Greensboro's Treasured Places

Landmark House in Southside's New Lease on Life

One of Greensboro’s most interesting historic houses is getting a major makeover.

The William Fields House at 447 Arlington Street near Southside was constructed between 1875 and 1879 (image, right). The two-story brick structure was designed in the Gothic Revival style of architecture, an unusual theme in the American South where steep-pitched roofs and narrow windows were not well-suited for sultry summers. Southerners popularized the low-rooflines and protective overhanging eaves of the Italianate style, a theme well-represented in the Gate City. In contrast to numerous Italianate-style homes, Greensboro has only three Gothic Revival structures, which is considered a high number compared to other cities in the state.

The house was built by William Absolum Fields, a manufacturer of plug tobacco when Greensboro had a bustling tobacco industry. Fields first bought the parcel from Joseph Shields, a northern developer who planned a suburban village near today’s Southside neighborhood named Shieldstown. Though the village concept never came to fruition, Fields bought his lot on Arlington Street (then named South Davie Street) for $550 (image, right - house marked in pink).

The sophisticated and unusual design of the house, featuring quatrefoils, wall-dormers, and a bay window, has been attributed to Greensboro resident Lyndon Swaim. Swaim’s own residence, located at the corner of East Washington and Lyndon streets (destroyed), was designed in the Gothic Revival style. Oral history referenced Swaim as the designer of the Gothic Revival-style Dixon-Leftwich-Murphy House on North Church Street (still standing). Swaim served as the editor and owner of Greensboro’s early newspaper the Patriot, before reinventing himself as an architect.

Fields and his wife Annie occupied the residence for over 30 years until it was sold in 1908 to the Starr family. By 1912 the house was used as the parsonage of Centenary Methodist Church, and many weddings, parties, and church gatherings were held at the home.

By 1979, the house was in poor condition when it attracted the eye of antique dealer and interior designer Carol Johnson. Johnson began a restoration program that included paint removal, but work faltered before completion and the property was acquired by the Old Greensboro Preservation Society. The Society was a nonprofit organization focused on the preservation of the historic core of the city. They adopted the Fields House as their headquarters in 1984 – placing the property on the National Register of Historic Places a year later (image, right: 2005 before restoration).

Today, the 134-year-old house is being restored by Southside developer Bob Isner. Using federal and state restoration tax credits, county historic property abatements, and incentive funding from the city, Isner is completing a comprehensive restoration of the house that includes repointing of the exterior brick walls, refurbishment of the historic windows, refinishing of interior oak floors and hand-plastered walls, and installation of new restrooms for use as an office. Upon completion, one of Greensboro’s most historic places will have earned a new lease on life.

Greensboro is unusual in that numerous historic sites such as the Fields House have been retained to document the early history of the community. Throughout downtown, historic structures remain standing in the shadow of skyscrapers and civic structures. It is the dichotomy of architecture and history that make Greensboro stand out among major cities in North Carolina. With this preservation project, the Gate City steps forward on the foundations of our past.

South Elm Street Makes Greensboro Cool

I have never heard someone from Charlotte say "I went to Greensboro the other day and their roller coasters are so cool."

I have never heard someone from Raleigh say "I was in Greensboro yesterday and the mall there is so cool."

I have heard people from both cities (and others) say "I was in Greensboro last weekend and South Elm Street is so cool!" In fact, I know some folks who enjoy a get-away weekend here to enjoy the art galleries, coffee shops, theatres, and restaurants...in the kind of urban environment that is rare in North Carolina. South Elm Street has made Greensboro cool.

The News and Record's Jeri Rowe wrote two great articles on our eclectic South Elm Street, the heart of the Old Greensboro Historic District. He captured the spirit of the neighborhood, including the blend of uses, attitudes, backgrounds, and architecture (image, right) that is special to that part of downtown. The photo essay by Jerry Wolford is fantastic. If you are not from Greensboro...or you don't take the paper, it's worth a perusal.

I am inspired to clarify the characteristics of a family of buildings that exist along South Elm Street that I pointed out to Jeri in our discussion. I am not aware of any other buildings in the state that have the same features. To my knowledge they are unique to the Gate City. Maybe later this week if I have some time.

Expanding North Carolina's Architectural IQ

What's your North Carolina architectural IQ? Who is your favorite local architect or builder? Chances are, your IQ will skyrocket and your favorite designers will multiply after visiting the new Biographical Dictionary of Architects and Builders in North Carolina website.
 
The effort to record biographies of Tar Heel architects began during the research for the publication Architects and Builders in NC in the 1980s. Many of the initial biographical sketches, each with building lists, were completed by architectural historians Catherine Bisher, Charlotte Brown, Carl Lounsbury, and Ernest Wood. Recently, many others were prepared by contributing authors, including Angie Clifton and Dave Delcambre and several students from UNCG’s historic preservation program.
 
The basic format is similar to the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, with each entry signed by the author. The entries are pretty brief, from one to five or six pages, depending on the importance and extent of the person's work. Included are both residents of the state and out of state figures that did major work in NC.

Greensboro is well represented on the website, featuring twenty-five designers ranging from A. J. Davis to Edward Loewenstein to W. L. Stoddart. Explore each biography to learn how they contributed to Greensboro’s architectural landscape!

In time, the website is sure to grow even larger as additional architects and designers are added to the list. Several Gate City architects such as James Raleigh Hughes, Lorenzo S. Winslow, and Harry Simmonds have yet to be added.

Thanks to all who contributed to this great new resource for exploring North Carolina’s rich architectural history.

What Can Greensboro Learn from Butte Montana?

Butte goes by many nicknames - The richest hill on earth; The Gibraltar of unionism; The ugliest town in the world; The most pictorial place in America, and most recently, The nation’s largest Superfund site. It is the home of the Butte-Anaconda National Historic Landmark District, the National Folk Festival, and was host to the Vernacular Architecture Forum Conference, of which I was an attendee last week.

The city grew from a mining camp on the side of what most in Greensboro would consider a mountain, over 5,000 feet in elevation in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. The mountain was discovered to hold one of the largest copper deposits in the United States – a fact that brought great prosperity to the region with rapidly increasing demand for copper due to the burgeoning electronics and munitions industry.

Between 1890 and 1920, mining for copper resulted in an explosion in the city’s population and an accompanying housing shortage. Just as Greensboro grew from a village into a city during the same period, Butte boomed into a nationally recognized industrial center and the largest city between Minneapolis, Minnesota and Spokane, Washington.

Butte was not coy in its position as a mining town. The city featured a Chinatown for the segregated Chinese, a Millionaires Club for the mine owners, a red light district for the lonesome, and lots and lots of mines. Mines drove the wealth of the town, and their entrances were located where geology dictated them to be – not where zoning laws restricted them. Unlike Greensboro’s wealth-generating mills and factories that were located on the outskirts of the Gate City, Butte’s mines were sprinkled throughout the city adjacent to schools, churches, playgrounds, and houses. Mining operations in Butte are not represented by a simple hole in the ground. Rather, they are flagged by massive and towering headframes – or industrial elevators – used to transport workers and ore from underground tunnels up to the earth’s surface.

Dealing with the high-profile headframes is the first lesson in what Butte is doing right. Instead of abandoning its unique history by tearing down the headframes in an effort to make the city look for like any other place, Butte has embraced its industrial past by celebrating the headframes in the city’s skyline. It is illegal to destroy a headframe, many of which are lit at night or used as trademarks for parks and redevelopment projects. Could the Gate City identify a similar iconic feature from our past – such as textile mill buildings or the elaborate cornices that topped most commercial buildings along Elm Street – and celebrate their role in keeping Greensboro a unique and authentic American city? (image, right) Could Greensboro adopt an iconic feature as the headframes have become for Butte?

As Butte exploded in growth in the early twentieth century, the once-modest settlement was graced with grand civic structures, towering skyscrapers, and sophisticated hotels designed by America’s most talented architects. Demand for real estate expanded shops and apartments beyond the intersection of Main and Broadway. Other streets grew in importance, including Park Street – the site of the Metals Bank Building designed by New York’s Cass Gilbert (image, right). Granite Street featured the new county courthouse. The Mother Lode Theatre located on Park Street. These landmark sites are united by the fabric of the city in the form of shop fronts and civic spaces.

Unlike downtown Greensboro, which focuses like a laser beam along South Elm Street, Butte’s uptown (so-named because it is on a mountain!) spreads over a broad area. Imagine replacing Greensboro’s sprawling parking lots along Edgeworth, Smith, and Church streets with mid-rise structures. Butte is endowed with a dense downtown, and though some notable losses of architecture have occurred, new buildings are being added that match the scale and character of the old (image, right).

At its peak, Butte is estimated to have sported a population of over 40,000. Today the city has only three-quarters of that number. In order to preserve its historic core in spite of depopulation, the city has recognized most of its center as an “Historic overlay zone”.

The overlay is a special zoning designation that protects the historical significance of existing structures by prohibiting the undue moving, removal or demolition of these structures. Much more stringent that the current Design Guidelines being considered in the Gate City, Butte’s overlay zone goes much further to promote the preservation of historic sites, structures, and buildings by addressing preservation issues at the local level and integrating them into the planning and decision making process. In doing so, the city recognizes that preservation enhances the visual character of the city by:
• Encouraging preservation ideals;
• Encouraging maintenance of the present housing stock;
• Promoting the tourist industry within Butte through the preservation of historically significant buildings and structures;
• Enhancing the property values of Butte through the preservation of historic buildings and structures;
• Fostering public appreciation of and civic pride in the beauty of the community and the accomplishments of the past; and by
• Safeguarding the heritage of the community by providing for the protection of historic buildings and structures representing significant elements of its history.

In enforcing this ordinance, Butte means business. Any person, firm or corporation who omits, neglects, or refuses to do any act required in these provisions or removes, moves or demolishes any building, headframe or pertinent element located in the historic overlay zoning district without approval shall be subject to a fine of not more than five hundred dollars or six months in jail or both!

Greensboro need not become Butte, Montana. To paraphrase Lady Bird Johnson “I want Greensboro to look like Greensboro and Butte to look like Butte”. Greensboro is doing some great things that serve this city well. However, Butte is exercising some actions that preserve the city’s character and enhance the economy that might also serve the Gate City well.

On Elm Street, A Chapter of History Is Preserved

A touchstone to Greensboro’s commercial past now enjoys an extra level of recognition…and protection.

Last night, the Meyer’s Department Store building at the corner of South Elm Street and February One Place was designated as a Guilford County Landmark Property by the Greensboro City Council. The owner-requested designation was unanimously approved by council following a favorable recommendation from the county’s historic preservation commission.

The Meyer’s building was constructed in 1924 according to plans devised by Greensboro architect Harry Barton. Barton designed several other important downtown buildings, including the Guilford County Courthouse on West Market Street and the Cone Export and Commission Building (now the Community Foundation) on South Greene Street. He also designed the Quad complex at UNCG now being considered for adaptive reuse or demolition.

Rising five-stories above Elm Street, the Meyers building incorporates terra cotta tile, pressed grey brick, and granite in a Neoclassical composition that includes pilasters, and a handsome projecting cornice. The street level of the building features an ornate art nouveau-inspired frieze with floral and foliage motifs. Only the exterior of the building is designated as historic. Interior spaces have been adaptively reused for office space and will remain unrestricted.

The department store was founded by William D. Meyer in 1904. Meyer’s store enjoyed rapid growth and expansion throughout the early twentieth century alongside the city of Greensboro. However, as shopping trends changed in the 1920s, Meyers needed even more space. Prior to World War I, department stores across the county kept their merchandise hidden away in drawers and storage rooms, brought out for customer inspection only by sales clerks. After the War, merchants discovered the profitability of impulse buying by displaying merchandise on the sales floor. Shoppers were likely to buy things that caught their eye upon passing, thereby increasing sales.

The Meyer’s building reflects this important change, with a grand street-front and open sales floor, large windows to allow lots of sunlight to penetrate the buildings interior, and even elevators and air conditioning. Upon opening, the basement contained women’s ready-to-wear clothing, yarns, and a lunch counter. The primary floor featured expensive silks, linens, laces, gloves, stationery, leather good, silverware, and jewelry. Upper floors housed a post office, a home décor department, and stockrooms.

The Meyers Department Store played a crucial role in the early Civil Rights movement in Greensboro. After the sit-ins of 1960 at the nearby Woolworth’s and Kress stores, Meyer’s was part of the dialog that occurred between middle-income black and white customers to redefine segregated spaces. Many black customers returned their Meyers charge cards until the facility was entirely desegregated. In 1974, Meyers became a Jordan Marsh Department Store, which closed the Elm Street location when it relocated to Four Seasons Mall in 1978.

Designation as a local landmark carries with it responsibilities and rewards. Owners of such properties must have plans for alterations approved by the Guilford County Preservation Commission, a quasi-judicial board of appointed members. Upon approval, a Certificate of Appropriateness is issued for alterations and improvements. In exchange for the upkeep and maintenance of an historic site, the county provides a 50% property tax reduction for participating properties. The county’s preservation program has been in place since 1980, and is a product of interest raised during America’s Bicentennial celebrations in 1976. The program has been proven to be a useful tool in economic development by encouraging reinvestment in our existing building stock, witnessed by successful projects such as The Lofts at Greensborough Court and the Kress Building.

Thanks to research completed by Megan Privette.

..and Another One's Down,

The year 2009 is turning out to be a notable year - in demolitions for downtown Greensboro. A few months ago, a two-story Queen Anne-style house was destroyed on Blandwood Avenue. On Easter weekend, the 110-year old Love House on Smith Street in Fisher Park was lost. Today, the old offices for Big Brothers Big Sisters at 211 Edgeworth Street was torn down within 30 minutes.

The preservation of old buildings encompasses many points, including aesthetic values, community identity, historical value, and sustainability. The value of this house, which was "only" 80 years old and long ago lost its surrounding neighborhood, was certainly in the later. Sustainable practices limit the volume of perfectly good building materials that are pitched into the landfill. Think of an old building as a massive soup can...recycling is good.

Today's loss was not without trying. The Preservation Greensboro Development Fund sought someone to move the structure for almost a year. Overhead wires, in the end, did the old house in. It's just too costly to get through the above-ground matrix of cables, wires and fiber optic lines. Until that fact changes, we might see a continued upswing in the loss of Greensboro's old places.

High Point's Residential Architecture

High Point has quite a few notable textbook examples of residential architecture. The Wilson House at 425 Hillcrest Drive is a rendition of the landmark home known as Tudor Place in the Georgetown section of Washington DC. The Zollicoffer House at 1207 Johnson Street (image, right) studiously follows the design philosophy of Frank Lloyd Wright. The Cottam-Wall House at 1101 Greenway incorporates brick recycled from a nineteenth-century home that was pulled down in 1926.

But do you know what style they are?

I will present a special mini-seminar tomorrow at noon as part of High Point Museum's Community Heritage Day. The 30-minute session will focus of prominent architectural styles found in High Point's neighborhoods, including Colonial Revival, Prairie, Craftsman, and Italian Renaissance styles. High Point's inventory of early and mid-twentieth century architecure is perhaps its most valuable contribution to North Carolina's historic built environment. Come and learn how to appreciate these buildings by learning about their styles!

Admission is free. To learn more about Community Heritage Day, click here.

Old Place, New Look

The North State Milling Company at 816 South Elm Street is an excellent example of an early twentieth-century industrial site.  The company was founded in 1912 and manufactured plain and self-rising corn meal and flour, hen scratch, bran, and feed for livestock. Grain was brought to the site by truck and by rail where it was processed and held for distribution across the region. The original three-level building features a handsome corbelled brick cornice and exterior painted sign advertising Daily Bread Flour, but the interior of the building holds exceptional detailing as well.

Processed grain was initially stored in vertical silos located within the building. Unlike the tall metal silos that were added with later expansions and lend their trademark silhouettes to the South Elm Street corridor today, these interior silos were constructed of hefty wood planks laid one atop the other. This substantial construction method provided support for the massive weight of tons of stored grain. The grain was accessed by use of a hopper at the base of the silo that dispensed material as needed.

Remarkably well-preserved, these silos remain an integral part of the Mill. Recent renovations by building owner Eric Robert have exposed these silos in a way that is both historic, yet dramatically contemporary. Robert divided the tall vertical space by floor level, reusing the planks once part of the wall, as flooring. Each roughly 10 foot silo space was connected by a broad passage to the adjoining space and opened to daylight from above. Although spaces are constructed of 100-year old wood, and conform to the dimensions of the original silos, the beautifully austere space is a minimalist setting that feels oddly futuristic.

Old buildings often feature universal truths that are manifested in the use of time-tested materials, organic spaces, and off-beat recycled spaces. The adapted silo spaces of the North State Mill feature many of these features, including heart of pine lumber, comfortably proportioned rooms, and repurposed grain storage volumes. Here is a great example of the beauty of art as an integral part of our architectural landscape.

Other interesting portions of the building are available for commercial adaptive re-uses. The site is located just a block south of the bustling South Elm Street historic district. Inquiries may be directed to Fred Preyer at 336.294.8900 or by email.

The Secrets of the Preyer Federal Building

Any building with the scale, history, and gravitas of the L. Richardson Preyer Federal Building on Market Street has a few stories to tell. With a recent Insider Tour sponsored by Preservation Greensboro, a few interesting secrets long forgotten were revealed about the stature and past of the building.

Architectural historians consider the structure to be one of the finest buildings in the state from the 1930s, and one of the best examples of Art Deco design in the Gate City. When it first opened, however, Greensboro residents were not so sure of its forward-looking style. A writer for a local paper opined that the building was an “extreme…departure from the enduring canons of the art”, a reference to the fact that the design did not follow incorporate traditionally articulated classical features such as pedimented porticos and overhanging cornices.

The Preyer Building sits upon a massive foundation of Mt. Airy granite, mined from nearby Surry County and delivered to the site in 12 boxcars. The main walls of the building are clad in Indiana Limestone, a strong, durable, and even grained stone that has been used in many other famous structures in the country, including the Empire State Building, the Pentagon, and 35 of the 50 state capitol buildings. In Greensboro, the Masonic Temple, the Cone Export Building, and the Southern Railway Passenger Station all sport Indiana Limestone. Fifty-five train car loads of Indiana Limestone were used to build this structure.

Notable features of the façade include stone lamp standards to each side of the main steps that are capped by aluminum and glass lanterns. Flanking the main entrance are carved open stone grilles incorporating the letters USA at the top and GNC for “Greensboro North Carolina” at the foot. Paired aluminum spandrel panels separating second and third floor windows above the entrance depict the seals of the Treasury Department and Post Office Department; the Department of Justice and the War Department; and the Department of Agriculture and Department of Labor – all departments that maintained offices within the building when it opened. The forth floor enjoys scored pilasters topped with carved eagles' heads that rise above Federal shields. The west and north façades include round paterae (Latin for “saucer”) and entry pediments featuring carved palmetta acroteria.

This exuberant building’s cornerstone credits James Wetmore as the projects Acting Supervising Architect. Wetmore was widely recognized from 1915 to 1934 as “the Cornerstone Man” for his name was carved on the cornerstones of more post offices, customs houses, federal court houses and office buildings than that of any other U. S. citizen.

Ironically, Wetmore was never an architect. When Supervising Architect of the United States Treasury Oscar Wenderoth resigned in 1915, Wetmore agreed to take over his job temporarily. Through the presidential terms of Wilson, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover and the first year of Roosevelt he continued to serve temporarily, and since he was not an architect, he would not allow his title to be other than Acting Supervising Architect. During his tenure, however, Wetmore witnessed the passage of the 1926 Public Buildings Act. The Act prompted the construction of important federal buildings across the country – including the Federal Triangle project in Washington, D.C. and Greensboro’s Federal Courthouse.

Newspaper accounts report that the Preyer Building was designed for the Treasury by the Washington architectural firm of Murphy and Olmstead. Little is known of the firm. A few buildings bear their signature, including a handful of churches and chapels around Washington and Baltimore and only one other federal building located in Wellsville, New York.

The Greensboro building was initially used as a post office, courthouse and offices. Citizens of Greensboro had patiently awaited construction of a new facility since lobbying began in 1922 to replace a facility that stood on the southeastern corner of Jefferson Square. Construction began on December 14, 1931, and when the building was dedicated on July 6, 1933, more than 5,000 people attended the dedication ceremony. The building was projected to cost $800,000 to construct before any dirt was turned, and upon completion the price tag exceeded budget by only $25,000. It contained 9 vaults, 88 clocks, 12 electric water coolers, and 2,413 lock boxes for mail.

The postal service moved out their central processing to East Market Street in the early 1970s, and their service branch followed in the late 1980's, at which point the entire first floor was converted to courts and related offices. At the present time the building serves primarily as a Courthouse for the Middle District of North Carolina. The District was established in 1927, and serves a large portion of central North Carolina. Its headquarters have always been in Greensboro.

In 1988, the building was named in honor of Lunsford Richardson Preyer, a six-term congressman and native of Greensboro.

The Federal Building represents one part of an interesting chapter of American architectural history that is well-represented in the Gate City. The passage of the Public Buildings Act of 1926 initiated a period of building construction that was unprecedented in the United States. The Act specified that Wetmore’s office of the Supervising Architect of the Treasury would be responsible for the design and construction of Federal Buildings. Within a brief period, nearly 1,700 architects were employed in the Supervising Architect’s office. That fact was a point of contention of private architects who wanted a slice of the pie. In 1933 Ralph Walker of the New York chapter of the American Institute of Architects charged that Wetmore’s government architects were doing the work that private firms should have, and he protested the practice to government officials. Wetmore retired from his position within a year.

The spat between James Wetmore and Ralph Walker is notable for Greensboro, because both men are represented in well-preserved buildings in our city. Walker was a principle in the firm Voorhees Walker Foley, and Smith in New York City, who later did work here in Greensboro in the progressive design of the Ellis-Stone Department Store now known as the Elm Street Center in 1949.

When the Federal Building opened in 1933, the local paper marveled at its design and quality…observing “if this mode in monumental building does indeed express our day and generation, it may be at least accorded the highest merit of honesty…” However, the writer seemed to succinctly dismiss the building’s high style by declaring “we are a pragmatic people, little disposed and having little time, to ponder the classics or contemplate the esoteric cosmos…What we are looking for in post offices is a suitable place for postal public servants to work.”

Perhaps the building was too esoteric for Greensboro in the midst of the Great Depression, and perhaps it didn’t garner the attention it deserved until decades later. However, it is appears the L. Richardson Preyer Federal Building is appreciated today, perhaps more now than ever.

Milling About with History

The Carolina Piedmont was central in the development of America’s textile industry. Corporate names such as Cone, Burlington, and Wrangler/ Blue Bell resonate within our community. Fortunately, our region still has a great deal of history to show for the industry that defined our region for over a century. If you enjoy learning about our region’s historic textile mills and their history, consider yourself lucky. Three events are planned over the next two weeks to celebrate North Carolina’s textile mill history.

On May 6th, Preservation Greensboro has organized a walking tour of the sprawling Revolution Mill.

The complex was erected by Cone Corporation in three major periods of expansion, ranging from 1900 and ending in 1915. Construction methods and floor plans of the mill are typical of textile mills built during the period, incorporating large floor plates, numerous windows allowing natural light, and “slow-burning construction” methods that used heavy “over engineered” timbers that would support their weight for some time into a major fire.

The entire complex was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984 based on its associations with early industrial development in Greensboro, and today the complex is enjoying renewal as the Revolution Mill Studios. The mixed-use project has created office space for dozens of companies as well as a special events center, and promises to grow even larger with future expansion.

The free tour is scheduled for Wednesday, May 6th, at 7:00 pm. Please meet at the Revolution Mill leasing office entrance at 1160 Revolution Mill Drive. That is the building to the right of the tall red water tower.

On May 9th, students from UNCG will provide tours of Cone Corporation’s surrounding mill villages.

Nine graduate students have explored mill history by documenting interviews with former mill villagers in and around Revolution Mill. Their discoveries will be the focus of free van tours of the former Cone Mills mill villages held this Saturday, May 9th. Tours will depart from Revolution Mill Studios, 1200 Revolution Mill Drive, between 10 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Tours will depart every 15 minutes and will last 45 minutes.

Tours will focus on the mill villages that were home to thousands of mill-work families who made their lives in the Cone Corporation’s mills – including Revolution, as well as the White Oak plant, the East White Oak plant, Proximity Mill, and Proximity Print Works. Students conducted twenty interviews with villagers for the Museum Studies class taught by Dr. Benjamin Filene, UNCG’s Director of Public History.

Many of the interviews show a surprisingly rural life in mid-twentieth century Greensboro—cows grazing on the Revolution ballfield, chicken coops in Proximity, hogs butchered in East White Oak. Earlier this spring, the students toured across town with a 7-by-7-foot map of northeast Greensboro—a “Memory Map” on which participants were invited to share their recollections of what happened to them at different locations in the villages. The stories that the students learned through interviews and the Memory Map sessions will be showcased in the van tours.

In addition to the van tours, students will host other mill village-related activities including “mystery” photographs of the villages; a screening of a 1930s-era film of the White Oak factory; and a “story swap” session for former mill villagers.

On Saturday, May 16th, mill history buffs can explore the Glencoe Mill Village north of Burlington.

In contrast to Cone Corporation’s twentieth-century mill villages in Greensboro, the Glencoe Village represents a rural mill community of the late nineteenth century. Large lots for gardens, a company store, and rural surrounding characterize Glencoe, a community almost lost to the bulldozer in the mid-1990s. Preservation North Carolina (PNC) spearheaded efforts to preserve the village that has been transformed into a vibrant community of colorful cottages.

The “open village” tour includes a special presentation by PNC’s Executive Director Myrick Howard entitled “The Rebirth of Glencoe” held at 11:30 at the historic Providence Christian Church in Graham. Houses within the Glencoe community will be opened for tours between 1:00–4:30 p.m. Admission for the “open village” is $25 per person (advanced tickets can be purchased for $20). Children under 12 are free.

For more information on the open house, visit the PNC website, or view their online slideshow.

Mill history is alive and well in the Piedmont of North Carolina!