KINGSPORT BOTTLING COMPANY

In the 1943 Kingsport City Directory there is a new bottling company listed at 312 East Sullivan Street, in what was once the Nesbitt-Fleenor Bottling Company.(1) This bottling company was called the Kingsport Bottling Company, no not the same one that had existed on Boone Street, and has a John L. Palmer listed as Manager, and William M. Fleenor listed as Bottler.(1) According to the March 9, 1944 Kingsport Times News, charges were filed against "two partners and a former manager of the Kingsport Canteen (a serviceman club) Company" which was operating at the Holston Ordnance Works, for conspiring to defraud the US Government.(2) So what does this have to do with the Kingsport Bottling Company? Keep reading.

The same article continues by reporting that the three men were "Robert A. Wellons, I. W. Stewart, both of Charlotte, NC, the partners, and Roy C. King, also a North Carolinian, former manager of the canteen."(2) Kingsport Bottling Company, formally Nesbitt-Fleenor which is most likely why William M. Fleenor is still in the picture, was leased by Stewart and Wellons, assigning ownership in the names of Stewart's son and Wellons' wife, selling the product to the canteen, and using government trucks to transport the product to the canteen.(2) They leased the company for one year and allowed their option to renew to lapse, so the company only operated for one year in 1943, and you can see what happened to the company.(2)

This is 312 the location of the Kingsport Bottling Company

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