THE WARREN SENTINEL
Article date: October 10, 2002

Avtex Open House recalls an era of contribution

Pollution is not the only legacy of huge synthetics manufacturing plant

By: Roger Bianchini

"Don't ask me to say anything bad about the plant. I never have and I never will," Marge Lichliter stated unequivocally about the huge rayon, polyester and polypropylene fiber manufacturing facility on the bank of the Shenandoah River.

Lichliter was one of a large contingent of Avtex retirees who participated in Saturday's second annual Avtex Open House. Lichliter, along with Jim Colbert, Helen Beatty and others spent the bulk of their working lives at Avtex. In fact, Lichliter began working at the then American Viscose plant in December of 1940 about four months after it opened. She retired from Avtex Fibers in May of 1989 just five months prior to its closing for violations of the state Water Control Board's standards for pollutant dumping into the river. The plant operated without Lichliter for less than a year of its live 49-year existence under three corporate owners, American Viscose, FMC, and Avtex.

From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday the public was invited to share a moment in one of the country's largest Superfund reclamation projects. Retirees like Lichliter, Colbert and Beatty were among the first on the scene. Many of the earliest arrivals were retirees who began assembling at 10:30 a.m.. Some who went out on early tours of the site were surprised to see the extent of the grounds that they had never been privy to during their working lives at the plant.

As the tour van crossed the railroad tracks and weaved its way up the remains of fly-ash mountain and the viscose ponds near the Shenandoah River's edge, the experience was as new for some retirees as it was to someone who had never before been on the property.

Refreshments were served to visitors on Saturday as both plans for the future and a historical record of an important 59-year portion of Front Royals past were displayed on the ground in front of the Avtex Administration building. That building is scheduled to become the first reclaimed portion of the property to be used for business purposes. Both the EDA and FMC are slated to take office space in the building when renovation work is completed.

The guided tours of the 467-acre site gave an up to the moment perspective on the status of the demolition and cleanup being overseen by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. That cleanup is being performed by the lone surviving former owner of the plant, FMC Corporation, along with the Army Corps of Engineers and subcontractors who specialize in work on sites strewn with hazardous materials.

Among the booths set up were EPA, FMC, Army Corps of Engineers , the local Economic Development Authority and the newly formed Shenandoah Center for Heritage and Environment at Front Royal. Sharing in that effort and manning their own table were members of the Avtex Retirees Group, which remains active locally.

While the recent perception of Avtex has been dominated by its 1989 closing due to violations of pollution standards and local plans to redevelop the site into a commercial, business park and recreational area, some present Saturday told another story.

"This plant was a big part of this community," retiree Jim Colbert says, " and we've been working to try to preserve its history.

"When this plant started this town was about 2.500 people, they tell me- I wasn't here yet. But when I came here in 1945 there were 3,800 people working here." Colbert made the move to Avtex and Warren County from Loudoun County as his former wartime employer the Naval Torpedo Station in Alexandria, began phasing back operations. "The personnel manager there was a friend of the personnel manager here and he suggested that we come here because they were still making critical materials here."

Both Jim Colbert and Margie Lichliter recall a "family atmosphere"among the work force at what was for years Warren County's major employer. "It was great,"Lichliter said of the work atmosphere at the plant. "Yes it was". The people you worked with were just like your family.

"I have fond memories," she added. "It was a great place to work and I do not think that it ever hurt anybody [who worked there] health wise."

Colbert concurred. "I don't think that it was ever that harmful to the people on the site," he says of environmental pollutants. "There may have been other problems that might have complicated it. We did have some fatalities here but they were industrial accidents and in most cases they were the person's fault that did something against the safety regulations of the time, and that can happen anywhere."

Lichliter adds that from her experience bosses were a part of that family atmosphere at the plant. "If you had an emergency at home they would let you trade a day so you didn't have to miss work. And if you did you job the bosses were really good to you."

Doing your work at the plant was important at American Viscose as Work War II loomed on the horizon. During its first six years of operation the plant produced over a third of the rayon fiber for tiers used by military vehicles in the Allied war effort.

Shenandoah Center representative Sue Reiner Ladd points out that the history of the plant spans major contributions, not only to that Allied war effort, but also to the fashion and medical supply industries into the 1980's and the American space program up to the day the plant closed on Nov.1, 1989.

One of the more noteworthy items make possible by the plant's manufacturing process is the ever popular disposable diaper. On the space front, materials- including those in the tiles that allowed NASA's space shuttle to return to earth despite temperatures over 4,000 degrees- were produced at Avtex.

Lichliter, who like Colbert said she has crossed into her 80s without negative health impacts from her long-term employment at the plant, said of the impact of Avtex on her life: "It gave me money. I had four children while I worked here, I was able to give them an education that I didn't have the money to get as I grew up. Now my grandson is a veterinarian. My granddaughters are teachers. I have a daughter who teaches at the University of Michigan.

"I couldn't have done that for them if I hadn't worked at Avtex."