen Farmer, J. “Doug” Bassett IV, Tim Prillaman, Bob Merriman, Pamela Luecke, Doug Brannock, Rose Maner

Chinese view of Americans’ work ethic: James McGregor, “Advantage, China,” Washington Post, July 31, 2005.

Increase in Chinese imports from 2000 to 2002: U.S. International Trade Commission, public conference, November 21, 2003. Domestic producers of bedroom furniture increased their imports from a level equivalent to 6 percent of their domestically produced shipments in 2000 to a level equivalent to 19.6 percent of those shipments in 2002, according to Wooden Bedroom Furniture from China: Preliminary Hearings Before the U.S. International Trade Commission, 17 (January 2004).

Vaughan-Bassett’s sales dive as result of imports: Profits sank from $14 million in 1999 to $6.4 million in 2000, according to Wyatt Bassett.

Closing of Bassett’s veneer plant in Burkeville: Allen Farmer, former veneer plant manager, interview with the author, November 13, 2012.

Vaughan-Bassett’s and other companies’ sales decline in 2001: Figures from public SEC statements, compiled and presented at furniture suppliers’ meeting, Galax, Virginia, July 30, 2001.

J.D. Bassett plants closure: Duncan Adams, “Bassett Furniture to Eliminate 280 Jobs,” Roanoke Times, November 29, 2000.

Two million copies of the Chinese-language edition of the WTO rule book sold: Thomas Friedman, The World Is Flat (New York: Picador, 2005), 137–39.

Genesis of Vaughan-Bassett Express: Jim McIngvale, Thomas Duening, and John Ivancevich, Always Think Big: How Mattress Mack’s Uncompromising Attitude Built the Biggest Single Retail Store in America, (Chicago: Dearborn, 2002).

Robert E. Lee’s greatest victory in the Civil War: Robert Cowley and Geoffrey Parker, eds., The Reader’s Companion to Military History (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1996).

$1.2 million of pretax profits: “Furniture Veterans Bear Witness to How Trade Spats Split Industries,” Wall Street Journal, June 17, 2004; importing details from Wyatt Bassett, interview with the author, December 14, 2012.

Kuo’s videotaping at Vaughan-Bassett: “Furniture Veterans Bear Witness.”

China’s treatment of Taiwan: The one-China policy had its origins in 1949, when Chiang Kai-shek moved the seat of his defeated government to Taiwan; Chiang and Mao Tse-tung each insisted that his government was the only legitimate government of China and that it had authority over both the mainland and Taiwan. Though Taiwanese businessmen maintained strong economic ties to China, few Taiwanese citizens wanted to come under Beijing’s harsh Communist rule. China has long regarded Taiwan as a renegade territory.

Taiwanese factories moving to the mainland: Sheryl WuDunn, “Taiwan’s Mainland Efforts Widen,” New York Times, April 14, 1990.

Chapter 18: The Dalian Dance Card

Interviews: Rose Maner, Wyatt Bassett, John Bassett, Doug Bassett, Frank Tothill, Michael Moh, Joyce Phillips, Sheila Key, Joe Dorn, Joe Meadors

Furniture imports increase again: Denise Becker, “Chinese Imports Talk of Market,” Greensboro News and Record, October 17, 2002.

Furniture job losses tallied: Edward Cone, “Against the Grain,” Baseline 21 (August 2003): 55–57.

Larry Moh’s location for fiberboard business: The Chengdu Economic and Technological Development Zone was approved as a state-level development zone in February 2000, sixteen years after Dalian’s.

Industrialization of Leshan: The first foreign-based company was Motorola, which built a semiconductor plant there in 1995 (“Motorola Leads Foreign Investors in Development of Western China,” China.org.cn, March 28, 2001).

Opening of Larry and Michael Moh’s FFDM: Powell Slaughter, “China Plant Impresses Retailers: FFDM Has Eye on $100M Mark,” Furniture/Today, December 1, 2002.

Bo Xilai’s ascent in party politics: Dexter Roberts, “A Princeling Who Could Be Premier,” Bloomberg Businessweek, March 15, 2004.

Corruption scandal: Jamil Anderlini, “Bo Xilai: Power, Death, and Politics,” Financial Times, July 20, 2012.

Bo Xilai’s wife in jail for murder: David Barboza, “As China Official Rose, His Family’s Wealth Grew,” New York Times, April 23, 2012.

Russian companies accused of illegal logging: “Attention Wal-Mart Shoppers,” Environmental Investigation Agency, 2007 report. The practice was confirmed by undercover EIA investigators; see Raffi Khatchadourian, “The Stolen Forests: Inside the Cover War on Illegal Logging,” New Yorker, October 6, 2008. Several months later, Walmart announced it would investigate its suppliers more rigorously and joined the Global Forest & Trade Network, according to “What Not to Buy at Walmart,” May 17, 2011, cbsnews.com.

Growth goals of Dalian Huafeng: Research Office of Provincial Township Enterprise Bureau of the People’s Government of Liaoning Province, “The History/Growth/Development of Dalian Huafeng Furniture Co., Ltd.,” Liaoning Daily, August 9, 2003 (translated by Rose Maner).

Factory dormitory size: “Ju Qian (Capable) Furniture Factory Report,” China Labor Watch, April 2007.

Dalian Huafeng’s plans: Testimony of Wyatt Bassett, U.S. International Trade Commission, public conference, November 21, 2003. Summary of Vaughan-Bassett’s injuries caused by imports: Testimony of John Bassett, U.S. International Trade Commission hearing, November 9, 2004, available at usitc.gov.

Bob Timberlake: Richard Craver, “Designer Will End Ties with Company,” Winston-Salem Journal, December 11, 2012.

Joe Dorn’s earlier Cemex case: The antidumping petition resulted in a 58 percent duty on Cemex imports; see David P. Baron and Justin Adams, “Cemex and Antidumping,” case study, Harvard Business Review (January 1, 1994).

J.C. Penney’s dumping of Bassett Furniture: Testimony of Rob Spilman, Bassett Furniture CEO, U.S. International Trade Commission, public conference, November 21, 2003.

J.C. Penney alleges price was not the cause of dropping Bassett: Testimonies of Rob Spilman and of Jim McAlister, operations manager of quality and sourcing for J.C. Penney, U.S. International Trade Commission, public conference, November 21, 2003.

Chapter 19: Gathering the Troops

Interviews: Doug Brannock, Wyatt Bassett, John Bassett, Sheila Key, Rick Boucher, Doug Bassett, Joe Dorn, Steve Kincaid, Powell Slaughter, Rose Maner

Jack Welch’s views on offshoring: Quoted in “Where America’s Jobs Went,” The Week, March 18, 2011.

Market’s state funding restored: Travis Fain, “McCrory Shifts—No Cuts for High Point Market Funding,” Greensboro News and Record, April 2, 2013.

Boucher’s influence in Washington: In 2007, Congress.org ranked Rick Boucher as the tenth most powerful member of the U.S. House of Representatives. In 2010, he lost his seat to Republican Morgan Griffith, a defeat analysts attributed to his support for his party’s cap-and-trade energy bill and growing conservatism in the coalfields.

Domestics companies’ importing statistics: Cited in the antidumping petition and Greg Rushford, “The Yankee Trader,” Rushford Report (December 2003).

Furniture Brands’ losses: Jon Hilsenrath, Peter Wonacott, and Dan Morse, “Competition from Imports Hurts U.S. Furniture Makers,” Wall Street Journal, September 20, 2002.

Furniture Brands’ investments in Asian plants: Dan Morse, “In North Carolina, Furniture Makers Try to Stay Alive,” Wall Street Journal, February 20, 2004.

Origin of Byrd Amendment: Tudor N. Rus, “The Short, Unhappy Life of the Byrd Amendment,” New York University Journal of Legislation and Public Policy 10 (Winter 2007): 427–43.

Retaliatory duties brought against American exporters: “Issues and Effects of Implementing the Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act,” United States Government Accountability Office, September 2005.

Political unpopularity of the Byrd Amendment: The European Union and eight other countries challenged the authority of the Byrd Amendment in 2001, saying it “clearly flies in the face of the letter and spirit of the W.T.O. law,” according to Elizabeth Olson, “U.S. Law on Trade Fines Is Challenged Overseas,” New York Times, July 14, 2001.

Displaced factory workers not faring well: Based on the work of economist Lori Kletzer of the University of California, Santa Cruz, published in “Globalization and Its Impact On American Workers,” University of California, Santa Cruz, and Peterson Institute for International Economics, written as pre-conference paper, “Labor in the New Economy,” May 2007 (revised).

Workers pledge support of antidumping petition: Denise Becker, “Workers Rally in Fight Against Chinese Imports,” Greensboro News and Record, July 30, 2003.

Paul Toms’s initial support of petition: Denise Becker, “Furniture Industry Looking to D.C.,” Greensboro News and Record, July 16, 2003.

Hooker abandons support of petition: “Chinese Furniture Faces U.S. Tariffs,” Wall Street Journal, June 17, 2004.

Other companies abandon support of petition: Amy Dominello, “The Committee Battling Against Chinese Furniture Loses Two Manufacturers But Gains One,” Greensboro News and Record, September 10, 2003.

Supply disruptions predicted: Powell Slaughter, “Hooker Exits Antidumping Group; Five Others Join,” Furniture/Today, February 22, 2004.

Petitioners ridiculed for picking on China: Rushford, “The Yankee Trader.”

Factory employment figures referred to by Steve Kincaid: Nearly twelve million Americans, or 9 percent of the workforce, are employed directly in manufacturing, according to the National Association of Manufacturers and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2012.

Sophistry preached by Sam Walton: George Packer, The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013), 104–5.

Bedroom imports continue to climb: Powell Slaughter, “Lawyers Tip Hands on Antidumping,” Furniture/Today, December 14, 2003.

John Bassett pressures suppliers to sign on: Powell Slaughter, “Suppliers Urged to Support Petition,” Furniture/Today, August 17, 2003.

“Because you’re an American”: Ibid.

Thirty-one companies in petition: Powell Slaughter, “Antidumping Clears Hurdle,” Furniture/Today, December 14, 2003.

“like a murder in New York City”: Powell Slaughter, “We Should Acknowledge Human Cost of Imports,” Furniture/Today, June 29, 2003, and Powell Slaughter, interview with the author, January 28, 2013.

La-Z-Boy employees dedicated solely to importing efforts: Amy Martinez, “As Layoffs Mount, Import Relief Sought,” Raleigh News and Observer, August 27, 2003.

“Jabberwocky economics”: Gary Clyde Hufbauer, Reginald Jones Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, interview with the author, January 24, 2013.

Tariffs on steel imports: The WTO ruled the steel tariffs were illegal, and Bush eventually lifted them, after twenty-one months, citing an improving economy and cost-cutting efforts by domestic steel makers. Elizabeth Becker, “W.T.O. Rules Against U.S. On Steel Tariff,” New York Times, March 27, 2003.

John Bassett’s speech: Speech delivered at the High Point Rotary Club, October 16, 2003.

Incentives to lure Mercedes to Alabama: “Ten Years After Mercedes, Alabama Town Still Pans for Gold,” Savannah Morning News, October 9, 2002.

Engineering of Congressional Furnishings Caucus by Doug Bassett: Powell Slaughter, “Antidumping Petition Filed,” Furniture/Today, October 31, 2003.

China the world’s leading furniture exporter: Jim Morrill and Tim Funk, “Job Losses Strain Loyalty of Bush Allies,” Charlotte Observer, November 7, 2003.

Furniture likely to become China’s number one U.S. export: John Bassett testimony, U.S.-China Trade Relations, House Ways and Means Committee Subcommittee on Trade, February 15, 2007, transcript available at http://www.c-spanvideo.org/videoLibrary/transcript/transcript.php?programid=170038.

Chapter 20: Mr. Bassett Goes to Washington

Interviews: Charlotte Lane, Fran Bassett Poole, Joe Dorn, Wyatt Bassett, John Bassett, Jake Jabs, Rob Spilman, Powell Slaughter, John Greenwald

Vaughan-Bassett embracing lean manufacturing: Wyatt Bassett testimony, ITC hearing, November 9, 2004; figures compiled based on financial records in “Furniture Veterans Bear Witness to How Trade Spats Split Industries,” Wall Street Journal, June 17, 2004.

“North Carolina has-beens”: Clint Engel, “Retailer Views Mixed on Antidumping Effort,” Furniture/Today, August 17, 2003.

ITC’s vote tally for and against domestic producers: William Bishop, Hearings and Meetings Coordinator, U.S. International Trade Commission.

Estimate of legal fees for antidumping petition: Jerry Epperson, furniture analyst and investment banker, interview with the author, June 19, 2012.

Government spending to advertise new twenty-dollar bill: Betsy Streisand, “Need Change for a $20 Bill? Call Hollywood,” New York Times, September 28, 2003.

John Bassett III telling Rob Spilman that his factories could be picketed if Bassett refused to join coalition: Rob Spilman, interview with the author, May 2, 2013.

Statements from preliminary hearing: Culled from transcripts, U.S. International Trade Commission, public conference, November 21, 2003.

Jeffrey Seamans explaining company’s practices: Ibid., 234.

“the business of making futile gestures”: Transcripts from the U.S. International Trade Commission hearing, November 9, 2004.

Operating income losses and closures tallied: “Petitioners’ Final Comments,” memorandum to the U.S. International Trade Commission, prepared by King and Spalding, December 7, 2004.

Chapter 21: Factory Requiem

Interviews: Joe Philpott, Rob Spilman, John Bassett, Buck Gale, Paul Fulton, Steve Walker

Record unemployment in Henry County: “October Unemployment Rate,” Roanoke Times, December 6, 2003; statewide rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Lack of safety precautions in Chinese factories: Bob Spilman, interview with E. L. Briggs, American Furniture Hall of Fame Foundation Oral Histories, April 4 and 7, 2005. Confirmed in Rob Spilman’s interview with the author.

Number of Bassett Furniture stores: Testimony of Rob Spilman, U.S. International Trade Commission, public conference, November 21, 2003.

V-B/Williams plant closing: Krista Pierce, “Furniture Plant Closing Its Doors,” Sumter Item, June 29, 2004.

Chapter 22: Million-Dollar Backlash

Interviews: Wyatt Bassett, James Riddle, Keith Koenig, John Greenwald, Tim Copeland, Reau Berry, Jerry Epperson, John Bassett, George Cartledge Jr., Mike Micklem, Marc Schewel, Jake Jabs, Jim Stout, Hope Antonoff

Wyatt Bassett on the gradual process of being dumped by a retailer: Wyatt Bassett testimony, U.S. International Trade Commission hearing, November 9, 2004.

Description of Lifestyle’s Forbidden City at Market: “Furniture Veterans Bear Witness to How Trade Spats Split Industries,” Wall Street Journal, June 17, 2004.

Sales losses after being dumped by angry retailers: “Chinese Furniture Faces U.S. Tariffs,” Wall Street Journal, June 17, 2004.

Furniture Retailers of America’s ads: Ibid.

“not the cutting edge”: Clint Engel, “Antidumping Issues Aired at Market,” Furniture/Today, May 2, 2004.

“There’s a neutron bomb”: Clint Engel and Powell Slaughter, “Retail Groups Says Antidumping Costs May Rise,” Furniture/Today, October 14, 2004.

Double-digit wage hikes in China: Chinese wages rose 10 percent a year between 2000 and 2005 and 19 percent a year between 2005 and 2010, according to Harold L. Sirkin et al., “U.S. Manufacturing Nears the Tipping Point,” BCG Perspectives, March 22, 2012; https://www.bcgperspectives.com/content/articles/manufacturing_supply_chain_management_us_manufacturing_nears_the_tipping_point/.

Reshoring movement: According to “Coming Home,” Economist, January 19, 2013, most of the multinationals bringing production back to the United States cited as their reasons the rising wages in Asia and the discovery of the hidden costs of moving production far away from corporate offices. See also Rana Foroohar and Bill Saporito, “Made in the USA,” Time, April 22, 2013.

Lack of couch staying power: Steven Kurutz, “Analyzing the Couch,” New York Times, February 27, 2013.

“porous antidumping rules are abused for commercial gain”: Daniel J. Ikenson, “Poster Child for Reform: The Antidumping Case on Bedroom Furniture from China,” Cato Institute, June 3, 2004.

Lumber and furniture movement at the Port of Virginia: Virginia’s number one export is lumber; its number one import is furniture, much of it crafted from the exported logs and lumber, according to Jeff Keever, senior deputy executive director of the Virginia Port Authority, interview by May-Lily Lee on Virginia Conversations, WVTF Public Radio, August 3, 2012. In 2013, the top Virginia export was soybeans, followed by logs and lumber, according to the Governor’s Conference on Agricultural Trade, March 6, 2014.

Chapter 23: Copper Wires and Pink Slips

Interviews: Richard McCormack, Lee Gale, Kay Pagans, Wanda Perdue, Coy Young, Spencer Johnson, Mindy Fullilove, Wayne Withers, Mary Thomas, Kim Adkins, Allyson Rothrock, Rob Spilman, Frances Kissee, Kim Wheeler, Octavia Witcher, Mary Redd, John Bassett, Lane Nunley, Matt Barr, Jane Bassett Spilman, Larry Brown, David Autor, Richard Freeman

“Some bones broken will forever be weak”: Quoted in Allison Glock, “Natasha Trethewey: Poet in Chief,” Garden and Gun (October/November 2012).

63,300 factories closed: Richard McCormack, ed., ReMaking America (Washington, DC: Alliance for American Manufacturing, 2013).

Poor media coverage of unemployment: Jason Linkins, “The Media Has Abandoned Covering the Nation’s Massive Unemployment Crisis,” Huffington Post, May 18, 2011.

Acknowledging unemployment caused by offshoring: Thomas Friedman, The World Is Flat (New York: Picador, 2005), 264.

Unemployment where Friedman lives: Peter Newcomb, “Thomas Friedman’s World Is Flat Broke,” Vanity Fair, November 12, 2008. In March 2013, the unemployment rate in Bethesda, Maryland, was 4.9 percent.

Veteran with PTSD who committed suicide by cop: Beth Macy, “A War Within,” Roanoke Times, October 23, 2011.

Martinsville/Henry County once very prosperous: Ben Beagle, “Boom Wipes Out Unemployment in Henry County,” Roanoke Times, February 24, 1963.

Job-loss numbers: Number of jobs in 1990 were almost double the number in 2010 in Martinsville and Henry County, according to “Labor Market Statistics—Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages.” The Martinsville unemployment rate was 21.9 percent in January 2010, according to the Virginia Employment Commission.

Data for free/reduced lunch in Martinsville: Virginia Department of Education statistics, http://www.doe.virginia.gov/support/nutrition/statistics/free_reduced_eligibility/2011-2012/divisions/frpe_div_report_sy2011-12.pdf.

Harder for poor people to go to college now: According to Stanford sociologist Sean F. Reardon, the achievement gap between rich and poor children born in 2001 was 30 to 40 percent larger than for those born twenty-five years earlier (quoted in Joseph Stiglitz, “Equal Opportunity, Our National Myth,” New York Times, February 16, 2013).

Henry County’s commuting workforce: Spencer Johnson, “2010 Commuting Patterns in Martinsville-Henry County,” Martinsville–Henry County Economic Development Corporation, provided by Johnson in e-mail to author, February 15, 2013.

Martinsville now a majority-minority community: 2010 U.S. Census data compiled by Beth Macy, “Lingering Racial Divide Clouds Foundation’s Efforts,” Roanoke Times, March 18, 2012.

StarTek jobs in Martinsville offshored to the Philippines: Beth Macy, “The Reality of Retraining,” Roanoke Times, April 22, 2012, and Amanda Buck, “Trade Act OK’d for StarTek,” Martinsville Bulletin, February 29, 2012.

Small-business man begging for Harvest funds to make payroll: Macy, “Lingering Racial Divide.”

Rob Spilman admonishing people not to “cry in our beer”: Ibid.

Dismantling of Old Town factory: Ginny Wray, “Bassett Furniture Relic Coming Down,” Martinsville Bulletin, August 27, 2009.

J.D. plant arson: Alison Parker, “Henry County Man Sentenced for Starting November Fire at Bassett Furniture Warehouse,” WDBJ7.com, June 13, 2012. Crane was sentenced to one year and one month in prison and fined $970,000.

American of Martinsville’s abrupt closing: Duncan Adams, “228 Lose Jobs in Henry Co. After Factory Shuts Down,” Roanoke Times, April 28, 2010.

Fieldale history: Dorothy Cleal and Hiram H. Herbert, Foresight, Founders, and Fortitude: The Growth of Industry in Martinsville and Henry County, Virginia (Bassett, VA: Bassett Print Corporation, 1970).

Importance of textile industry to Virginia: “Henry County Presents Towels to Legislators,” Roanoke Times, March 2, 1962.

End of textile industry in region: Jamie C. Ruff, “Pillowtex Closing 16 Plants, One in Virginia—Files for Bankruptcy,” Richmond Times-Dispatch, July 31, 2003. Pillowtex closed all sixteen of its plants, ending jobs and benefits for 16,450, including those in Henry County.

Closing of MasterBrand: Debbie Hall, “MasterBrand Cabinets to Close Here,” Martinsville Bulletin, August 3, 2012.

Four in five Americans will live in poverty: Hope Yen, “AP Exclusive: 4 in 5 in US Face Near-Poverty, No Work,” Associated Press, July 28, 2013.

MIT study: William Mauldin, “China Imports Punish Low-Wage U.S. Workers Longer,” Wall Street Journal, July 22, 2013.

30 percent increase in disability: David Autor, interview with the author, October 1, 2013. Autor was also featured in “Trends with Benefits,” This American Life, March 22, 2013, available at http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/490/trends-with-benefits.

Chapter 24: Shakedown Street

Interviews: Joe Philpott, Rob Spilman, Lee Gale, Minnie Wilson, Maxine Brown, Charlotte Lane, Joe Dorn, John Greenwald, Wyatt Bassett, Jake Jabs, Keith Koenig, John Bassett, Richard Ledger, Bruce Blonigen, Mark Drayse, Gary Hufbauer, Shirley Johnson, Bonnie Byers, Doug Bassett

Bedroom plants rendered obsolete: Rob Spilman, interview with the author, and Heath E. Combs, “Duties Often Reinvested,” Furniture/Today, April 22, 2007.

Bassett Furniture sales on the upswing: In February 2013 Rob Spilman said the company was on track to sell $300 million in 2013.

Bassett Furniture sales growth: Jay McIntosh, “Bassett Rebounds to Profit as Sales Soar 31% in 1Q,” Furniture/Today, April 8, 2013. The company grew 22 percent in fiscal year 2012, Rob Spilman said.

Bassett Furniture’s hedge-fund investments: Roddy Boyd, “Furniture Company or Hedge Fund?,” Fortune, February 29, 2008.

Vagaries of Bassett Furniture dividends: Quarterly stock dividends went to a more modest five cents per quarter following the IHFC sale, according to Rob Spilman.

Countries that protect domestic industries: Germany and Switzerland have sophisticated apprenticeship programs, and Germany and Japan have policies that protect industries and encourage innovation; see Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele, The Betrayal of the American Dream (New York: PublicAffairs, 2012). Nobel Prize–winning economist Michael Spence cites the benefits of Germany’s salary and wage limits and worker protections in The Next Convergence (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011).

John Greenwald’s hypocrite claim: U.S. International Trade Commission in the Matter of Wooden Bedroom Furniture from China, October 5, 2010, http://www.usitc.gov/trade_remedy/731_ad_701_cvd/investigations/2009/wooden_bedroom_furniture/PDF/Hearing%20(review)%2010-05-2010.pdf.

Elkin plant closing: Devetta Blount, “400 Out of Work, Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Closing Elkin Plant,” WFMY News2, Devetta Blount, Dec. 1, 2008. The factory rehired fifty employees the following year for its factory and distribution center.

Companies seeking countries other than China to import furniture: Andrew Higgins, “From China, an End Run Around U.S. Tariffs,” Washington Post, May 23, 2011.

Georgia retailer phone conversation with Joe Dorn: U.S. International Trade Commission sunset review (2010): 193–99, available at https://edis.usitc.gov.

Dormitories not needed alongside every Vietnam factory: Richard Ledger, vice president of importing for Stanley Furniture, interview with the author.

Antidumping laws are bad economics: N. Gregory Mankiw and Phillip L. Swagel, “Antidumping: The Third Rail of Trade Policy,” Foreign Affairs (July/August 2005).

Cost of antidumping duties per job saved: Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Jared C. Woollacott, “Trade Disputes Between China and the United States: Growing Pains So Far, Worse Ahead?” Peterson Institute for International Economics Working Paper, December 13, 2010.

Not a single cell phone is made in the United States: Richard McCormack, ed., ReMaking America (Washington, DC: Alliance for American Manufacturing, 2013), 20.

Concentrated disadvantages of trade: David H. Autor, David Dorn, and Gordon H. Hanson, “The China Syndrome: Local Labor Market Effects of Import Competition in the United States,” American Economic Review 103 (March 2011): 2121–68; available at economics.mit.edu/files/6613.

Byrd Amendment “must go”: Paul Meller, “WTO approves sanctions on U.S.,” New York Times, September 1, 2004.

Duties collected now go into U.S. Treasury: Since the Byrd Amendment was repealed by Congress in 2006, with implementation effective October 1, 2007, the collected duties have gone into the U.S. Treasury, not to the petitioner companies; see Paul Blustein, “Senators Vote to Kill Trade Law,” Washington Post, December 22, 2005. California representative Bill Thomas, a Republican, got the repeal attached to the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005.

America’s trade deficit with China: U.S. Census Bureau, “Trade in Goods with China,” www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html#2005.

Tripling of food stamps, shifting of jobs from manufacturing to retail: McCormack, ReMaking America, 30–31.

90 percent of commercial litigation: Bureau of Justice Statistics, Federal Tort Trials and Verdicts, 2002–2003, as quoted by trade lawyer Kenneth J. Pierce in a memorandum to Joe Dorn.

Amount of duties collected: Joe Dorn, interview with the author, December 19, 2012.

Decline of Chinese imports: Wyatt Bassett, interview with the author, August 6, 2013, and Charlotte Lane, interview with the author, September 17, 2012. The decline was also documented in “U.S. Furniture Imports Slump In 2013,” published in the Import Genius, citing the Timber Network’s “Market Report,” July 2, 2013.

Closing of Dalian Huafeng’s American warehouses: Heath E. Combs, “Great River Trading Closing U.S. Furniture Warehouses,” Furniture/Today, July 21, 2011.

He YunFeng’s focus on emerging Chinese middle class: Clint Engel, “U.S. Buyers See Potential, Challenges at Dalian Show,” Furniture/Today, June 24, 2007.

Chapter 25: Mud Turtle

Interviews: Tim Luper, Shirley Johnson, Doug Brannock, John Bassett, Jim Stout, Doug Bassett, Linda McMillian, Sheila Key, John Nunn, Tim Prillaman, Jessy Shrewsbury, Ray Kohl, Jill Burcham, Susan Clark, Joe Wilson

Brouhaha between hospital and insurance company: M. Paul Jackson, “Doctors’ Practice Tries to Ease Fears, Blue Cross–Baptist Clash Has Worried Some Patients,” Winston-Salem Journal, April 22, 2005.

Vaughan Furniture employment: John Vaughan, “History of Vaughan Furniture Company,” reprinted in Galax History online at galaxscrapbook.com, June 30, 2012.

Press release on closure: “Vaughan Furniture to Close Galax Plant,” Carroll News, March 19, 2008.

Tourism up by a third: Ray Kohl, interview with the author, March 29, 2013.

Blue Ridge Backroads: The show is also available at www.blueridgecountry98.com.

Social services figures in Galax: Susan Clark, Galax’s Department of Social Services director, interview with the author, March 29, 2013. According to the Virginia Department of Education, 62 percent of Galax schoolchildren qualified for free or reduced-rate lunches.

Chapter 26: The Replacements

Interviews: Micah Goldstein, Chase Patterson, Al Jones, Neil MacKenzie, Wanda Perdue, Richard Ledger, Jerry Hall, Rob Spilman, Dini Martarini, Jim Febrian, Elok Andrea, Kusnun Aini, Allen Jubin, Bruce Cochrane, Katie O’Neill, Fachrudin, Kristanto Siswanto, John Bassett, Jim Stout

Stanley Furniture domestic employment: Debbie Hall, “Stanley Holds Last Local Annual Meeting,” Martinsville Bulletin, April 19, 2012.

Stanley’s switching crib production from offshore to domestic: Timothy Aeppel, “A Crib for Baby: Made in China or Made in USA?,” Wall Street Journal, May 21, 2012.

Crib recalls: “Stanley Furniture Recalls Cribs Due to Entrapment Hazard,” Home Furnishings Business, June 2008.

Stanley’s layoffs in Robbinsville: “Stanley Will Lay Off 200 at N.C. Plant,” Furniture/Today, December 17, 2006.

Indonesian economy: I. Made Sentana and Farida Husna, “Indonesia’s Economic Growth Slows,” Wall Street Journal, February 5, 2013.

New Ashley plant opening in North Carolina announced: Based in Arcadia, Wisconsin, Ashley Furniture, the world’s largest retail brand of home furniture and accessories, is investing $80 million in a new upholstery-manufacturing and import-distribution center in Advance, North Carolina; see Rana Foroohar and Bill Saporito, “Made in the USA,” Time, April 22, 2013.

Niche markets stand a better chance of being domestically made: “Here, There and Everywhere: Special Report on Outsourcing and Offshoring,” Economist, January 19, 2013.

Resurrection and fall of Lincolnton Furniture: Cameron Steele, “Lincolnton Company, Praised by Obama for Bringing New Jobs, Closes,” Charlotte Observer, January 4, 2013, and Karen M. Koenig, “Lincolnton Furniture Shuts Down,” Woodworking Network, January 4, 2013.

Cause of disaster mud pinpointed: “Scientists Blame Drilling for Indonesia Mud Flow,” NBC News Asia-Pacific and Associated Press, June 11, 2008.

State of furniture making in Indonesia in early 2014: Richard Ledger, interview with the author, January 28, 2014.

Chapter 27: “Sheila, Get Me the Governor!”

Interviews: Doug Bassett Lane, John Bassett, Bill Stanley, Doug Brannock, Sheila Key, Tim Prillaman, Ray Kohl, Susan Clark, Tripp Smith, Reau Berry, Wyatt Bassett, Keith Koenig, Jake Jabs, Mike Micklem, Pat Bassett, Marc Schewel

Economic incentives: Beth Macy, “Vaughan-Bassett to Add 115 Jobs,” Roanoke Times, January 27, 2012.

Unveiling of big chair in downtown Martinsville: Debbie Hall, “Big Chair Is at Home,” Martinsville Bulletin, September 20, 2009.

Furniture employees in Martinsville/Henry County: Virginia Employment Commission, Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, third quarter, 2012.

Same wood coming back across the ocean: Jeff Keever, director of Virginia Port Authority, Virginia Conversations, WVTF Public Radio, August 7, 2012.

Shareholder equity value: Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Company annual report, 2012.

Litigation over Byrd Amendment duties: Nick Brown, “Byrd Amendment Doesn’t Hurt Free Speech,” Law360.com, October 29, 2010.

Update on Ashley case: In August 2013, the United States Court of Appeals for the Twelfth Circuit voted two to one against Ashley and in favor of the petitioners, ruling that companies had to have voted for the petition in order to lay claim to any of the Byrd money funds.

Epilogue: The Smith River Twitch

Interviews: Pat Ross, Harry Ferguson, Rob Spilman, Jim Franklin, John Bassett

Traditional parting gift for the winner of Martinsville NASCAR race: Fast Freddy Lorenzen won the first Martinsville clock in 1964 when he ousted Richard Petty and Junior Johnson, according to Ryan McGee, “The Timeless Victory: A Victory in Martinsville Means the Most to NASCAR Trophy Lovers,” ESPN.com, accessed January 2, 2014, http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=4011608.

Ridgeway clocks made in China: Grand Furniture executive George Cartledge III, interview with the author, May 24, 2013.

Reverend Moses E. Moore’s parents: Gleaned from the Henry County Cohabitation List, recorded in February 1866, when the government sent a Freedmen’s Bureau official to each county in Virginia to record blacks by name. If the man of the household took his common-law wife to the courthouse—enslaved blacks had not been allowed to marry—the marriage was then legalized on a list that included information about prior slave ownership. Only a handful of Virginia’s county cohabitation lists survive. In 1976, Henry County’s was found in a dumpster outside the Martinsville jail by a part-time Bassett librarian and given to a black educator to transcribe, according to Pat Ross and recounted in Henry Wiencek, The Hairstons: An American Family in Black and White (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 176–80.

Mulatto furniture worker: As described in Wiencek, The Hairstons, 18, quoting Squire Hairston on his mulatto forebears: “They were born from the masters by the kitchen women. They would take our mothers and get children just like they wanted to.”

Fall festival now held at Old Town: Beth Macy, “Bassett Is a Factory Town—but with No More Factories,” Roanoke Times, September 13, 2013.