A look back at 1961

Fifty years ago total orders were $231,728 or an average of $19,310 per month. 1961 was a down year compared to sales in other years around that time. Although my records only go back to 1956, this was the lowest sales amount of the 1950’s or 1960’s and represented a 20% drop in sales from the prior year. However, this seemed to be an anomaly because the next year orders increased by 46% to total over $337,000.

As was often the case, December was the month with the highest sales volume. The largest dollar value for a Millwork job that year was placed by contractor Conquest, Moncure & Dunn in December for $30,654 for St. John Vianney Seminary. To read more about this project, click here. Kayhoe Construction placed the most orders with nine for a total of $19,088.

Some of the notable orders that year were the State Chamber of Commerce building (contractor: Russell Blank), a Day Care Recreational Building for the Memorial Foundation (contractor: Alexander Construction), the Southside Baptist Church (contractor: Bass Construction), a job for the Dillard Paper Company (contractor: Bass Construction) and the Hyman-Meyers Residence on Wilton Road (contractor: Russell Blank).

The Mill’s configuration was virtually identical to the way it was on the day it closed in 2007 and it had all of the same buildings, with a few buildings on 1208 N. 28th having been added in the mid fifties.

Herman and Bernard Beckstoffer were both the proprietors of the Mill at that time, according to the Richmond City Directory.