Wright Manufacturing Company At 5201 South Post Oak Rd.

[Highrise Tower]

I was browsing the 1950 Sanborn map when I saw a manufacturing company next door to the Pin Oak Stables located near the present day Westpark & 610/59. 

Anyone remember this plant?  Would love to see some photos.

I could have sworn me and a fellow HAIF member was talking about this last year. I was under the assumption the plant was located on South Post Oak and West Bellfort where Meyer Park Shopping Center would eventually be built.  Searched and couldn't find it.  

Wright Manufacturing Co. made rubber tile, and I think plastics.  Looks like the plant and associated buildings was built in 1949.  It's possible their plastic facility was located further down South Post Oak Road.  Or maybe I'm just confused. 

[Highrise Tower]

A few articles I found.

From the newspaper Southwestern Times dated August 5, 1948:

New Plastics Plant Planned In Section

Construction will begin soon on a $1,000,000 plastics plant at the intersection of Post Oak Road and the S.A. and A.P. railroad tracks, just north of the Bellaire city limits, according to J.B. Dannenbaum, consulting engineer.

Designed for a 16-acre site, the plant will house the Wright Manufacturing Company. An office building, a factory, and a plant facilities will be contained in approximately 130,000 square feet of floor space.

Mr. Dannenbaum stated that 300 persons would be employed at the company for the purpose of manufacturing rubber tile and plastics products.  Paved roads and parking spaces, as well as a railroad spur track, are included among the appurtenances on the plans.

From the newspaper Southwestern Times dated March 3, 1949:

Plastics Plant Will Open In Southwestern Section This April

Football Cleat and Rubber Floor Tile To Be Among Items Made

The Southwestern section bids fair to become the football cleat capitol of the world, among other things, with the opening sometime in April of the $2,000,000 Wright Manufacturing Company plant.

Located on the southeast corner of the intersection of Post Oak Road and the S.A. and A.P. railroad tracks, the plant will specialize in rubber floor tile, offering in addition an assortment of other item including plastic teacups, motor bearings, sink strainers, or for that matter “anything in plastics,” as President Thomas F. Millane has phrased it.

More than 125,000 square feet of floor space is represent in the architect’s sketch above the Wright Manufacturing Company plant, which is now nearing completion at the intersection of Post Oak Road and the S.A. and A.P. tracks at the northern fringe of Bellaire.  The office building at the front has an area of 7000 feet, while the factory at the rear contains 116,000 square feet.  The plastics firm, one of the largest manufactures of rubber tile flooring in the country with plants in Milwaukee and Racine, Wisconsin, has scheduled an April opening.

[Jim Maddox]

My dad was the heavy machinery maintenance guy for Wright Rubber. I think he started working there in the 50s.

Wright sold to Ruberoid who eventually became GAF.

When dad worked there they made asbestos floor tile and those asbestos panels that were used in barns and workshops as sky lights.

Jim@maddoxproperties.com

I think the sky lights were fiberglass with asbestos threads and they were corrugated. Dad brought home a bunch that were damaged and we cut off the damaged portion and used them in our horse barn and garden shed. Can you say asbestosis?