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Knoxville Glove Company To Close

A company that has been manufacturing gloves in Knoxville for 99 years will shut its doors this Friday.  The Knoxville Glove Company formed in 1914 and at its peak in the 1960's, it employed 350 people, manufacturing sturdy industrial gloves for clients like the Department of Defense and NASA.  But the domestic glove industry has long since buckled under the strain of foreign competition and these days, Knoxville Glove Company employs just 15 workers.  In a 2011 article in Metro Pulse, owner Rod Townsend Jr. described his small factory as "the detritus of the entire American glove industry."