Interview with George H. Mceachern, February 13, 2007
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University of North Carolina Wilmington Archives and Special Collections Interview with George H. McEachern, February 13, 2007 Title: Interview with George H. McEachern, February 13, 2007 Date: February 13, 2007 Description: Interview with George McEachern, whose family has been part of the local business community for several generations and whose ventures have included a Coca-Cola bottling plant and investment in real estate. Repository: UNCW Archives and Special Collections Transcript: Interviewee: McEachern, George Interviewer: Jones, Carroll Date of Interview: 2/13/2007 Series: SENC Notables Length 120 minutes Jones: Good afternoon. Today is Tuesday, February 13, 2007 and I'm Carroll Jones with Matt Early for the Randall Library Special Collection Oral History Program. We've very pleased today to be speaking with Wilmington native, George McEachern, whose family has been not only a part of the business community for several generations, but most generous benefactors in multiple areas. Thank you for visiting, George. McEachern: It's a pleasure to be here and I thank you for the opportunity of letting me talk a little bit about the family and about Wilmington. Jones: Oh I can hardly wait! You can start anywhere you want, but maybe you could go back a few years and tell us how your family, the Hutaff's and the McEachern's and so forth came to Wilmington, and what businesses they were in originally and how this developed. McEachern: Okay. I'd be glad to do that. I'm not familiar with the Hutaff side of the family, primarily Interview with George H. McEachern, February 13, 2007 Page 1 University of North Carolina Wilmington Archives and Special Collections because my grandfather on the McEachern side of the family had passed away before I was born, so I just heard about him in stories. I didn't actually meet him. But my grandfather Hutaff lived until 1957, so I knew him for quite a good while. But his family, the Hutaff family came from Hanover, Germany. His parents came over from Germany and they ultimately came to Wilmington. The family was in the business of bottling sarsaparilla, bottled water and fruit drinks. I hear in the movies about sarsaparilla, but I'm not even sure I've ever had a sarsaparilla. Jones: I was going to ask you. Did they ever keep any? McEachern: No, we never had any of the sarsaparillas. By the time I knew him, we were in the Coca Cola business, which was a much better business to be in. Jones: Yeah, I guess so. McEachern: But I'll tell first about him, and then I'll talk a little bit about my grandfather McEachern. But my grandfather Hutaff was in the sarsaparilla and bottling water business. They lived in the Sixth or Seventh Street area. This was a hand done business. They put the product into bottles, poured it in my hand, capped the bottles by hand. Jones: What year about was this? McEachern: This was in the late 1800's, early 1900's. Jones: Okay. McEachern: And then in 1902, something happened that changed everything. My grandfather and his brother signed a contract with the Coca Cola Company for franchises for eastern North Carolina. At that time, his brother lived in Florence, South Carolina, but they ultimately built bottling plants in Fayetteville, which the one that lived in Florence ultimately ran. And my grandfather built one in New Bern and Wilmington, ultimately, and Goldsboro and Kelford, which is a little town in northern North Carolina and part of Virginia, and this sort of changed everything for them. Coca-cola was a relatively small business then, but it grew rapidly. I think I saw one of the old clippings that one weekend, they brought a train loaded with 1,000 bottles of drinks to the beach for the summertime and that was a milestone. Jones: Oh my gosh. Now who did this? Interview with George H. McEachern, February 13, 2007 Page 2 University of North Carolina Wilmington Archives and Special Collections McEachern: My grandfather. Even the Coca-cola business started out as a relatively small hand business, but it quickly moved into a mechanized business with bottle washers and mechanized bottling equipment. The business grew very rapidly. It was a great opportunity, a great time to seize the opportunity and be in the business. He was an interesting person, though, because even though the Coca-Cola business was his life for a long time, he had a lot of other interests. He was an avid fisherman, and in connection with that, he bought a couple of small islands, the Northern Inner Shell Island and Hutaff Island, which is on the other side of Figure Eight Island. Hutaff Island now is merged into Lee Island so that it's now one island, but that island is still undeveloped and we're allowing the nature conservancy to monitor Piping Plovers, because they are an endangered bird and they nest on that island. Jones: When you said you went to mechanize, how early was that done about? Is there any remnant of that operation left? McEachern: We're no longer in the business. We sold out our interest in the Coca-Cola business in the late 1990's. At that time, the company was trying to consolidate its bottlers, because there were just literally hundreds and hundreds of Coca-Cola bottlers all over the country and they were trying to better control the business. They wanted to really end up with a business that they could meet all in one big boardroom and decide the future of the company. I personally think that was a bad idea, because the small bottlers had their finger on the pulse in their different communities; whereas, the general executives ran the business from Atlanta, Georgia. And what happens in Atlanta is different from Wilmington, different from San Francisco, different from New York. Jones: Did the owners of these various bottling companies, when they sold out or when they bought, have to sign any kind of a disclaimer or any kind of-- McEachern: Non-compete or anything. Jones: Yeah, something like that. McEachern: Not really. Jones: Or that they wouldn't divulge. McEachern: The formula? Jones: Yes. Interview with George H. McEachern, February 13, 2007 Page 3 University of North Carolina Wilmington Archives and Special Collections McEachern: We didn't really have the formula, because they shipped it to us in concentrate form. That was the big thing they did. They shipped the concentrate to us, for example, here in Wilmington, and it was diluted and carbonated water was added to it and so forth. And one of the reasons they put the bottling plant where they did in Wilmington is there are Artesian wells there, and well water was really important for the taste of the drink. A sideline of that, before we did get out of the business, they had a huge celebration in Atlanta, the 100th anniversary, and my wife and I and our kids got a chance to go to that celebration. It was just unbelievable. It was the largest collection of Coca-Cola bottlers there have ever been in the world. Jones: How many? McEachern: There were thousands. There was probably 15-20,000 people. They took over the World Congress Center, the Omni. They closed some of the streets in Atlanta. It was just unbelievable. They had an indoor parade at the World Congress Center. But back to my grandfather, he also did a lot of interesting things as far as helping people. He was a lifelong supporter and active member of the Red Cross. I'm reading from some notes, so I don't forget something. Jones: That's fine. McEachern: But during World War I, he was chairman of the Soldiers Relief Committee, the local chapter. He had an office at Fort Caswell and he literally helped hundreds of soldiers and their families during World War I. Another little thing he did, an example of thoughtfulness, the Red Cross had a sanatorium right near the airport. The people at the sanatorium were there for a good while and he purchased Sunday papers and brought them to them on Sunday, so they'd have something to read. He also supported various welfare things through the Associated Charities. I was not familiar with that organization, but apparently, it was an organization in Wilmington at about that time. In 1921, he helped organize Sunday school services at the local prison, and monthly meetings at which prisoners could discuss their future after they got out of prison. Jones: What a legacy he left. McEachern: Another little thing he did was in 1923, he gave 50 Rhode Island chickens to New Hanover County School children involved in the home demonstration programs and then taught them how to raise the chicks. He also donated land, a part downtown for African Americans, and he Interview with George H. McEachern, February 13, 2007 Page 4 University of North Carolina Wilmington Archives and Special Collections also donated land for a park near the hospital. He was on the board of both James Walker and Community Hospitals. And he planted a magnolia tree for each one of his children at James Walker, and I think some of them probably are still standing, but they grew to be huge trees. They were these groves of magnolia trees that represented his children. He did a lot of things in a quiet way. He also donated a house at the beach to the WLI, the Wilmington Light Infantry. After his death, a lot of people told us about how he had helped them.