Mill Comes Back From the Dead, Town Follows

"Eight years ago, a paper mill closed in this remote corner of the western Adirondacks, taking with it more than 100 jobs. Most of the 75 houses in this speck of a hamlet a two-hour drive from Canada soon fell into disrepair, their frames thrashed by weather and hardship."

"It is a familiar story: industry leaves, jobs disappear, hardscrabble town is left adrift. Not Newton Falls. As if in a fairy tale, the shuttered mill has come back to life, thanks to a healthy dose of luck, a longtime paper executive’s willingness to take a chance, and the unbending commitment of two men to the place where they had labored for two decades."

"For eight months now, the mill has churned out an average of 200 tons of coated paper a day, or 2,000 feet per minute, 54 percent more than it did before it went dark."

"The mill received close to 600 applications last summer for 77 jobs; 104 people work there now, up from 97 when it reopened. About half had toiled at the mill before it closed and left other jobs to come back."