For more than one hundred years, this site was the heart of commerce in Villa Rica. By 1900, the two-block area to the east was developed by the Villa Rica Cotton Oil Mill under president W. B. Chandler, and the original brick buildings served first as warehouses for cotton bales produced at the cotton gin building on the site. In 1902, the Villa Rica Electric Light and Power Company was incorporated and occupied part of the complex, soon followed by an ice plant and the Coca-Cola Bottling Plant, whose earliest cola bottles here bore the electric light company's name. A fertilizer plant was added in 1908. By 1927, the multi-business operation had become the Villa Rica Manufacturing Company and added a hosiery mill component called Rica Tex Mills. The last two major textile mills operating here were the Golden City Hosiery Mills and Vince Hosiery Mill, Inc. The two-acre property and buildings were sold in 2000 and became the home of Avanti Auto Manufacturing, Incorporated, and in 2006 the site was purchased by the City of Villa Rica. Early deeds called the street area to the west of the mill complex The Public Square, and the old railroad depot stood about 150 feet down the track from the corner of the property, flanking one side of the square area.