1929 – Hundreds gathered for the grand opening of the Southern Sugar Company’s new sugar mill in Clewiston on this date. The Southern Sugar Company had purchased land and equipment from the Pennsylvania Sugar Company (PENNSUCO) in the early 1920s and set up the mill in Clewiston on the north side of the Lake Okeechobee. By the late 1930's however, the Southern Sugar Corporation fell victim to the national economic depression and went bankrupt. In 1931, the industrialist Charles Stewart Mott bought the defunct Southern Sugar Corporation, renaming it the United States Sugar Corporation and turned the company into one of the largest agricultural operations in the world, and one of the largest sugar production facilities in the county. The company is still based out of Clewiston and can process up to 38,000 tons of sugar cane per day as well as other agricultural products such as citrus and vegetables.