University of Virginia Library

Manufacturing

While the manufacturing interests of Roanoke have
not yet assumed the proportions they are destined to
reach at no remote time, there has been a gradual increase
from year to year, especially during the past
decade, as transportation facilities and the building of
new lines of railway have attracted the attention of

manufacturers to Roanoke as a distributing point for
all classes of merchandise and manufactured articles,
as well as a place where cheap power and efficient labor
could be obtained.

The Roanoke Machine Works where the heavy repairs
are made to engines and cars of the Norfolk &
Western Railway, and where a portion of the company's
rolling stock is built, is the largest industry in
the city.

There are also two bridge companies, several large
planing mills, flouring mills, two ice plants, a large
brewery, several bottling works, two blast furnaces,
two overall factories, one iron works, three marble
works, a fertilizer factory, a metal culvert factory, a
cotton mill, a box factory, one packing house, several
large printing houses and book binderies, a barrel and
stave factory, one extract and proprietary remedy
manufactory, an enamel-ware factory, an aerial tramway
manufactory, several sash, door and blind factories, a
sheet metal manufactory, a candy factory, several
cigar factories, as well as numerous smaller industries.