Ralph Wilson, Sr.

According to Wikipedia's history of Wilsonart, Ralph Wilson came to Texas to retire after a heart attack, but American Desk owner Arthur Brashear urged him to open a laminate company beside the school-desk factory. Ralph Wilson Plastics began in 1956 across the street from its first customer. Sixteen competitors already sold decorative laminate, and Formica held 65 percent of the market. Wilson's edge was speed: the company promised nearly any product within ten days, against as many as twenty-five elsewhere. It sold shares to the public in 1964.

What the plaque says

Ralph Wilson, Sr. With only a high school education, Ralph Wilson moved to California from Indiana in 1920 and began working in an ornamental plaster and concrete business, making and selling decorative architectural pieces for public buildings. In 1928, he bought the company he worked for and managed to remain solvent throughout the 1930s. During World War II, his company switched to manufacturing molds for rubber bullet-proof gasoline tanks, and later, began experimenting with molding plastic. After the war, he became interested in high-pressure decorative laminate. His entry into this market was sold under the brand name Laminart. This product could be used to surface countertops and furniture such as tables and school desks. Laminart became widely accepted amid California's expanding construction enterprises. Following a heart attack in 1954, he sold the company and planned to retire, but the break was short-lived. Partnering with American Desk Company and the Wynnewood Group, he founded Ralph Wilson Plastics (now Wilsonart International) in Temple. In the next few years, he transformed this new enterprise into what over time became the nation's and later the world's largest producer of high-pressure decorative laminate. Wilson shared his wealth with the community. His will established the Ralph Wilson Public Trust that poured thousands of dollars annually into the community through non-profit organizations serving the arts, people with special needs, children and the poor. Wilson's lasting legacy of generosity and public service continues through the Ralph Wilson Youth Club that he founded. (2015)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Temple Railroad and Heritage Museum — 1.1 mi
  The Santa Fe depot of 1911 in a railroad town that began in 1880 as a construction camp, now a museum with locomotives and cars parked beside the active rail yard.
• Mother Neff State Park — 18 mi
  A Leon River park that grew from six acres Isabella Neff left the state in her 1921 will, where Civilian Conservation Corps Company 817 built a stone tower, a pavilion and roads in the 1930s.
• Milam County Courthouse and Jail — 28 mi
  Cameron's 1892 Renaissance Revival courthouse and the 1895 St. Louis-built jail beside it, now the county museum, are listed together on the National Register.

More markers nearby

• Log Cabin Study of Dr. Arthur Carroll Scott — 0.2 mi
• W. Goodrich Jones (1860-1950) — 0.5 mi
• Former Site of Scott & White School of Nursing — 0.6 mi
• Scott & White Hospital — 0.6 mi