Mention has been made of the power of reputation in the financing of a cotton mill. Not only was this stressed in suitable ways by those concerned in securing funds directly, but it was used in another way. This may be conveniently illustrated by the history of the great mill at Albemarle, North Carolina. Some years ago this village was an isolated one of five or six hundred inhabitants. A family of planters near the place, the Efirds, wanted to see a cotton mill located at Albemarle. They were probably as little able to attract capital as the village was uninviting to the industrialist. In this situation, the Efirds approached J. W. Cannon, of Concord, a town nearby, who had succeeded in the cotton manufacturing business and had extended his interests to mills in other places, and asked him to take the presidency of the mill proposed, and subscribe to $10,000 of stock. Mr. Cannon was not much inclined to go into the venture, but the Albemarle family showed determination. The plant today is a mile long, and represents an investment of some $3,000,000.[271] It is said that most of Mr. Cannon's mills outside of Concord had birth in the minds of people of the several communities; for instance, a merchant named Petterson interested him in a mill at China Grove.[272] One of the most interesting cotton mills in the Southern States is that of the Gaffney, South Carolina, Manufacturing Company. The mill was conceived by a building contractor of the place while working upon churchs and cottages in a nearby mill village, that of Clifton. When he had planted his idea in the minds of the leading men of Gaffney, spurred them to local subscription and then to seeking money at the North, and because receiving small encouragement in New York and Philadelphia, their enthusiasm subsided, Mr. Baker, considering home enterprise and outside assistance unavailing, went to Mr. Converse, head of the successful Clifton Mill, and asked him to take over the Gaffney project at the point at which it had been dropped. Mr. Converse was aged, and felt himself overburdened with mill cares, but he encouraged the Gaffney man in his ambition, saying that mills in the South would pay better dividends than Northern mills, either large or small. Meantime, however, Mr. Baker had come to know H. D. Wheat, the superintendent at Clifton. The indomitable promoter had hard work to persuade the practical-minded superintendent to leave his good position at Clifton for the uncertain fortune of a factory at a town which had failed to establish the mill itself, and could not interest Northern support; but finally, Mr. Wheat agreed to raise $20,000 besides his own subscription, to add to the subscriptions still in force at Gaffney, and to take charge of the mill as its active president. The $20,000 was invested by friends of Mr. Wheat at Clifton and at Kings Mountain, nearby. Directors were soon elected, and the imported president with his contributions to the venture, was installed.[273]