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    Greensboro
    Greensboro
    Greensboro
    Ebook165 pages52 minutes

    Greensboro

    By Kevin Reid

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    About this ebook

    Greensboro has reinvented itself in recent decades. By the time of its 1958 sesquicentennial, Greensboro was North Carolina s second-largest city and the world s largest producer of denim. It was home to many textile companies, including the world s largest; major insurance firms; and manufacturers of other products. Greensboro holds an important place in the civil rights movement, with the sit-ins at Woolworth s department store, a site now preserved as the International Civil Rights Center & Museum. In 1982, a grocery store opened in Greensboro that wanted to bring the old-fashioned market experience back to consumers. The Fresh Market has since expanded to over 100 stores in more than 20 states. Greensboro s roster of colleges and universities has grown over the years, and it remains a key education and research center. Founded in 1991, RF Micro Devices, Greensboro s largest company, makes components of most cell phones. Greensboro showcases the rich commercial and community history of this city over the past 50 years.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateJul 21, 2014
    ISBN9781439646281
    Greensboro
    Author

    Kevin Reid

    Author Kevin Reid, who moved to Greensboro in 1948, has been a writer since 1981. Images from this title have been collected from personal collections and local museums and organization.

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    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed the photos and captions in this book, partly because I used to live in Greensboro, and recognised several names as well as locations.

    Book preview

    Greensboro - Kevin Reid

    completed.

    INTRODUCTION

    In 1958, Greensboro celebrated its sesquicentennial. Indeed, there was much to celebrate. The textile industry, which had begun in the 1830s in Greensborough, as it was spelled then, and which was enhanced by the placement of the North Carolina Railroad and the Cone brothers’ discovery of the area, was reaching its peak. Cone Mills was the world’s top producer of denim and, with its manufacturing operations more concentrated here, the top employer in the city. Burlington Industries was the world’s largest textile company, and Blue Bell was the top manufacturer of overalls. Greensboro was also an insurance center, to the point of being referred to as the Hartford of the South. Another feather in the city’s cap was Vicks, the producer of Vicks VapoRub and other nationally known health care products. The city had landed a major manufacturing plant for tobacco giant P. Lorillard as well as a major distribution center for Sears, Roebuck and Co. Furthermore, the city was filled with colleges. Women’s College, North Carolina A&T, Greensboro College, and Bennett College were within walking distance of downtown. Guilford College was just west, in its namesake town that would eventually become annexed into the city.

    Greensboro had recently extended its boundaries. It began in 1957 with 18.4 square miles within its city limits, but on July 1 of that year, it added more than 31 square miles by annexing the town of Hamilton Lakes, the community of Bessemer, and areas to the north and south of the city.

    After a failed attempt to build an arena on North Elm Street, the Greensboro Coliseum was dedicated on Lee Street at the fairgrounds site on October 24, 1959. The coliseum has continued to expand over the years. It has played a key role in the city’s history and remains the most important building in Greensboro. In the last half century, when outsiders have read a newspaper article or seen a dateline of Greensboro, it has more likely than not touched on something that took place at the coliseum.

    The colleges, particularly A&T, played a major role in social change, which arguably was Greensboro’s greatest contribution to history in the period since its sesquicentennial. There is no question that the actions of A&T students, and those who joined them in their cause, spurred integration in the South.

    The colleges continued to grow. Women’s College and A&T became universities. Branches of Guilford Technical Community College came to town, as did the law school of a university not far past the county line to the east. In a changing economy, GTCC has become a key resource for retraining displaced workers and preparing Greensboro natives for what is needed in the new workforce.

    At the beginning of the 1960s, downtown Greensboro was still known as the place to shop for clothes. Major department stores Belk, Meyers, and Ellis Stone were in the heart of downtown, and Sears, Roebuck and Co., Montgomery Ward, Kress, and others had a strong retail presence there. Men’s clothing stores, such as Hall Putnam, Younts-DeBoe, and Vanstory’s, and women’s shops, like Montaldo’s, Prago Guys, and Brownhills, brought shoppers downtown. After Friendly Shopping Center opened, downtown had competition, but it was still king. The game, however, was starting to change. When the Four Seasons Mall opened in the 1970s, downtown no longer was the place to shop. The haberdasheries, boutiques, and department stores began an exodus.

    When it comes to major-league sports, the Professional Golfers’ Association of America (PGA) has been a constant presence in Greensboro since the Greater Greensboro Open started here in 1938. After a hiatus because of World War II, PGA golf has presented an annual event in Greensboro. The tournament has changed names, changed courses, and changed the month in which it is played, but it continues to entertain Greensboro golf enthusiasts and draw others to the city each year. The Wyndham Championship continues to attract the superstars of golf.

    The Greensboro Coliseum hosted the highest-ranked sports teams to play here. The Carolina Cougars played in the American Basketball Association (ABA), an upstart league set up in 1967 to compete with the established National Basketball Association. The Cougars took over for the old Houston Mavericks franchise in 1969 and stayed until 1974. Based at the coliseum, the Cougars played 30 percent of their home games in Charlotte and 30 percent of their home games in Raleigh, even though they drew much better while in Greensboro. Their best season was 1972–1973, when they made the playoffs and had the ABA Player of the Year (Billy Cunningham) and ABA Coach of the Year (Larry Brown). Upon the disintegration of the ABA, a few teams were able to merge into the NBA, but not the Cougars. After the 1973–1974 season, the Cougars moved to St. Louis.

    Greensboro also had a National Hockey League (NHL) team. After the 1996 season, the Hartford Whalers announced they were leaving for North Carolina, where they would be known as the Carolina Hurricanes. The first two years the Hurricanes played in the state, they competed at the Greensboro Coliseum while a new arena in

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