The Southern Sugar Company

The Southern Sugar Company was set up in 1925 in Florida as part of the businesses of B.G. Dahlberg who had created Celotex - an insulation board brand still around today. The industrial logic was that Celotex required bagasse - a waste product of sugar cane processing as a key ingredient. In 1929 the company operated two factories in Clewiston and Canal Point both in  Florida and a celebratory pamphlet dated January 1929 expected the brightest future. The Great Depression however spelt the end for Southern Sugar: in 1930 the company was put in receivership and in December 1931 the property of the company valued at 15 million US-$ was sold for 900,000 US-$ to a reorganization company (United States Sugar Corporation). Dahlberg continued to successfully manage Celotex.

Preferred stock. Typical design by American Bank Note with a vignette depicting a steam train being loaded with cane delivered by ox-carts from nearby fields. If the 1929 pamphlet is to be believed the actual process was much more mechanized and less romantic…Punchholes and stamped “Specimen”. This specimen will date from the second half of the 1920s.