Val-Kill Industries

In 1927 with Nancy Cook at the helm, the three friends (plus Caroline O'Day as a partner) opened a small furniture factory on site, and hired several skilled wood workmen (NYC immigrants) to produce fine American reproduction furniture. Eleanor Roosevelt bought many pieces, encouraged purchases by her friends, and Val-Kill had sales exhibits in NYC. Although they never were able to employ a large number of local workers, as Nancy and Eleanor and FDR had hoped would be a precursor of later New Deal employment projects, for about a decade they kept the business going during the most difficult years of the Depression. They demonstrated the business interests of the New Woman. Val-Kill furniture today is prized by collectors.