The sudden shutdown of North Carolina Finishing Co. signals a two-fold loss:Some 300 or so jobs apparently are gone, and so is a Rowan County institution.

Three businessmen — Napoleon Bonaparte McCanless, Thomas B. Marsh and M.L. Jackson — organized N.C. Finishing in 1916 as Yadkin Finishing Co., building the plant right on the edge of the river for which it was named.

But the names that spring to mind in connection with the plant are those of men like Julian Robertson and Mort Rochelle.

Robertson, who came here in 1925 as a young textile engineer, led the plant to pre-eminence in its field. Workers at the plant numbered more than 1,100 at one time. They would dye, bleach and finish rolls of cloth for other textile companies to make shirts, pants, sheets, comforters and countless other U.S.-made goods.

Robertson, president of the company from 1939 to 1964, became a community leader. His son, Wall Street wizard Julian Robertson Jr., was the driving force behind a charitable foundation that bears the senior Robertson’s name — The Blanche and Julian Robertson Family Foundation —and has distributed more than $4.3 million to community groups in just the past two years.

Rochelle succeeded Robertson and also headed the plant for a long time, from 1965 to 1990. His strong leadership and gregarious personality endeared him to workers and the community alike. His family established ties to Catawba College —and scholarships —that will benefit the community for years to come.

Like nearly every other business with connections to textiles, N.C. Finishing has been through a string of changes in recent years. In perhaps one of his better moves, Pillowtex CEOChuck Hansen sold N.C. Finishing to Color-Tex in 1998 for $12.5 million, breaking the plant’s decades-old connection to what was once Fieldcrest Mills.

The going has been rough ever since. Though notification to workers Thursday was sudden, neither workers nor suppliers were surprised that business had taken a turn for the worse. Color-Tex announced a restructuring in June, but not much appeared to change. Bills have continued to go unpaid. And the uncertain way word of the closing came out —with workers ordered off the property, but no official public announcement —suggests disarray and disintegration. Workers have not received fair warning or responsible treatment.

Things aren’t what they used to be, for N.C. Finishing, textiles, or the Rowan economy. In the past two years, the county has lost some 3,000 jobs through plant closings and layoffs. Companies closing their Salisbury plants have included Cone Mills, Pillowtex, Ball Corp., Frito-Lay, York International and American & Efird. Carolina Maid in Granite Quarry shut down. Officials announced layoffs at Kosa, Fuchs, Oakwood Homes and —affecting a whopping 1,300 people —Freightliner.

That puts Color-Tex’s closing in the context of a general downturn in the local manufacturing economy. But it can’t relieve the sense of loss and disappointment at the way the company has finished this chapter of what was once a proud history.