Southern Appalachian Digital Collections

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Carroll and Juanita Wright

  • wcu_picturing-5510.jpg
  • This 1941 image taken by Irving Kip Stearns (1895-1942) of Carroll Clinton Wright, Sr. (1910–1996) and Edna Juanita Thomas Wright (1912–1986), both raised in Swain County, is part of the Stearns-Grueninger collection. Carroll was assistant superintendent of Carolina Wood Turning Company until he began Carolina Building Supply with Jess Shank, Thurman Leatherwood, and Queve Woody, Sr. He eventually became sole owner of the business and turned it over to his daughter Kay and her husband Charles Killebrew who sold it in 2001. I. K. Stearns was president of Carolina Wood Turning Company from 1928 until his death in 1942. Stearns’ grandfather, Jeremiah Shank, started the company in 1903 as Bryson City Pump Works and it grew to be a thriving industry for the community. In 1911, Stearns was in the first graduating class of Bryson City High School. He had one son, Joseph Pease Stearns (1917-1948). In 1935, I. K. married Betty Grueninger (1896-1971).