Dade County FlArchives Biographies.....Wells, Richard M. 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Nancy Rayburn http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00025.html#0006128 January 14, 2016, 11:02 pm

Source: Vol. II  pg.153-154  The Lewis Publishing Co. 1923
Author: History of Florida, Past and Present   

        RICHARD M. WELLS is founder and president of the Miami Mattress
Company, now one of the flourishing industries of this south Florida city. He
has been a resident of Florida and in the mattress manufacturing business since
1908.
        Mr. Wells was born in Mason County, Kentucky, and he was only twelve 
years of age when his father died, since which time he has depended upon his 
own wits, ingenuity and effort to achieve success. He attended the common 
schools, and from his earnings made by selling papers and operating a laundry 
agency he took a two-year course in business college at Lexington, Kentucky. He 
was in the service of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad in Kentucky, served 
as a station agent, and while with that company at Birmingham, Alabama, he 
resigned to get into the commercial field. He was in the flour business for a 
time, and in 1908 came to Florida and at Pensacola founded the Pensacola 
Mattress Company. This business was continued there until the summer of 1917, 
and in August of that year he established the Miami Mattress Company, of which 
he is sole proprietor. The output of his plant is mattresses and box springs, 
and they have widely distributed throughout wholesale houses in Florida and the 
southeastern states. The mattresses and springs represent the highest quality 
to the trade, and this standard has been achieved through Mr. Wells’ long 
experience and personal attention to the details of his business. His original 
plant was opened August 21, 1917, in a room 20 by 60 feet, and with a capacity 
of twenty mattresses a day. Since then the industry has grown by additional 
quarters, equipment and increase of operating force, and recently he moved his 
operations to a new factory building at Thirteenth and Miami Court, formerly 
known as Jones and Rickner streets.
	Mr. Wells is a member of the Miami Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary
Club. His most valuable assistant in his business career has been Mrs. Wells,
who was born in Georgia and whose name before her marriage was Miss LILLY IVIE.
They have one son, RICHARD M. Jr.



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