In early 1910, J. Irving Westervelt was chosen by a northern textile machinery coalition to manage a new southern textile mill venture. Lockwood, Greene, and Company designed the village and mill, and Gallivan Construction of Greenville served as contractor. The mill’s original capitalization was 10,000 shares valued at $100 per share, for $1,000,000. It opened in March 1912 with a two-story 56,000-spindle spinning room and a one-story 1,200-loom weave room. Two hundred employees and their families, living in 75 houses, produced fine quality lawn handkerchief material. In 1912, Bennette E. Geer, a Furman University English professor, became mill president and urged that the mill be renamed Judson Mill in honor of his longtime Furman mentor and friend, the late Charles Judson, the university treasurer and a mathematics professor. By 1917, Judson was expanding to produce a blend of Japanese silk with long-staple cotton. In 1924, a small building was purchased and homes were built across from the mill, forming Judson Silk Mill, or Judson No. 2, which produced pure rayon and silk products. As the Depression of the 1930s approached, Judson took pride in its school, which enrolled more than 600 students. The 1934 strike divided employees so severely that the Baptist church closed for a time. By 1939, Judson had three churches, a school, a community building, and a baseball field, all around the well-known Judson Crossing at the intersection of Judson and Brandon. Before World War Two, under new owner Deering-Milliken, Judson became the first Greenville textile community to begin selling off its homes. The closed mill and village were placed on the National Historic Registry in 2018.