L&P is sponsoring Third Thursday on October 20. From 5:30 PM to 8:30 PM CDT, stop by Main Street in Downtown Joplin, Missouri, to join the fun!
We will be accepting donations to support the local United Way, and there will be free activities for you to enjoy. For kids, we will have games, a Truck or Treat with candy, and pumpkin decorating. We’ll also have free bags of popcorn and a festive fall photo station.
We hope to see you there—find us by the big rig!
On October 7, L&P joined manufacturers across the United States to celebrate Manufacturing (MFG) Day.
MFG Day gives us a chance to celebrate our amazing employees who further our mission to produce quality products for our customers and allows us to showcase the opportunities in modern manufacturing.
To celebrate, our Carthage Spring branch hosted an in-person MFG Day event, inviting the local community and schools to tour the facility, check out one of our semi-trailer trucks, enjoy a cookout lunch, play cornhole, and win L&P merchandise. Some L&P employees invited their families to the branch so they could show them what they do while at work.
L&P also participated in the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Virtual MFG Day livestream. During the livestream, Randall Wood, VP of Manufacturing-Spring and Foam, gave a presentation and answered questions from students and teachers across Missouri. You can watch the Virtual MFG Day recording here.
We are proud to provide manufacturing jobs across the United States and we have many open positions! Join us today: Find Your Career at Leggett & Platt
Take a look at these amazing photos of one of our drivers visiting an elementary school in Carthage, Missouri!
The school hosted a convoy of trucks for their students as part of Truck Driver Appreciation Week. Students got to tour the truck and even sit in the cab. What a fun day!
September is Suicide Prevention Month, and we want to raise awareness about the new 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline—a phone number you can call or text to receive free and confidential support.
If you or someone you know needs help, connect to hope. Call or text 988, or chat at 988lifeline.org, to speak to a trained crisis counselor 24/7/365.
Did you know?
We’re a global company, operating in 18 countries, with nearly 20,000 people strong!
Wherever you are, join us today: Find Your Career at Leggett & Platt
At L&P, we are always looking for the best & brightest talent to join our team.
If you want to be a part of our Doors Internship program, visit our careers site at careers.leggett.com. We’d love to see you here!
We take pride in making products that make life more comfortable.
In 2021, we donated more than 900 mattresses, 100 innerspring units, and 40 bedframes to aid in disaster relief, homelessness and crisis recovery, and refugee resettlement.
Leggett & Platt recently made a donation of 200 medium respirator masks, 725 large respirator masks, and 250 filters to Franklin Technology Center Adult Education and High School students in Joplin, Missouri.
Attending the donation are (from left) Vanessa Gile, Commodity Manager at L&P; Nikki Medley, Effectiveness Coordinator at FTC; Dave Rockers, FTC Director; Joe Flynn, Tech Teacher at FTC; Doug Donnel, Collision Repair Instructor at FTC; and Dustin Riner, Maintenance Supervisor at L&P.
This photo and article were originally published by The Joplin Globe | Roger Nomer.
Last week, we introduced you to one of the exhibitions currently on display at the George A. Spiva Center for the Arts. L&P has a long history of supporting the arts in our community and are a corporate sponsor of their organization. The show, scheduled to run through March 13th, is a perfect representation of the importance of this philanthropy — educating all of us about the history of the Joplin community, while also highlighting the accomplishments and work of African American artists, musicians, athletes, and poets.
Spiva’s Main Gallery exhibit, Route 66: Crossing Cultural Lines, showcases more than 100 works by some of America’s premier painters, sculptors, textile artists, poets, and photographers. These works highlight the significant role that Route 66 played in cross-pollinating cultures throughout our country.
“The artists are presenting their interpretations of the stories associated with the highway,” says curator Sara Sonié Joi Thompson-Ruffin. “These experiences include professional baseball, territory bands, jazz musicians, civil rights crusades, military bases, or hopping in that big red truck to search for that perfect place to go camping and fishing. Art is a powerful tool of the truth, and these artists serve as our custodial documenters of our past.”
Fiber artist and designer, Kim Newton, is one of several artists featured in the exhibit. Kim has been recognized as one of the top 100 African Americans in corporate America, having served as Senior Vice President of Consumer Experience of the Hallmark Brand, where she’s enjoyed a 20-plus year career. She’s also been named to the 2017 class of The Henry Crown Fellow by the Aspen Institute and serves as a member of The Executive Leadership Council, The Network of Executive Women, African-American Artist Collective, The Links, Inc. and Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.
Kim Newton is an accomplished Fiber Artist and Designer. She is featured above with two of her textiles – a depiction of Langston Hughes, a Joplin native and poet, novelist, fiction writer, playwright, and Harlem Renaissance pioneer (left); and a depiction of an African American woman using real jewelry as a 3D element of the piece (right).
Kim’s grandmother taught her traditional quilting when she was 22. She evolved to a modern approach to the craft, putting herself and her experiences into the storytelling. Instantly recognized as unique, she had the opportunity to feature her quilts in her first show at 28, and eventually secured her first solo show in May of 2020. She works almost exclusively with Indonesian batik fabric because of their color vibrancy, symbolic meaning, and workmanship. She believes the variation of the fabric brings movement to and enhances the emotion of her pieces.
Click here to take a virtual tour of the Spiva Center for the Arts exhibition.
This textile by Sara Sonié Joi Thompson-Ruffin, titled “Outside My Picture Window / Mayfair 33502”, is displayed with a list of the streets of East Town, Joplin. The artwork represents the historic African American community where the artist was raised and nurtured. The exhibition at the George A. Spiva Center for the Arts is open through March 13th.
Anyone who has visited L&P’s Corporate Office has seen the extensive collection of paintings which grace our hallways. Two of our former CEOs, Harry Cornell and Felix Wright, were passionate collectors of fine art. This appreciation led to Leggett & Platt’s long history of supporting the arts within our local community. The current exhibition at the George A. Spiva Center for the Arts is a perfect representation of the importance of this philanthropy — educating all of us about the history of the Joplin community, while also highlighting the accomplishments and work of African American artists, musicians, athletes, and poets.
The show, scheduled to run through March 13th, features three unique exhibits, curated by nationally acclaimed fabric artist and Joplin native, Sara Sonié Joi Thompson-Ruffin. Her own work is featured in one of those exhibits, entitled Journey: Legacy, East Town.
According to Ms. Thompson-Ruffin’s artist statement, East Town is an exhibition curated in a mixture of textiles designed to engage the viewer in a visual conversation. Many of these textiles are accompanied by poetry written by Sonia Sanchez, a writer and educator considered by many to be the leading female voice of the Black Revolution.
“This collection is a touchstone of accounts, experiences, and contributions of Joplin’s East Town,” says Sara. “It shares a people’s journey, facing the hardships and adversities of building a viable community during a time when African Americans were not welcomed to live in or around Missouri and its surrounding areas.”
The work also highlights the rich resiliency of Joplin’s historic African American community, where she was raised and nurtured.
“The African American residents of Joplin persevered through all adversities. They used their talents, gifts, and education to build a strong and vibrant community in spite of all the challenges that besieged them,” shares Sara. “We are all the legacy of their gifts.”