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Bona Allen Company

When Washington Allen, father to Bona Allen, Sr., began tanning leather in Gwinnett County, his methods were simple. He bought his hides from the surrounding farmers by paying them one hide of finished leather for each two raw hides delivered to him. He also traded leather for the bark of trees which grew in the district. He soaked his hides in the water of the river running through his farm, treated them with locally-obtained lime to remove the hair, and then tanned them with ground bark mixed with water in pits. This tanning process could take one year or more to complete. Fats from locally slaughtered cattle were used to make the leather pliable, and iron rust was commonly used as the dye. Bona Allen learned the art of tanning from his father.

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The Bona Allen Company, established in 1873, operated a tannery and leather goods factory. Its management met the business threat of the motor age with an assurance that paid off handsomely.

True, there wasn't enough demand to support the industry on the scale of pre-Model T days. But concentration of the few scattered users of saddles, bridles, harnesses and horse collars proved enough to keep Bona Allen well supplied with orders. Furthermore, the firm was a nearly self-contained unit, where the paychecks of the employees found their way back through the firm's own housing scheme, shops, theaters, farm, etc.

Bonaparte Allen, who preferred the shorter version "Bona," was 27 years old when he formed his tannery. At first he began producing only leather but within a few years he was turning out finished whiplashes. This was followed by the production of horse collars and as the business steadily expanded the tannery added other leather articles to be sold under Bona Allen labels.

In 1903, when the company was 30 years old and well on the way to becoming one of the foremost harness factories in the country, a fire swept through the frame buildings and completely destroyed the tannery. Not only did Allen lose about a half-million uninsured dollars he had invested in the firm but Allen's reputation as a manufacturer and business man was so highly regarded that a local bank offered him any amount he chose to borrow to re-establish his business. It wasn't long before he had paid off his loans and again had a thriving business, this time fully insured.

Bona Allen died in 1925 and left the firm in the hands of his three sons, Bona, Jr., John and Victor. Under their management, the company continued to follow the founder's policy of producing what he firmly believed was the best leather in the nation.

The business depression of the early thirties found the firm busier than ever. Farmers who could no longer afford new tractors re-discovered the horse drawn plow. As a result, the Allens' harness business boomed and a nationally circulated magazine of the period acclaimed Buford as "Georgia's depression-proof town.

The trio of brothers continued at the head of the company until the death of Victor, secretary-treasurer and youngest of the three, in 1939. Stanley Allen succeeded him, representing the third generation of Allens to enter the firm.

Until it's demise in 1982, the tannery and leather goods factory may well have been the largest of its kind in the country. Stanley Allen, grandson of the founder and secretary-treasurer of the company, put it this way: "If there's a larger one, we've never heard of it."

As the company's rail link with suppliers, Southern Railway brought in most of the factory's raw materials. Each year, several hundred carloads of cowhides were brought in from stockyards in the Midwest. Other rail shipments included large quantities of coal, lime, tanning extract and miscellaneous supplies.

The same year the Bona Allen Company was founded, the Atlanta and Charlotte Air-Line Railway opened a rail line between those two cities. The Richmond & Danville later leased the line which Southern took over as the R&D's successor and now operates as part of its Charlotte division.

Bona Allen's two major divisions, each housed in separate buildinsg several stories high and a block long, represented a blend of the present and the past. Modern machinery was evident throughout the tannery division, but a great deal of hand labor was still necessary in converting tough, stiff, hair-covered cowhides into smooth, flexible sheets of leather.

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In the "harness" factory, a designation carried over from the heyday of the horse and buggy, the majority of the plant was devoted to manufacturing riding equipment. Here, highly-skilled craftsmen (and women) painstakingly cut, stitched and hand-tooled the high quality Bona Allen leather especially made to withstand rugged use. Saddles, bridles, halters, harnesses, stirrups, and a dozen or more different kinds of riding accessories were cut and assembled in this section.

The company took special pride in its saddle making. At the height of production, some 30,000 to 35,000 saddles were produced and sold annually both in and outside the United States. The Bonal Allen catalog listed 86 different models ranging from simple jump saddles to heavy, ornate "westerns:' The latter carriedy such sagebrush-scented names as "Rio Chico," "Cheyenne Chief," "Texas Quarter Horse," and "Cow Country."

While some designs could be stamped by machine to give the appearance of hand-tooling, the majority of Bona Allen's saddles carried the label "fully hand carved." This meant hours of work with mallet and stamping tools went into carving the intricate floral designs traditional for western saddles.
To the layman, a saddle may appear to be nothing more than a few pieces of leather tacked or riveted to a wooden frame. But an average saddle requires 128 different manufacturing operations. It's no small wonder that cowboys in TV westerns would shoulder their saddles for miles when their horses were crippled or shot.