Their improved lifestyle descended upon them like a pale white spaceship, which is what Toyota's massive auto plant in Princeton looks like and where Richard Greenwell now works.

The existence of the auto plant, plopped in a wind-swept cornfield, separates this southwest corner of Indiana from the rest of the state, which is battered by factory closings. The plant also separates this area from much of the Midwest, which is in the midst of another painful retrenchment of the unionized auto industry -- perhaps the greatest downsizing in Detroit's history.

In contrast, the Toyota factory provides thousands of jobs with paychecks of $60,000 or more a year, company-paid health, dental and vision insurance, a pension plan and a 401(k), and on and on.

For some employees, whose only options had been low-paying jobs, working in the mines or moving elsewhere, it is as if the Japanese company had planted an automated teller machine in a field and invited them to use it at the company's expense.

``Many folks were coming from $8-, $9-, $10-an-hour jobs, and that's a blessing and curse if you get yourself into trouble easy,'' said Tony Dillon, the factory's head of human resources.

Several years ago, Toyota officials noticed that the increase in the number of hardship loans and garnished paychecks was ``growing faster than we were hiring workers,'' said Dillon.

As General Motors, Ford and parts suppliers to those companies shutter factories and slash employment, the new American auto industry is sprouting up in places far different from Detroit. This new version of the U.S. industry includes foreign competitors that aren't saddled with the huge costs associated with the Big Three.

In late 1995, Toyota picked a 1,100-acre cornfield in rural Gibson County, population 32,000. It is far from union strongholds, has good rail links and is about 180 miles from Toyota's Georgetown, Ky., plant.

When Toyota signed the deal to build the plant, it planned to hire 1,500, but the work force has swollen to more than 5,200. And that doesn't include the hundreds hired by Toyota's parts suppliers in the region.

Initially, Toyota predicted it would spend $700 million on the factory. But by 2004, its investment had reached $2.5 billion, according to a study by economists at the University of Evansville and the University of Southern Indiana. By the schools' tallies, the factory's 2004 payroll was $310 million, plus $106 million in benefits, and the facility had spawned nearly 13,000 area jobs.

It is the largest employer for miles. Last year, it gave away nearly $1.9 million to area charities and public organizations; that's the most locally for the company, which, as officials explain, prefers to go slow when using its money and clout.

When the factory opened in 1998, production workers earned $13 an hour. Today, hourly pay after two years on the job is $25 for unskilled workers and $28 for skilled workers.

The sprawling but cramped, seemingly hectic facility operates around the clock. The workers are former miners, farmers, housewives and white-collar workers, experienced factory hands and younger workers with technical degrees. The average age is 37, compared with 50 at General Motors, the nation's largest automaker.

One of the younger Toyota workers is 24-year-old Billy Griswold, a tall, hefty man who has a two-year degree in tool-and-die technology. After finishing his studies, he went to work at Toyota's Georgetown, Ky., plant. But he missed his family and came home.

At first, the factory hired only from within 50 miles, but it extended that boundary to 75 miles as hiring increased. About one in 10 applicants is hired, and the plant's turnover rate is less than 3 percent, Toyota officials said.

Despite the explosion of money from Toyota, a sudden makeover of the region hasn't taken place. Princeton, the county seat, population 8,600, seems asleep; a number of stores on its downtown square are closed or empty.

Mayor Robert J. Hurst acknowledged the downtown has problems and many residents have low incomes. But that's not the point, said Hurst. What matters, he said, is that Toyota money is flowing into the area, which is why he predicts that Princeton probably will land a new movie theater complex and a newer, bigger Wal-Mart store.

This is cache, read story here