J. P. SCOTT, proprietor of the Watauga Woolen Mills, and one of the prominent citizens of Carter County, was born in that county August 19, 1834, and is the son of John and Jane (Humphreys) SCOTT. The father was born in Washington County in 1797, and was a soldier of the war of 1812, participating in the battle of Horse Shoe. He was a carpenter by trade, and also followed farming. He was quite prominent during his life, and served as a captain in the militia. He died in 1857. His father was Absalom SCOTT, a native of Scotland, who immigrated to Maryland, where he was married, and then came to Tennessee and settled in Washington County, of which he was one of the pioneers. The mother was born in Carter County, on Doe River, three miles above Elizabethton in 1808, and was the daughter of Elisha HUMPHREYS, a farmer of Carter County. She died in 1868. She was a member of the Baptist Church. To the parents were born nine children, of which our subject is the fifth.
He was reared partly on the farm, and also worked at different trades. In 1869 he associated himself with Messrs. Isaac SLINKER and C. H. LEWIS, and established the Doe River Woolen Mills both of whom were Northern men, and were attracted to the location, and its rare advantages by the report of the State geologists just after the war, and by the lectures delivered in the North by N. G. TAYLOR, the father of the present governor. Remaining with that establishment for about six years, he then sold out his interest in that mill and established the Watauga Mills, of which he is the present proprietor. He was married, in 1870, to Emma Josephine FLETCHER, who was born at Newport, Cocke County, in 1844, and is the daughter of A. J. FLETCHER. To this union seven children have been born, two of whom are dead.
The Watauga Woolen Mills, J. P. Scott, proprietor, of Elizabethton, Tenn., were established in 1876 by the present proprietor. The mills have a daily capacity of about 300 yards, while during the year 1886 upward of 45,000 yards of goods were manufactured. It has water and steam power and 815 spindles, and uses 150 pounds per day. About $15,000 capital is invested. The large two story building is on the Watauga River, one mile from Elizabethton
Transcribed by Kris L. Martin
Source: Goodspeed Publishing Co. History of Tennessee from the Earliest Time to the Present: Together with an Historical and a Biographical Sketch of from Twenty-Five to Thirty Counties of East Tennessee. Chicago: Goodspeed, 1887.