Honey Grove Cotton Compress [RPPC]
Name/Title
Honey Grove Cotton Compress [RPPC]Description
Real photograph postcard of the "Cotton Compress. Honey Grove Tex. / and bales of cotton" Postmarked on back "HONEY GROVE TEXAS / SEP 27 1909."Context
The cotton-compress industry developed in antebellum Texas because of the need to lower the cost of transporting cotton on sailing vessels. Before the introduction of power cotton compressors, or hydraulic compressors, workers known as screwmen used screwjacks to pack and stow bulky bales of cotton for shipment by sea. Compressors reduced bales received from cotton gins to roughly half their former size, Honey Grove was the most important cotton marketing trade center in Fannin County, with four cotton gins and the one cotton compress in active operation during the cotton season. It was not unusual for the number of bales of cotton shipped from Honey Grove to equal that of all the other bales shipped from all other towns in Fannin County.Category
Cotton Culture
Agriculture, Being Texas, Bullock Museum