Wagner Electric

In 1973 Bob Daniels, Industrial Representative of  Mississippi Power Company of Gulfport, Mississippi contacted me and said that he had shown a site for a large plant in the new Industrial Park that I had built in Lumberton while I was said City’s Mayor.  He couldn’t give me the name of its prospect. 

About two weeks later I followed up and he told me that the prospect had eliminated Lumberton as a prospect for its new plant as it would not build its plant on property serviced by a Rural Electric Cooperative since its sales were exclusively to publicly owned power companies.

I then went to the Power Company and got a map of their territory.  The forty acres immediately North of the area embraced by the Rural Electric Coop was in Mississippi Power Company’s territory.  I got the City an option to purchase this land and then notified Mr. Daniels who then contacted the prospect.  He then called me and said the company was about to announce it was going to locate near Covington, Louisiana.  He said he was talking with their Engineer.  I requested he have the Engineer to contact me. 

The Engineer called me and I told him that I had optioned the land and that the City had a rail siding leading to the property plus sewage and water.  I impressed on him that the water line met the requirement of the top 500 corporations in America for underwriting insurance purposes which required a 12 inch line plus we had installed adequate ground storage facilities.  Gulfport had built a large industrial park but it only had an 8 inch line which ruled it out as a site.  He then said he would come to Lumberton and see if the site was suitable.

The Engineer was John Whitely and the Company was Wagner Electric Company out of Newark, New Jersey. Mr. Whitely swore me to secrecy and told me if anyone ever divulged his company’s name that would be the end of the matter.  Wagner had gone to a town in Tennessee and it got out they were locating there and they were besieged by hundreds of calls and it let their competition also be privy to their intentions.

They then told me that they wanted more land than we had optioned.  This additional land was owned by Max Jordan who then worked for Howard Hughes’ Company and he lived in Huntington Beach California.  Wagner then told me if I could get an option on this land and a survey and topographical map within the next seven days that they would build a large transformer plant on the land.  I got busy and went to Los Angeles and got the option and our City Engineer, Brax Batson. made the survey and topo map and the plant was later constructed and is now Lamar County’s largest employer. The plant facility later expanded and is a 15 million dollar investment and is now operated by Cooper Industries. I consider it a monument to my effort to get industry for Lumberton.