By Theresa Knapp 

On March 23, the Little Red Shop Museum hosted a standing-room-only program entitled Family Business: Drapers, Whitins, and the Rise of Industry, the role these families played locally and in the American Industrial Revolution. 

Becca Draper King and her brother George Draper, who could not attend the event. Their parents, Sophie Whitin Draper (1912-2006) and George Draper (1908-1976), merged the two industrial families when they married in May 1934. Photo source: Little Red Shop Museum

Among the attendees were members of the Draper and Whitin families including Jill Calfee Smith, a Draper descendant, and her cousins 

Harry Whitin and Jim Whitin. The two families became connected in 1934 by the marriage of George Draper and Sophie Whitin. After the program, Calfee Smith shared family trees that outlined how the families are connected. 

The program presenter was Allison Horrocks, a National Park Service Ranger with the Blackstone River Valley National Historical Park based at Old Slater Mill in Pawtucket, “the first successful water-powered cotton spinning mill in the United States [1793],” according to www.nps.gov.  

The intent of the program, Horrocks’ said, was to answer questions such as, “How did a fairly small amount of people create a textile powerhouse?” and “How do these places emerge from places that are essentially wooded land?,” among others. 

She provided a thorough history of the area from the Indigenous Peoples and English settlers, the settlement of ‘Mother Mendon,’ the creation of the Whitinsville section of Northbridge, Adin Ballou’s short-lived utopian experiment (Hopedale), the rise of the Whitin Machine Works and the Draper Corporation in the textile industry, and much more.

The Draper and Whitin families merged in 1934

According to information provided to the Little Red Shop Museum by Becca Draper King, the Whitin/Draper connection came about when her parents married 90 years ago. 

In 1934, Sophie Whitin (daughter of Paul and Rebecca) of Northbridge married George Draper (son of Clare and Grace) of Hopedale. Their parents knew each other and did business with each other in the textile industry, namely the Whitin Machine Works and the Draper Corporation.

Sophie and George met at the “coming out party” of Lilla Draper (George’s sister). The couple settled in Dover until 1967 when they moved to Boston after George’s retirement.

The event lasted 2.5 hours with many questions from the audience after the presentation.

A full recording of the program is available on Hopedale Cable.

From top: The Little Red Shop Museum is located on the Mill River, at the corner of Freedom and Hopedale Streets, and overlooks the site of the former Draper Mill Complex which was demolished in 2022; Sue Ciaramicoli, Volunteer Coordinator at the Little Red Shop Museum and a member of Hopedale’s Historical Commission, welcomes a large crowd, including members of the Draper and Whitin families, for a presentation on the history of the Drapers of Hopedale and the Whitins of Whitinsville; Allison Horrocks, a National Park Service Ranger based at the Old Slater Mill in Pawtucket, presents “Family Business: Drapers and Whitins” at the Little Red Shop Museum, the original location of the Draper Corporation. Photos: Theresa Knapp