The history of Stuart Flooring Corporation goes back much further than its incorporation date of November 1982. In fact, it goes all the way back to May of 1922. On the 22nd of that month, four local citizens of Patrick County incorporated Stuart Lumber Company in order to utilize the vast timber resource located in and around the county. Those incorporators included: Flem Ross, Joel Marshall, Larkin Cockram, and A. Leon Powell. For the next 17 years, these men rotated as President, General Manager, and Directors. In 1949, the business was sold to Virgil R. Williams, who became President and General Manager. V. R., as he was known, operated the plant with the help of many of his eight sons. (He also had four daughters who were not involved with the business.) His sons worked part time, driving trucks from the time they were 14, handling lumber and ‘fixing’ things. After high school, Buddy Williams, one of V.R.’s sons, went to the Nashville Auto Diesel College in order to come back and keep up Stuart Lumber’s rolling stock. He came on full time in 1957, using his skills on rolling stock as well as flooring machinery. However, the flooring industry hit a peak in 1954 with approximately 120 flooring mills operating in the U. S. (Interestingly, ninety-five percent of the flooring market at the time was in the Northeast.) However, the prosperity was not destined to last. With approval of wall to wall carpet and other alternative flooring products in government loan approved housing, the flooring market took a major and long downturn. By the early 70’s, flooring manufacturing had been reduced to 12 mills in operation.In 1969, Buddy Williams was influential in the company’s decision to expand into particleboard production to pick up the slack from declining flooring sales. The plant employed about 60 employees at this time. Particleboard was already being used extensively in furniture manufacturing. Not only could Stuart Lumber use shavings from the flooring plant to make particleboard, but ninety-five percent of the furniture industry was located within a 100 mile radius of the plant. In the mid 70’s, Stuart Lumber’s particleboard caught the attention of Masonite Corporation who purchased the plant in 1977. As Stuart Board Company, a Division of Masonite Corporation, the primary focus was on particleboard and by 1979, and the number of employees swelled to 200. Masonite decided to close the flooring plant. Buddy was General Manager for several years before deciding to leave the company to handle his father’s (V. R. Williams) properties. Buddy purchased the old Stuart Lumber flooring plant from Masonite in 1982 and incorporated Stuart Flooring Corporation. A new facility was built, and the Stuart Lumber flooring equipment was installed. Production began in July of 1984 with one half line. Stuart Flooring steadily added production and with four lines in 1998, Buddy Williams sold the plant to Tarkett. He remained General Manager until 2003. Gary Birkett took the helm temporarily and until Doug McDaniel came on board as General Manager in 2004.