Three Walker County businessmen, Andrew P. Allgood, Spencer S. Marsh, and Col. W.K. Briers, officially organized the Trion factory on Oct. 12, 1845, making it the first cotton mill in northwest Georgia. It had few shut-downs after first production began in 1847. An epidemic in 1858, Sherman's invading Federal Army in 1864, which closed the mill until the end of the War Between the States, a fire on April 10, 1876, which shut it for only six months, and a strike for six weeks in 1934 were the main interruptions. Three families owned and operated the mill through its first 150 years: the Allgood family from 1845 to 1912, the B.D. Riegel family from 1912 to 1987, and the R.B. Pamplin family, which purchased the mill in 1987.