Employment in Manufacturing--Excluding military personnel from the total government group, employees engaged in manufacturing rank first in number. However, when civilian government and military personnel are combined, government employment surpasses manufacturing employment. Approximately 20% of the total work force is engaged in manufacturing. During the decade of the 1940's manufacturing in Virginia surpassed agriculture for the first time, and the growth of manufacturing continued progressively through the decade of the 1950's. Manufacturing as a whole is diversified. Expenditure for new manufacturing plant and equipment exceeded one billion dollars in one recent seven-year period. Additional millions of dollars have been spent recently for expanding existing facilities. Fabricated metals (example, swimming-pool type atomic reactors) and machinery and electrical equipment (examples, motors, calculators) groups of industries have grown substantially within the past few years. The four manufacturing industries having the largest number of employees are textile, chemical and chemical products, food and kindred products, and lumber and wood products. The employees in these four industries constitute nearly 50% of all workers engaged in manufacturing. Textile employment leads all other manufacturing employment. The textile industry in Virginia includes the spinning and processing of yarn and the weaving and finishing of material. Cotton and rayon broad-woven fabrics are the major ones. Approximately 60% of Virginia's textile employment is found in this category. The cities of Danville, Fieldale and Roanoke are especially noted for their textiles. Knitting mills constitute the second type of textile activity, and approximately two-thirds of employment in the knitting mills is engaged in making full-fashioned and seamless hosiery. Lynchburg is a key center of knitting mills for men's and ladies' hosiery.