Robert E. Cline ’48

Robert E. Cline ’48 of Hickory, died July 12, 2006, from complications of pneumonia. He was a veteran of World War II. As a businessman, he served as president of Southern Elastic Corporation and J.A. Cline & Son, Burke County’s oldest hosiery mill. He served on the boards of First National Bank of Catawba County, Bank of Granite, Frye Regional Medical Center, First Security Co. and Ridgeview Mills of Newton. He also was a fifty-year Rotarian and Paul Harris Fellow. He was deeply involved with the Hickory Museum of Art, Catawba Science Center, Catawba Arts Council, Sipe’s Orchard Home, CPCC, Western Piedmont Symphony, N.C. Symphony, N.C. Dance Theatre, Hickory Soup Kitchen, the Salvation Army, Hickory Community Theatre, United Way, March of Dimes, North State Academy, Lenoir-Rhyne College, Holy Trinity Lutheran Church and, most recently, The Montessori Children’s House of Newton. Survivors include his daughter, Mary Helen Cline, 419 West 6th St., Hickory, N.C., 28658; a son, Robert Eugene Cline, Jr. of Charlotte; and two sisters, Nancy C. Shuford of Hickory and Martha C. Cobb of Hay Market, Va. He was preceded in death by his wife, Marion Gaither Cline of Hickory.