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You Had a Job for Life: Story of a Company Town
Absentee owners.
Single-minded concern for the bottom line.
Friction between workers and management.
Hostile takeovers at the hands of avaricious and unaccountable multinational interests.
The story of America’s industrial decline is all too familiar—and yet, somehow, still hard to fathom. Jamie Sayen spent years interviewing residents of Groveton, New Hampshire, about the century-long saga of their company town. The community’s paper mill had been its economic engine since the early twentieth century. Purchased and revived by local owners in the postwar decades, the mill merged with Diamond International in 1968. It fell victim to Anglo-French financier James Goldsmith’s hostile takeover in 1982, then suffered through a series of owners with no roots in the community until its eventual demise in 2007.
Drawing on conversations with scores of former mill workers, Sayen reconstructs the mill’s human history: the smells of pulp and wood, the injuries and deaths, the struggles of women for equal pay and fair treatment, and the devastating impact of global capitalism on a small New England town. This is a heartbreaking story of the decimation of industrial America.
Single-minded concern for the bottom line.
Friction between workers and management.
Hostile takeovers at the hands of avaricious and unaccountable multinational interests.
The story of America’s industrial decline is all too familiar—and yet, somehow, still hard to fathom. Jamie Sayen spent years interviewing residents of Groveton, New Hampshire, about the century-long saga of their company town. The community’s paper mill had been its economic engine since the early twentieth century. Purchased and revived by local owners in the postwar decades, the mill merged with Diamond International in 1968. It fell victim to Anglo-French financier James Goldsmith’s hostile takeover in 1982, then suffered through a series of owners with no roots in the community until its eventual demise in 2007.
Drawing on conversations with scores of former mill workers, Sayen reconstructs the mill’s human history: the smells of pulp and wood, the injuries and deaths, the struggles of women for equal pay and fair treatment, and the devastating impact of global capitalism on a small New England town. This is a heartbreaking story of the decimation of industrial America.
- GenresNonfiction
304 pages, Paperback
Published December 5, 2017
17 people are currently reading
105 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
October 22, 2018
I had never heard of Groveton, New Hampshire nor of it's paper mill prior to marrying a 'Groveton boy' in January of 1971. I soon learned how a factory with procedures, machines, and human sweat and hearts brought together a community of people and helped it become a family that in spite of it all, persists even to this day.
Admittedly, I'm biased; while living across the river from the mill (within rock throwing distance), I soon learned that my new family, their friends, and sometimes their enemies made, without a doubt, many of the highest quality paper products ever produced in the 20th century. I knew the two men who lost their arms in the machines, one of them a dear friend of my husband. My father in law worked in the digester-an extremely dangerous and detrimental-to-your health section of the mill. Three of my brothers in law and countless friends spent most of their waking hours in that huge labyrinth of machines, buildings, chemicals, and human camaraderie.
While the book chronicles the saga of this mill and it's ultimate demise because of corporate overreach and dispassionate attitudes, it goes beyond the sad, simple statistics of just another small town losing it's primary place of employment. It tells the small stories; about real working class people who tried, with all their heart, to keep their livelihood intact; about friendships among workers, male and female both; about dangerous working conditions, and the willingness of the original owner's son to jump right into a machine's innards along with the men that worked for him. I laughed at some of the stories, and nearly cried at others; and I remembered.
This book spoke to my heart in a personal way, having lived in or near this town for almost a half century; and even though it may not speak to yours like it does mine, it's still a book you should buy and read if for no other reason than to understand how the changing face of volatile carbon based energy costs, corporate greed, and a society less and less willing to care about their fellow humans continues to gut small town American businesses.
Admittedly, I'm biased; while living across the river from the mill (within rock throwing distance), I soon learned that my new family, their friends, and sometimes their enemies made, without a doubt, many of the highest quality paper products ever produced in the 20th century. I knew the two men who lost their arms in the machines, one of them a dear friend of my husband. My father in law worked in the digester-an extremely dangerous and detrimental-to-your health section of the mill. Three of my brothers in law and countless friends spent most of their waking hours in that huge labyrinth of machines, buildings, chemicals, and human camaraderie.
While the book chronicles the saga of this mill and it's ultimate demise because of corporate overreach and dispassionate attitudes, it goes beyond the sad, simple statistics of just another small town losing it's primary place of employment. It tells the small stories; about real working class people who tried, with all their heart, to keep their livelihood intact; about friendships among workers, male and female both; about dangerous working conditions, and the willingness of the original owner's son to jump right into a machine's innards along with the men that worked for him. I laughed at some of the stories, and nearly cried at others; and I remembered.
This book spoke to my heart in a personal way, having lived in or near this town for almost a half century; and even though it may not speak to yours like it does mine, it's still a book you should buy and read if for no other reason than to understand how the changing face of volatile carbon based energy costs, corporate greed, and a society less and less willing to care about their fellow humans continues to gut small town American businesses.
September 10, 2022
There was a time when you could walk into an office, ask people around if there is something you can do, and wham! You are employed for the rest of your life, even handing over the job to your children and countless other generations in line. In this book, we followed the 114-years long story of Groveton Paper Company of Massachusetts, USA, and the surrounding Groveton village that sprung around it, making it a Company Town. Under the leadership of three generations of Wemysses, that it flourished. Of course, the water and air was filled with toxic, clashes between Bosses and the Unions were unavoidable, and freak accidents happened here and there, but everyone stick together, bounded by community spirit of living their lives in Groveton, both in business and residence sense. However, it was when both Jim Wemyss senior and junior decided to merge with Diamond International, the company and the whole community began to put the nails in the coffin. Subsequent energy crises, lackluster fundings for modernization from the corporate owners, left Groveton finished for good, a truly sad ending that teaches us how Shareholder capitalism and globalization had ruined various community-based economies around the world. However, as the author also pointed out, even without the corporate takeover, Groveton was bound to die off anyway, except if it were successfully managed to navigate itself through by means of turning to the more environmentally sustainable mode of production. Overall I found this book to be an interesting, but sad story of paternalistic company crushed by faceless capitalism which counted people as numbers, nothing more.
April 15, 2019
I found myself very interested in the story of the paper mill and the town, but the writing was uneven and choppy. Most of the writing was based on interviews, so the point of view and the voice changed quite often. The reading smoothed out by the end of the book as I got to know more about the mill and the interviewees themselves. Worth the rad if you are interested in this chapter of NH history, otherwise a challenge to get through.
February 21, 2018
I really enjoyed this book. It tells the story of a small town New England paper mill from the day it was built until the day it closed and was eventually torn down. Mr. Sayen weaves together hundreds of interviews with former mill workers, townspeople, a former mill owner, and others into a very interesting and readable story. The closing of the mill was a small town tragedy that has played out in towns all over New England. How and why it happened is described very well. Highly recommended!
January 28, 2018
I actually started reading this book at Chapter 6, when the Wemyss family that dominated papermaking in Groveton for 50-ish years entered the scene, buying a nearly defunct paper mill. I know the central Wemyss figure, James Jr., fairly well, so I could easily identify with quotes from him (of which there were many; I could almost hear him speaking in reading those quotes).
There are a dozen or more other people whom I know well who were interviewed extensively for this book, so that added an element of interest to me. It's well-written and interesting, though I'm not sure how interested I would be without the personal connection. Nevertheless, the original purpose of the book was to create an oral history of this seminal North Country industry that is all but gone now, and it does that quite well.
There are a dozen or more other people whom I know well who were interviewed extensively for this book, so that added an element of interest to me. It's well-written and interesting, though I'm not sure how interested I would be without the personal connection. Nevertheless, the original purpose of the book was to create an oral history of this seminal North Country industry that is all but gone now, and it does that quite well.
January 7, 2018
I was hoping to learn more about the decline of the paper industry in my home state and I did.
November 20, 2020
Great Oral History About Paper Mills, Paper Making and Its Importance To Community and Its Cultute
There are very few books about paper mills and paper making. This book is unique in its scope and focus relative to providing an overview of paper mills and paper making and all its processes through the voices of workers and owners in one community, Groveton, New Hampshire. While this book deals with the workings of one mill in the northeast US, it serves as a window to the trials and tribulations implicit in a global economy and the dictates of Wall Street that determine the fortunes of industry and the success, failures and survival of rural communities that lack economic diversity.
There are very few books about paper mills and paper making. This book is unique in its scope and focus relative to providing an overview of paper mills and paper making and all its processes through the voices of workers and owners in one community, Groveton, New Hampshire. While this book deals with the workings of one mill in the northeast US, it serves as a window to the trials and tribulations implicit in a global economy and the dictates of Wall Street that determine the fortunes of industry and the success, failures and survival of rural communities that lack economic diversity.
April 4, 2018
I heard this author speaking on C-SPAN and thought the book would be interesting. It focused more exclusively on life in one small paper mill town (Groveton, NH) than I expected, but it was still a good read about the forces conspiring to deindustrialize America. I also learned that papermaking was a really tough job, especially in the years before worker safety got much attention.
July 20, 2018
Jamie Sayen gives the reader a complete look at the life of the mill. The feel of working a small town in the heart of rural America. It was one of those stories that you already knew the end but it was still sad to see it happening anyways. Good luck to the town and the people of Groveton, Northumberland, NH.
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February 26, 2018Reviewed in the Wall Street Journal 2018 Feb 26: https://www.wsj.com/articles/review-r...
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews