| The Triad | |
| Wiston-Salem | |
| Greensboro | |
| High Point | |
| Triad Nearby | |
| By Anne Holcomb Waters and Carolyn Sakowski |
To people who are not North Carolina residents, it can be confusing to keep the Triad and the Triangle straight. The Piedmont Triad actually covers an area greater than the three cities—Greensboro, High Point, and Winston-Salem—that are usually associated with the name. Technically, the Triad encompasses a 12-county area that runs from the Yadkin River on the west to the Haw River on the east and from the Virginia border on the north to the start of the Sandhills to the south.
The concept of a Triad region came to light in the mid-1960s, when elected officials from the area’s county and municipal governments met to discuss common concerns. They adopted the name Piedmont Triad Committee. As best as can be determined, this was the first time the word Triad was used to describe the area. In 1987, the name of the airport was changed to Piedmont Triad International Airport.
Although local governments and chambers of commerce try to work together on issues of mutual concern, old rivalries die hard. The cities have been pitted against each other in recruiting wars for too long. So much friction exists between Greensboro and High Point that at one point High Point wanted to secede from Guilford County and form a new county. Fortunately, the newcomers arriving in the area in droves don’t know about the old battle lines, so cooperation among the communities seems to be on the rise. Thousands of Triad couples have one partner working in one city and the other in another, further diminishing the old lines.
Today, due to the state’s increased visibility in technology-related industries, the Piedmont Triad is drawing more and more people and businesses. Greensboro, its largest city, has a population of over 251,000. A city that owes much of its economic base to textiles, it is now home to several colleges and universities. Boasting a population of over 224,000, Winston-Salem is the second-largest city in the region. Although it owes much of its prosperity to tobacco, Winston-Salem has now become a leader in the medical field. The home of both the country’s first arts council and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, it is known as “the City of the Arts.” High Point has a population of over 102,000. Known internationally as a furniture capital, it attracts thousands of people to its showrooms. Altogether, the 12-county area claims a population of approximately a million.
With the mountains less than two hours distant and the beaches only four hours away, this region becomes more attractive with each passing year.
By Anne Holcomb Waters
As is reflected in its hyphenated name, Winston-Salem has always been a city that throws together opposites and comes out stronger as a result. In other words, you take pious Salem, throw in raw Winston, and get a city remarkable for its civility, its commitment to education, and its culture both classical and folk.
The Moravians who came to the area they named Die Wachau (later Latinized to Wachovia) in 1753 were sober, thrifty, disciplined, and peaceful. After establishing the villages of Bethabara and Bethania, they began building their main city, Salem, in 1766.
The Salem Moravians belonged to one of the first Protestant sects. They came mostly from German-speaking areas of Bohemia, Poland, and, of course, Moravia. Arriving in America to escape persecution, they settled first in Pennsylvania, then sent colonists into their new land in the back country of North Carolina. They organized themselves—they were nothing if not organized—into congregational towns in which just about everything was owned and controlled by the church. No non-Moravians were allowed to live in Bethabara or, later, in Salem.
The Moravians were frequently envied and mistrusted by their neighbors, most of whom were small farmers leading hardscrabble lives on the frontier. These farmers struggled all their lives just to eat. By contrast, the Moravians essentially finished building Salem—complete with church, meeting house, and a water system—in five years.
Despite this mistrust, Salem quickly became the trading center of northwestern North Carolina and southwestern Virginia. Nearby was the only safe place to cross the Yadkin River for 50 miles, so all the major thoroughfares in the area (including the Great Wagon Road from Pennsylvania) ran by Salem.
When Forsyth County was created out of Stokes County in 1849, Salem was the logical choice for the county seat. The Moravian leaders, however, wanted no truck with the rabble that came with a county courthouse, so they agreed to sell the new county 51 acres for a town a mile north of Salem Square. For almost two years, the Forsyth County seat was known as “that place north of Salem.” In 1851, the North Carolina General Assembly named the town after a local Revolutionary War hero, and Winston was born.
While Salem built textile mills, Winston was known for selling dried berries. Not until after the Civil War and Reconstruction did it begin to capitalize on the area’s major crop and pledge fealty to King Tobacco. Factories for making plug tobacco and tobacco auction houses and warehouses sprang up around the young town, but those were lemonade stands compared to what a 24-year-old former traveling tobacco salesman had in mind.
Just as his statue outside city hall suggests, Richard Joshua Reynolds arrived in Winston on horseback. He was drawn from his Virginia home in 1874 by Winston’s new rail line, by which the young Reynolds realized he could ship his tobacco anywhere and permanently retire his salesman’s wagon.
Reynolds built his tobacco company and Winston at the same time. He was phenomenally hardworking and uncommonly canny. A decent man, he was also one of the first industrialists to realize how closely his own fortunes were tied to his workers’. He paid his (mostly black) employees well by the day’s standard, instituted profit-sharing plans, and provided drinking water, lunchrooms, day nurseries, and a medical department. His wife, Katharine, encouraged and continued his philanthropy, and the leaders who followed him at R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company and elsewhere placed a high value on giving back to the community.
Winston officially merged with Salem in 1913, although they had been called “the Twin City” for years. The two combined, in the words of longtime Winston-Salem Journal writer Chester Davis, “the Salem conscience with the Winston purse.”
Most of the 20th century was a heyday for Winston-Salem. Reynolds tobacco and Hanes hosiery were sold around the world. Piedmont Airlines, started at what would become Z. Smith Reynolds Airport, grew into one of the best-run airlines in the country. In the 1950s, Wake Forest College moved from its home near Raleigh to a new campus in Winston-Salem donated by R. J. Reynolds’s daughter and son-in-law. A new limited-access highway was designed to relieve downtown traffic; the planned east-west expressway became, before its completion, part of Interstate 40. Winston-Salem boasted the first municipal arts council in the nation. In the 1960s, the Twin City beat out several other communities to become the home of what is now the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.
As the century drew to a close, however, so did Winston-Salem’s period of startling growth. Population declined in the 1980s, the first time since Salem’s founding. Piedmont Airlines was bought by USAir. The AT&T plant on Lexington Road shut down in 1988. Most devastating of all was the move of the headquarters of R. J. Reynolds Tobacco—now RJR Nabisco—to Atlanta. RJR Nabisco president and CEO F. Ross Johnson became the most hated man in town when he justified the move by calling Winston-Salem too “bucolic.”
But as the poet noted, “Tho’ much is taken, much abides.” The misfortunes that beset Reynolds and other local giants forced the city to diversify its economy. And the sudden absence of patriarchal industry captains led the city to learn how to run itself. Winston-Salem still has the cultural legacy left by its forebears. Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem State University, Salem College, and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts call the city home. So do two major art museums—Reynolda House Museum of American Art (housed in the former country estate of R. J. Reynolds) and the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art. The Stevens Center for the Performing Arts plays host to outstanding productions of dance, music, film, and drama. Throw in its thriving Downtown Arts District and Winston-Salem can truly claim to be “the City of the Arts.”
Just as the Moravians learned to coexist with their rural neighbors, and staid Salem with boisterous Winston, high culture in Winston-Salem coexists with the rowdy working-class legacy of the city’s industrial past. Many of the happenings in the revitalized downtown, for example, make use of Winston-Salem’s tradition of mountain bluegrass, gospel, and Piedmont blues, the music of the farmers and sharecroppers who brought their crops to town and the workers who labored in the mills and factories.
Winston-Salem boasts as much culture as any city in the state, while retaining a blue-collar earthiness that has been glossed over elsewhere beneath tides of transplants and slick prosperity. It’s a Jeffersonian combination that reflects the industriousness, piety, and simplicity of the Moravian pioneers. It’s a combination that has helped make Winston-Salem thrive again.
JUST THE FACTS
Winston-Salem is the county seat of Forsyth County, which has a population of more than 343,028. The Winston-Salem Visitors Center, in the historic Brookstown Mill at 200 Brookstown Road (27101), can provide information on the city; call 866-728-4200 or visit www.visitwinstonsalem.com.
Located in the northwestern corner of the North Carolina Piedmont, Winston-Salem is less than two hours from the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains and less than an hour from the Virginia border. Interstate 40 runs east and west just south of town; Interstate 40 Business cuts straight through downtown. U.S. 52 connects Winston-Salem with the Virginia mountains and the Blue Ridge Parkway to the north and with the Yadkin River Valley to the south. In the near future, U.S. 52 is slated to become part of Interstate 73/74, which will run between Detroit and Charleston, South Carolina.
The city’s Greyhound bus station is at 250 Greyhound Court (27101); call 800-231-2222 or 336-724-1429. The nearest Amtrak station is in Greensboro, but a connector is available; call 800-872-7245 for information.
Piedmont Triad International Airport, located off Interstate 40 just across the Guilford County line, is the major airport for Winston-Salem. Seven carriers provide flights daily. Call 336-721-0088 or visit www.ptia.org for general airport information. Smith Reynolds Airport, 10 minutes north of downtown Winston-Salem at 3801 North Liberty Street (27105), is a base for commuter and corporate aircraft; call 336-767-6361 or visit www.smithreynolds.org.
Things to Do
Historic Places, Gardens, and Tours
Old Salem Museums and Gardens, at 900 Old Salem Road (27101) near the intersection of Academy and Main streets, is where most visitors will want to begin—where Winston-Salem itself began. The Moravian town has been carefully restored into a living-history community. Costumed interpreters lead tours, demonstrate traditional crafts, and chat with visitors as if the 19th century, rather than the 21st, has just turned.
Though visitors can stroll the old streets free of charge, tickets are required for admission to some of the restored buildings. They may be purchased at the visitor center, located across the street from Old Salem. The visitor center is open Tuesday through Saturday from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. and Sunday from 12:30 P.M. to 5 P.M. The hours for various buildings and shops within Old Salem may vary slightly. Old Salem is closed Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and Christmas. Most shops—including the Moravian Book and Gift Shop, T. Bagge Merchant, A. Butner Hat Shop, and the highly aromatic Winkler Bakery—do not require tickets. Nor does the Salem Tavern, described in the “Places to Eat” section below. Nor does God’s Acre, the burial ground used by original settlers and modern-day Moravians alike; it is to God’s Acre that worshipers march from Salem Square at dawn during the traditional Easter Sunrise Service, celebrated since 1773. A ticket gains the purchaser unlimited one- or two-day admission to all gardens and restorations, including the Single Brothers House, where visitors can see early trades demonstrated; the Miksch House and Manufactory; the Vierling House, home of an early physician; the Boys School; the Schultz Shoemaker Shop; the Tavern Museum Barn; the St. Philips log and brick churches; and the John Vogler House. At each stop, interpreters tell about the building, the town, and the orderly, pious life of the Moravians. The ticket also includes admission to the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts (MESDA) and the Old Salem Toy Museum, which are covered in the “Museums and Science Centers” section. It takes at least a half-day to see Old Salem thoroughly. Visitors should enjoy it at a leisurely 18th-century pace anyway. For more information, call 888-653-7253 or 336-721-7350 or visit www.oldsalem.org.
The most recent happenings at Old Salem include the return of the 1821 Herbst House to its original site, the unearthing of archaeological remains of the Reich-Hege House, and, most notably, the restoration of St. Philips. Originally known as “the African Moravian Church,” St. Philips serves as an interpretive center for the story of the African-Americans of Salem. A special walking tour called “African-Americans in Salem” is offered, as is an audiovisual presentation. The Moravians were uncomfortable with slavery—but not uncomfortable enough to end the practice.
Old Salem adjoins the campuses of Salem College and Salem Academy, which are among the oldest women’s institutions in the country and a testament to the Moravians’ belief that both sexes deserved an education.
Historic Bethabara Park, at 2147 Bethabara Road (27106), is a restoration of the Moravians’ first settlement in Wachovia. The men who came to scout the site spent their first night in an abandoned trappers’ cabin. The town was never intended to be a permanent settlement; in fact, its name means “House of Passage.” Bethabara soon became a trading center for the region. A palisade was built to protect against raiding parties during the French and Indian War. The town, however, was largely abandoned when Salem was established in 1772.
The palisade, the Potter’s House, and the Gemeinhaus (or Congregation House) are still standing and are open to the public. Several foundations unearthed at the town site have been studied by archaeologists, and gardens have been re-created. The restored site is surrounded by a 175-acre park and nature preserve that includes trails to the site of Bethabara’s mill, a beaver pond, and a picnic ground overlooking the village.
Bethabara does not take as long to explore as Old Salem, but a visit here should certainly not be rushed. A visitor center is located across Bethabara Road. The exhibit buildings are open for guided tours from April 1 through December 16 except for Thanksgiving and Sundays in December. Tours run Monday through Friday from 10:30 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. and Saturday and Sunday from 1:30 P.M. to 4:30 P.M. A modest admission fee is charged. The grounds are open all day, every day. For more information, call 336-924-8191 or visit www.bethabarapark.org.
Two famous North Carolina originals have their roots in the Piedmont, and, boy, are they sweet!
Although technically started in Paducah, Kentucky, Krispy Kreme Doughnuts (www.krispykreme.com) has been based in Winston-Salem since founder Vernon Rudolph opened his doughnut shop in 1937.
With two assistants, a 1936 Pontiac, a few pieces of doughnut-making machinery, and $25 in cash, Rudolph rented a building on South Main Street in the middle of what is now Old Salem. After spending his little money, he had to convince a nearby grocer to loan him the ingredients for his first batch of doughnuts, which he delivered in his Pontiac outfitted with a baking rack.
Although Rudolph originally established himself as a wholesaler, the alluring aroma of his yeast-raised doughnuts created such demand that he responded by cutting a hole in the shop’s wall in order to sell directly to customers. Thus, he created the company’s successful model for drive-through windows and open viewing of the doughnut-making process.
In 1997, Krispy Kreme artifacts were placed in the Smithsonian Institution, forever securing the company’s place as an American icon. “Hot Doughnuts Now” signs currently shine from the Piedmont to the Philippines. If you see one lit up, stop in for a melt-in-your-mouth morsel worth every fat-filled calorie.
Cheerwine (www.cheerwine.com) is a cherry-flavored cola created in Salisbury in 1917. While its appeal isn’t quite as far-reaching as Krispy Kreme’s—yet—it is a much-loved soda throughout the Southeast.
Curiously, Cheerwine can also be traced to Kentucky, where company founder L. D. Peeler and some other investors bought stock in a regional branch of the maker of MintCola. In 1917, they bought out the company, changed the name to Carolina Beverage Corporation, and purchased Cheerwine’s unique flavoring from a “flavor salesman” from St. Louis.
When L. D. Peeler died in 1931, his son Clifford took over, serving as president until 1992 and chairman until his death in 2000 at the age of 96. The company, still family-owned, is thriving under the leadership of L. D. Peeler’s great-grandsons, Mark and Cliff Ritchie, who have steadily increased sales.
For those who don’t have a taste for sweets, both companies sell an array of cool paraphernalia featuring their nostalgic, retro logos.
Reynolda Gardens of Wake Forest University occupies most of the land adjacent to Reynolda House on Reynolda Road. Owned by the university, the property includes greenhouses, four acres of formal flower and vegetable gardens, and 125 acres of woods and streams with marked trails. The grounds are open free of charge during daylight hours year-round. The greenhouses are open free of charge from 10 A.M. to 4 P.M. Monday through Saturday except for Saturdays in January. For more information, call 336-758-5593 or visit www.reynoldagardens.org.
Adjacent to the gardens at 2201 Reynolda Road (27106) is Reynolda Village, created to house and educate the workers on the Reynolds estate. Katharine Reynolds planned the green-roofed, whitewashed village as a model farm where area farmers could learn the latest agricultural techniques. The village has been renovated to house upscale shops, galleries, and restaurants. For more information, call 336-7585584 or visit www.reynoldavillage.org.
Museums and Science Centers
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, at 2250 Reynolda Road (27106), was the country home of tobacco magnate R. J. Reynolds. Devoted to building his tobacco company, Reynolds married late. He took as his bride his distant cousin Katharine. She was many years his junior, but he had long admired her intelligence and bearing. For most of their married lives, they lived in a mansion on Fifth Street, where they had four children: Richard Jr., Mary, Nancy, and Zachary Smith.
In 1912, they began work on what they called a “bungalow” on their country estate about three miles north of town. The house was designed by Philadelphia architect Charles Barton Keen. But the driving force behind the development of the estate was unquestionably Katharine. That it was called Reynolda, the female Latin version of the family name, was no accident.
By the time the house was finished in 1917, R. J. was near death. Katherine did not long outlive him. The house was left to the children, who tended to use it as a holiday house as they grew older. In 1936, however, Mary and her husband, Charles Babcock, renovated the property for use as their family home.
In 1964, Charles Babcock donated the house and 20 surrounding acres to be used as a nonprofit institution dedicated to the arts and education. His daughter, art historian Barbara Babcock Millhouse, and then–executive director Nicholas Bragg set about turning Reynolda House Museum of American Art into one of the country’s finest facilities for the study of American art, architecture, and design. Thomas Cole, Georgia O’Keeffe, Grant Wood, Frederic Remington, Mary Cassatt, Thomas Hart Benton, Alexander Calder, Jacob Lawrence, and Jasper Johns are all represented in the museum’s permanent collection. Visitors will also find a number of quietly magnificent works by lesser-known artists, including The Old Hunting Ground by Worthington Whittredge. A collection of vintage clothing from the Reynolds family is housed in the attic.
Reynolda House is itself a museum. It is a classic of the Arts and Crafts movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which encouraged simplicity and rustic craftsmanship in design and decor. The most impressive feature is an Aeolian organ with 2,566 pipes, some of which are visible from the second-floor gallery and in the attic. All rooms are furnished with period pieces, including many Reynolds family originals. Children and adults also enjoy seeing the bungalow’s indoor swimming pool, bowling alley, shooting range, squash court, and mirrored Art Deco bar.
A wing added in recent years houses an auditorium, the visitor center, the museum shop, exhibition space, classrooms, studios, and a library.
Reynolda House is open from 9:30 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. Tuesday through Saturday and from 1:30 P.M. to 4:30 P.M. on Sunday. It is closed Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s. Admission is charged. Students with valid identification are admitted free. For more information, visit www.reynoldahouse.org or call 888-663-1149 or 336-758-5150.
The Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (SECCA), not far from Reynolda House at 750 Marguerite Drive (27106), is housed in the 1929 English-style home of Hanes Hosiery industrialist James G. Hanes. Twenty thousand square feet of exhibit space have been added to the original house. None of this space is used for a permanent collection; instead, SECCA hosts as many temporary exhibits as possible, bringing some of the Southeast’s most impressive and up-to-the-minute work to Winston-Salem. Like Reynolda House, SECCA hosts a variety of programs and performances in the house and on the grounds.
Readers of a certain age may recall the dustup in 1989 surrounding Andres Serrano’s “Piss Christ,” which won SECCA’s “Awards in the Visual Arts” competition. A Google search 20 years later lists 15,600 hits—a testament to the ongoing interest in the controversy.
SECCA is currently undergoing major renovations and is scheduled to reopen in January 2010. Since new hours of operation are under consideration, contact the museum before planning your visit. Admission is charged except for children under 17 and SECCA members. For more information, call 336-725-1904 or visit www.secca.org.
The Museum of Anthropology of Wake Forest University is located behind Kentner Stadium on Wake Forest’s main campus. Founded in 1963 by the faculty of the school’s Department of Anthropology, it was originally intended for Wake students but is now a favorite of Triad residents and visitors.
The permanent collection features artifacts from the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. Some of the most interesting pieces, however, are prehistoric artifacts found here in the Yadkin River Valley. The museum also hosts a wide range of special exhibits and programs.
The museum and its gift shop are open from 10:30 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. Tuesday through Saturday except for holidays and WFU intersession. Admission is free. For more information, call 336-758-5282 or visit www.wfu.edu/MOA.
While you’re here, the university campus is well worth a quick stroll. Wake Forest College was founded by Baptist ministers in the town of Wake Forest, just north of Raleigh, in 1834. In the 1940s, the Reynolds family invited the college to move to Winston-Salem, offering land on R. J. Reynolds’s country estate and a sizable endowment. In 1953, President Harry Truman turned the first shovelful at the groundbreaking ceremony. Five years later, classes began on the new campus.
Built of local red bricks in the Colonial Revival style, the campus is dominated by Wait Chapel, located at the northern end of the quad. The sanctuary for Wake Forest Baptist Church and a popular site for weddings and the annual Christmas Lovefeast, Wait Chapel was host to presidential debates in 1988 and 2000.
SciWorks, at 400 West Hanes Mill Road (27106), focuses on earth and physical sciences. Kids love the interactive exhibits and programs at this venerable children’s museum. SciWorks boasts 25,000 square feet of attractions including a Foucault pendulum, a 15-acre environmental park, and a 119-seat planetarium. Kids can see mounted animals from around the world, walk inside a 20-foot tree to check out its age, and, best of all, strum a stringless harp and play “Happy Birthday” on the floor piano. SciWorks also offers nature trails, habitats for river otter, deer, and waterfowl, and a small collection of farmyard animals.
From June 1 through Labor Day, the facility is open Monday through Saturday from 10 A.M. to 5 P.M. The rest of the year, it is open Monday through Friday from 10 A.M. to 4 P.M. and Saturday from 11 A.M. to 5 P.M. Admission is charged; the price includes a planetarium show. For more information, call 336-767-6730 or visit www.sciworks.org.
The Museum of Early Southern Decorative Art (MESDA), at 924 South Main Street (27101) in Old Salem, is dedicated to preserving, exhibiting, and researching regional decorative arts. Covering the years from colonization to 1820, MESDA exhibits furniture, paintings, textiles, ceramics, and silver in 24 period rooms and seven galleries.
Visitors will note the marked cultural differences in the Colonial and early Federal Southeast; the region was anything but a “Solid South.” The Scots-Irish settlers on the frontier lived very different lives from their German neighbors, who in turn existed a world apart from the Englishmen and French Huguenots in the cities of the coastal plain. MESDA takes as its geographical area a region that includes the Chesapeake, the Low Country, and the back country. This encompasses all of the Carolinas and Virginia and wide swaths of Maryland, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, and what is now West Virginia.
MESDA is open Monday through Saturday from 10 A.M. to 5 P.M. and Sunday from 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. Guided tours are offered on the hour. Visitors have to buy an all-in-one ticket to Old Salem to get into MESDA. For more information, call 888-348-5420 or 336-721-7300 or visit www.mesda.org.
MESDA shares the Frank L. Horton Museum Center with the Old Salem Toy Museum. The latter houses a permanent collection of more than 1,200 antique toys dating from 225 A.D. to the 1920s. Here, you can see third-century toys dredged from the Thames River, as well as a plethora of 19th-century German toys enjoyed by the children of Salem. As with MESDA, an Old Salem ticket is required to enter the museum. The hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 9:30 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. and Sunday from 1 P.M. to 4:30 P.M.
Cultural Offerings
Diggs Gallery, on the campus of Winston-Salem State University at 601 Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive (27110), brings in traveling exhibits and artists of national renown. It features a sculpture garden, a pair of noteworthy murals by John Biggers, and a permanent collection focusing on traditional and contemporary African-American art. The gallery also houses an impressive collection of works on paper by well-known European and American artists including Jean-François Millet, Joan Miro, and Robert Rauschenberg. The gallery is open Tuesday through Saturday from 11 A.M. to 5 P.M. Admission is free. For information, call 336-750-2458 or visit www.wssu.edu/WSSU and select “Diggs Gallery” under “featured links”.
The Delta Arts Center, located at 2611 New Walkertown Road (27101), is the attractive new gallery space of Winston-Salem Delta Fine Arts, Inc., established in 1972 to promote cultural arts by African-Americans. That same year, it started a permanent collection at Winston-Salem State University that remains housed in the O’Kelly Library. The gallery features fine art, crafts, and performance art by Hispanic and African-American artists. The hours are Tuesday through Friday from 10 A.M. to 5 P.M. and Saturday from 11 A.M. to 3 P.M.; the center is closed major holidays. For information, call 336-722-2625 or visit www.deltafinearts.org.
The North Carolina Black Repertory Company has its offices at 610 Coliseum Drive, Suite 1 (27105). The company sponsors the week-long National Black Theatre Festival every other year. Professional theater groups from around the world come to Winston-Salem for the festival, as do celebrities from theater and film. Call 336-723-2266 or visit www.nbtf.org for more information.
The Stevens Center for the Performing Arts, at 405 West Fourth Street (27101), was a vacant 1920s movie theater until the early 1980s, when what is now the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA) turned it into one of the finest performance venues in the Southeast.
The center has a seating capacity of 1,400. It hosts year-round events ranging from UNCSA student productions to performances by such local and regional groups as the Piedmont Triad Symphony, the Piedmont Opera Theatre, the North Carolina Dance Theatre, and the North Carolina Shakespeare Festival. It also brings in national acts, touring productions of Broadway shows, and children’s performances, including that perennial holiday favorite, The Nutcracker. In recent years, the Stevens Center has returned to its cinematic roots, playing host to the Films on Fourth series (which brings independent, foreign, and limited-release films to Winston-Salem) and to screenings during the RiverRun International Film Festival.
Call 336-721-1945 or visit www.ncarts.edu/stevenscenter for information about ticket prices and upcoming events.
Special Shopping
A gallery hop is held the first Friday of every month in Winston-Salem’s Downtown Arts District, centered along Fifth, Seventh, and Trade streets. Sponsored by the Downtown Arts District Association, this is one of the best free social and cultural activities the city offers. Two of the premier shops are almost directly across Trade Street from one another: the Piedmont Craftsmen shop and Urban Artware. Their respective websites are www.piedmontcraftsmen.org and www.urbanartware.com.
Recreation
Winston-Salem sponsors downtown parties every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night from April to October. Alive after Five, held Thursday from 5:30 P.M. to 8:30 P.M. at Corpening Plaza, brings in pop and alternative acts aimed at young professionals. Downtown Jazz, held every Friday from 5:30 P.M. to 8:30 P.M. in the revitalized Fourth Street area, offers funk and soul in addition to jazz and blues. Summer on Trade, billed as “Winston’s Roots Revival,” is held in the Downtown Arts District on Trade and Sixth streets on Saturday from 7 P.M. to 10 P.M. It draws on the musical heritage of the Piedmont and the Blue Ridge and has featured performers such as Doc Watson. For more information, call the Downtown Winston-Salem Partnership at 336-354-1500 or visit www.dwsp.org.
At the time of this writing, the swanky new downtown baseball park for the newly minted Winston-Salem Dash (named for the Camel City’s hyphen) stood three-quarters built at First Street and Peters Creek Parkway. Stalled by the recession, construction should soon resume thanks to the unanimous support of Winston-Salem city officials and an additional allocation of $12.7 million. When completed sometime in 2010, the stadium promises to be a first-class sports arena that also encompasses specialty shopping and fine dining. For information, call 336-714-BATS or visit www.wsdash.com.
Seasonal Events
The Dixie Classic Fair, the regional exposition for northwestern North Carolina, is the last big fair before the North Carolina State Fair in Raleigh. Originally a chance for local farmers to show off their crops and livestock, the Dixie Classic still shows its agricultural and community roots. Concession stands are operated by local nonprofit organizations such as Boy Scout troops, Little Leagues, and the Kiwanis Club; prizewinning student artwork is displayed in the exhibit hall; and one of the most popular events is the pig race. A re-created folk village offers demonstrations of blacksmithing and woodcarving; bluegrass bands play on the front porch of one of the log cabins. The mile-long midway, meanwhile, is filled with ample opportunities to lose money on games of skill and chance. Rides are available for all ages and courage levels. The fairgrounds are behind Lawrence Joel Veteran’s Memorial Coliseum, which is on the corner of University Parkway and Deacon Boulevard. The fair is held in late September or early October. Call 336-727-2236 or visit www.dcfair.org for more information.
The Piedmont Crafts Fair, held each November in the M. C. Benton Convention Center downtown, brings in more than 100 regional craftsmen to display and (they hope) sell their wares. The fair is sponsored by the Piedmont Craftsmen organization, which operates a gallery at 601 North Trade Street year-round. You can reach the gallery at 336-725-1516 or learn about it by visiting www.piedmontcraftsmen.org.
Old Salem is renowned for its Moravian Christmas celebrations. A Salem Christmas, which includes strolling brass bands and seasonal decorations, is capped by the Christmas Candle Tea, in which a Lovefeast of buns, coffee, and hymns is held by candlelight in the Single Brothers House.
The RiverRun International Film Festival began in Brevard but moved to Winston-Salem in 2003. Founded by Gennario D’Onofrio, father of Full Metal Jacket and Law & Order: Criminal Intent star Vincent D’Onofrio, RiverRun uses the facilities of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, the Stevens Center, and other downtown venues to showcase the best new films by independent, international, and student filmmakers. Among its many noteworthy screenings have been The Baker, Crazy Love, The Notebook, and the Christopher Guest “mockumentary” A Mighty Wind. Call 336-724-1502 or visit www.riverrunfilm.com for more information.
Places to Stay
Resorts, Hotels, and Motels
In earlier times, Winston-Salem boasted two of the finest hotels in the South: the Hotel Zinzendorf and the Hotel Robert E. Lee. The Zinzendorf stood on the hill overlooking the West End neighborhood, near what is now the intersection of Fourth and Glade streets. It burned in its prime on Thanksgiving Day in 1892; among the diners who had to be evacuated were R. J. Reynolds and William A. Blair, whose son John founded the company that publishes this book. The Hotel Robert E. Lee suffered a long period of decline after World War II. It was imploded in 1972 to make way for a succession of fine hotels.
Most of Winston-Salem’s hotels are representatives of national chains. The following, however, feature distinctive accommodations with a definite local flavor.
Brookstown Inn. Deluxe. 200 Brookstown Avenue, 27101 (800-845-4262 or 336-725-1120; www.brookstowninn.com). Located in the historic Brookstown Mill area on the edge of the even more historic Old Salem, Brookstown Inn is listed on the National Register. It is housed in what was one of Salem’s first textile mills. Each of the 71 guest rooms and suites is furnished with what the inn says are “authentic early-American pieces,” including poster beds and handmade quilts. A complimentary continental breakfast is served every morning; a complimentary wine-and-cheese reception is offered each evening. Complete business services (fax, copiers, etc.), an exercise room, meeting space, and banquet facilities are available.
The Hawthorne Inn and Conference Center. Expensive/Moderate. 420 High Street, 27101 (877-777-3099 or 336-777-3000; www.hawthorneinn.com). Located just off Interstate 40 Business, The 155-room Hawthorne is convenient to downtown, Old Salem, and Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center. In fact, the inn is owned and operated by North Carolina Baptist Hospitals, Inc., which means that those in town because of the medical center receive especially good rates. Particularly suited to business travelers, The Hawthorne combines the cozy comfort of an inn with the facilities of a business hotel. It offers a fitness center, meeting space, an amphitheater, and the Bayberry Restaurant.
Wingate Inn. Moderate. 125 South Main Street, 27101 (800-228-1000 or 336714-2800; www.wingateinns.com). The first franchise of the Wingate chain in the Triad, this inn is considered a key part of the effort to revitalize downtown Winston-Salem. Designed to attract business travelers, the Wingate employs the latest technology in its 24-hour business center and its rooms, which have cordless keyboards for Web TV, free high-speed Internet access, and cordless phones. The lobby features a mural of Old Salem. Valet parking and a breakfast buffet are included in the room rate. The Twin City Chop House opened next to the inn in 2001.
Henry F. Shaffner House. Deluxe/Expensive. 150 South Marshall Street, 27101 (800-952-2256 or 336-777-0052; www.shaffnerhouse.com). In the shadow of Winston-Salem’s skyscrapers and just off Interstate 40 Business sits the expansive Henry F. Shaffner House. Built for one of the city’s early industrialists, the home is located on what was once called Millionaire’s Row, the stretch of fine houses constructed just south of Winston during the post–Civil War boom. Each of the nine guest rooms has a different decorative theme and a name taken from Winston-Salem’s history. All rooms have cable television, high-speed Internet access, and phones. A hot breakfast is included. The inn serves dinner nightly.
The Augustus T. Zevely Inn. Expensive. 803 South Main Street, 27101 (800-928-9299 or 336-748-9299; www.winston-salem-inn.com). Not to be confused with the Zevely House restaurant in the West End neighborhood, the Zevely Inn, built in 1842, sits in the heart of Old Salem. Some of its 12 rooms have original fireplaces. All are decorated with period antiques and reproductions and have lovely views of Old Salem. Rates include a “continental-plus” breakfast during the week and a full gourmet breakfast on weekends, nonalcoholic drinks throughout the day, and wine and cheese at night. Pets can be accommodated if arrangements are made at the time of reservation.
Summit Street Bed-and-Breakfast Inns. Expensive/Moderate. 420 and 434 Summit Street, 27101 (336-777-1887; www.bbinn.com). Comprised of the 1887 Jacob Lott Ludlow House and the 1895 Benjamin Joseph Sheppard House, the Summit Street Bed-and-Breakfast Inns are located in the historic West End neighborhood. These two large, adjacent 100-year-old Victorian houses offer a range of amenities including two-person Jacuzzis, in-room gourmet breakfasts, an exercise room with Nautilus equipment, and a billiards room.
Places to Eat
Salem Tavern. Expensive. 736 South Main Street, 27101 (336-748-8585; www.oldsalem.org/visit/dining). The restaurant known as the Salem Tavern is actually located in the Salem Tavern Annex. The original Salem Tavern burned in 1784 but was rebuilt that same year; the brick structure located next to the annex, it hosted a visit from President George Washington in 1791 and serves as a museum today. The highlight of the restaurant’s menu is the authentic Moravian chicken pie, though more contemporary food is also served. The restaurant is open for lunch daily and for dinner Monday through Saturday. Reservations are recommended.
Bleu Restaurant & Bar. Expensive/Moderate. 3425 Frontis Street, 27103 (336760-2026; www.bleurestaurantandbar.com). The food at Bleu is fresh and dependable and the atmosphere hip. The menu includes inventive tapas, pizzas, pasta dishes, salads, sandwiches (at lunch), and a full array of grilled meat and seafood—yep, something for everyone. Lunch and dinner are served daily.
Downtown Thai. Expensive/Moderate. 219 West Fourth Street, 27101 (336-7771472). If you want to save a buck, eat lunch here. If $24 Thai entrees don’t bother you, go for dinner. From good, old, comfortable “Pad Thai” to “Pet Nam Prik Pow,” everything is fresh, delicious, and lovingly prepared. Lunch and dinner are served daily.
Miss Annie’s. Expensive/Moderate. 3064 Healy Drive, 27103 (336-774-0922; www.missannies.com). Don’t be discouraged by the somewhat dilapidated shopping center where Miss Annie’s is located. The Caribbean-inspired food served here is excellent. Chef Jean Spence Eubank is a native of Jamaica who cut her culinary teeth cooking for United Nations dignitaries before opening her own four-star restaurant in New Jersey. Luckily, she decided to move south. In addition to her Jerk chicken and seafood dishes, her specials are highly recommended. Miss Annie’s serves lunch on Thursday and dinner Tuesday though Saturday.
Noble’s Grill. Expensive/Moderate. 380 Knollwood Street, 27103 (336-7778477; www.noblesrestaurants.com). Chef and restaurateur Jim Noble has built a solid reputation for his “clean and natural cooking.” In other words, he prepares food in the tradition of the legendary Alice Waters. His wood-fired pizzas, delectable soups and salads, and roasted meat entrées are all first-rate. Noble’s serves lunch Monday through Saturday and dinner all week.
Xia Asian Fusion. Expensive/Moderate. 134 North Spruce Street, 27101 (336723-1400). This restaurant serves delectable appetizers, including a fresh summer roll filled with mint and shrimp, as well as an array of Japanese and Thai dishes such as “Spicy Lemon Grass Chicken and Asparagus.” Guests can dine in the sleek red-and-black dining room with its peaceful wall fountain. Or if the weather is fair, they can enjoy the patio out front. Lunch and dinner are served Monday though Saturday.
Sweet Potatoes. Moderate. 529 Trade Street, 27101 (www.sweetpotatoes-arestaurant.com; 336-727-4844). Sweet Potatoes offers the best casual dining experience in the city, in the opinion of many. Located in the heart of the Downtown Arts District, it serves delicious Southern food. And yes, as the name implies, many recipes include sweet potatoes. You might start with the “Red and White Fries,” follow that with “Catfish Nola,” and finish with the sweet potato cheesecake. Of course, you may then need to fast for a week. Sweet Potatoes is open for lunch Monday through Saturday and for dinner Thursday through Saturday.
Athena Greek Taverna. Moderate/Inexpensive. 680 South Stratford Road, 27103 (336-794-3069). In a town where many restaurants are owned by Greeks but few actually specialize in Greek food, this small, bright eatery was a welcome addition when it opened several years ago. Try the roasted chicken with lemon potatoes. If you order the “Horiatiki”—a country Greek salad—plan on sharing because it’s enough to feed a small village. Lunch and dinner are served Monday through Saturday.
Foothills Brewing Company. Moderate/Inexpensive. 838 West Fourth Street, 27101 (336-777-3348). Though folks definitely come to Foothills for the beer, the food is surprisingly good, too. The inventive offerings include “Pear and Arugula Salad” and “Fried Cashew-Encrusted Chevre and Bibb Lettuce Salad.” Foothills also offers the requisite quarter-pound burger. It serves lunch and dinner daily.
Ichiban. Moderate/Inexpensive. In Thruway Shopping Center at 270 South Stratford Road, 27103 (336-725-3050). This small storefront restaurant serves the best sushi in town, and its Japanese fare is pretty good, too. The front dining room is very brightly lit, so head for the sushi bar in the back for more intimate dining. Ichiban serves lunch and dinner daily but is closed during midafternoon.
NOMA. Moderate/Inexpensive. 321 West Fourth Street, 27101 (336-703-5112). NOMA (short for nearby North Marshall Street) offers an inventive Sunday brunch menu that includes “Bloody Mary Benedict” and “Orange Dreamsicle Crepes,” among other fare. Since NOMA stays open late on weeknights, it’s a good bet after a show at the Stephens Center, located across the street. The owners, husband-and-wife team Chris and Kathleen Barnes, are also the talent behind 6th & Vine. Lunch and dinner are served daily; brunch is offered on Sunday.
6th & Vine Wine Bar & Café. Moderate/Inexpensive. In the Downtown Arts District at 209 West Sixth Street, 27101 (336-725-5577). This establishment sells over 40 wines by the glass and more than 300 by the bottle, as well as fine fare including tapas, salads, paninis, and flatbread pizzas. In addition, 6th & Vine offers a full bar and live music on Friday and Saturday evenings. Lunch and dinner are served Tuesday through Saturday; brunch is offered on Sunday.
Village Tavern. Moderate/Inexpensive. 221 Reynolda Village, 27106 (336-7480221) and 2000 Griffith Road, 27103 (336-760-8686). The Village Tavern began in Reynolda Village and has spread across the state and the Southeast and into Colorado and Arizona. The patio in the original location has become famous; the atmosphere is upscale but relaxed enough for college students. The second Winston-Salem location is just off Hanes Mall Boulevard at the intersection with Stratford Road; it offers a snazzier ambiance and is more spacious. Both locations serve lunch and dinner daily and brunch on Sunday. For information, visit www.villagetavern.com.
West End Café. Moderate/Inexpensive. 926 West Fourth Street, 27101 (336-7234774; www.westendcafe.com). West End Café is always bustling, and for good reason. It serves fresh, delicious food in a pleasant atmosphere; businessmen, families with small children, and young people are all comfortable here. The ambiance is rivaled only by the setting, in the West End neighborhood just across from beautiful Grace Court. Lunch and dinner are served Monday through Saturday.
Krankie’s Coffee and Camino Bakery. Inexpensive. 211 East Third Street, 27101 (336-722-3016). Krankie’s and Camino Bakery stretch the restaurant definition but are too unique not to mention. Both are housed in the Wherehouse, a multiuse performance and gallery space downtown. Here, you can get delicious coffee, baked goods, and even wine and beer.
Little Richard’s Barbecue. Inexpensive. 4885 Country Club Road, 27104 (336-760-3457). Like its renowned neighbors to the south, Little Richard’s serves “Lexington-style” barbecue, which means that it has a tomato base. It gets high praise from Mr. Barbecue himself, Bob Garner, for being one of the few stalwarts still using a wood-fired pit. Don’t miss the hush puppies. And if you don’t like pork, you’ll be pleased to know that the barbecued chicken is outstanding as well. Lunch and dinner are served Monday through Saturday.
Ollie’s Bakery. Inexpensive. 200 South Marshall Street, 27101 (336-727-0404). Although Ollie’s is primarily a European-style bakery, it is such an asset to the city that it merits mention here. With its proximity to Old Salem and its outdoor tables for enjoying scones in the morning and focaccia in the afternoon, it is a perfect spot for a light meal. It is open Tuesday through Saturday from morning to late afternoon and Sunday from morning to early afternoon.
North Carolina Gets a “Toe-Dancin’ School”
“A faith in our youth and the talent of our youth. A realization of the place art has in our civilization.”
This was the answer Vittorio Giannini gave whenever he was asked what characteristics a city should have to be home to the North Carolina School of the Arts (now the University of North Carolina School of the Arts). This was in the early 1960s, when the question of the School of the Arts’ existence, much less its location, was far from settled. Giannini, an internationally renowned composer from Philadelphia who had long spent his summers in the North Carolina mountains, was an early advocate who would become the school’s first president.
The School of the Arts was the brainchild of novelist and Asheville native John Ehle. In 1961, Ehle wrote an article for the News & Observer of Raleigh entitled “What’s the Matter with Chapel Hill?” The article was a wide-ranging critique of the failure of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and liberal-arts colleges in general, to provide the proper environment and training for creative and performing artists.
The article caught the eye of Governor Terry Sanford. Sanford made education a cornerstone of his administration, going so far as to bring Ehle on board his staff as special assistant for new projects. Ehle and Sanford accomplished a number of initiatives, including the Governor’s School and the North Carolina Film Board, but the School of the Arts was by far their most original, unorthodox, and controversial project.
Unlike liberal-arts colleges, the school gives students at both the high school and college levels an intensive and rigorous program in their chosen art. Unlike traditional conservatories, it also provides a solid general education.
The School of the Arts met with opposition from two sides. One side consisted of proponents of traditional liberal-arts colleges and their existing music, art, and drama programs. The second consisted of those who objected to spending tax dollars on a “toe-dancin’ school.”
Ehle argued, as he had in his 1961 article, that while liberal-arts colleges were superbly equipped to teach the study of the arts, they were inadequate for teaching the techniques of creation and performance.
The second argument was finally defeated on the floor of the North Carolina General Assembly by Representative John Kerr, who took to task for their shortsightedness those who opposed government support of the arts. Kerr closed his speech with this: “Now, some of you have ridiculed this legislation as a toe-dancin’ bill. Well, if there’s going to be toe-dancin’, I want to be there.” At that, he assumed a ballet pose, which was photographed for the state’s newspapers.
Once the bill for the creation of the School of the Arts passed, the work of selecting a site began in earnest. Biltmore House in Asheville and Reynolda House and Graylyn in Winston-Salem were considered. Several cities expressed some degree of interest, but in the end, only three were judged to have viable claims to being the best location: Raleigh, Charlotte, and Winston-Salem.
Winston-Salem had a tradition of supporting the arts that went back to its founding. The Moravians who built Salem made music an integral part of their worship and culture. The industrialists who built Winston had long supported education. Winston-Salem was the first city in the country to have an arts council. It had at its disposal the facilities of Salem College, Wake Forest College, and Winston-Salem State University.
Tradition, however, was not going to bring the School of the Arts to Winston-Salem. Two city leaders, Smith Bagley and Philip Hanes, spearheaded a drive to prove the Twin City’s eagerness and worthiness to host the school. More than 200 volunteers worked the phones in a “Dial for Dollars” campaign that raised nearly $600,000 in two days. A plan was drawn up to convert Gray High School into a campus for the School of the Arts.
But according to Leslie Banner’s A Passionate Preference: The Story of the North Carolina School of the Arts, the deciding factor was not just that Winston-Salem had better-laid plans and a more successful fund drive. Winston-Salem simply wanted the school more than the other cities did.
John Ehle had a strange thought: to start a school, far from the world’s cultural centers, that would teach students to be professional artists of the highest caliber. Unimaginable to most, scoffed at, and threatened with extinction, the University of North Carolina School of the Arts is now known around the world for the quality of its training, faculty, students, and alumni.
By Carolyn Sakowski
Greensboro and Guilford County have a long tradition of valuing education. Prior to the formation of the county, a staunchly religious group of settlers arrived around 1750. These settlers were members of the Religious Society of Friends, a group commonly known as Quakers. The Quakers named their first settlement New Garden. These settlers would have a lasting influence on educational standards and moral decisions in the area.
In 1767, David Caldwell started a local school known as the Log College. Serving as a Presbyterian minister in what was then the wilderness, Caldwell established the school to educate young men for the ministry. Five of his students went on to become governors of their states; one of them, John Motley Morehead, was governor of North Carolina from 1841 to 1845.
In 1771, North Carolina’s colonial assembly created Guilford County in order to gain more administrative control over the growing Piedmont population. Named after the earl of Guilford, a friend of King George, the county had a sparse population of about 10,000. By 1774, a log courthouse and jail were built at a place known as Guilford Courthouse.
On March 15, 1780, Guilford Courthouse played an important role in the Revolutionary War. The battle that raged in the woods and over the fields proved the beginning of the end for Lord Cornwallis’s campaign to squelch patriot forces in the South. When the county courthouse was ready in 1809, the new town needed a name. The commissioners chose to honor Nathanael Greene, the leader of the American forces at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse. Somehow, the final e on the name got lost, so the town was named Greensborough.
In 1837, the Society of Friends opened New Garden Boarding School to train teachers. In 1887, this school became Guilford College, the first coeducational institution in the South. In 1863, the Methodist Church founded a school for girls named Greensboro Female College, which came to be called Greensboro College. In 1905, its new leader, Lucy H. Robertson, became the first woman to serve as a college president in North Carolina. In 1873, the Freedmen’s Aid Society established Bennett Seminary, a normal school. In 1889, the Methodist Church began to support the school, which eventually became Bennett College.
In the 1820s, young John Motley Morehead, who augmented his law practice with a dry-goods and grocery business, began to push for a railroad to come to Greensboro. He became the first president of the North Carolina Railroad. By July 1851, construction began on the railroad, which was to have its western terminus in Charlotte and its eastern terminus in Goldsboro. Thanks to Morehead, the railroad would pass through Greensboro. The line was completed in 1856.
When war clouds threatened, Morehead and other powerful men in Greensboro did not readily embrace secession. These conservative businessmen realized what war would do to economic progress. In 1861, the citizens of Guilford, including the antislavery Quakers, defeated a proposal to call a convention to consider secession; the margin was 2,771 to 113.
But Guilford benefited from the war when the Confederate government built the Piedmont Railroad to connect Greensboro with Danville, Virginia. The railroad proved the missing link in the supply line from Columbia, South Carolina, to the Army of Northern Virginia.
After the war, industrialization reached Greensboro in a big way when Moses and Ceasar Cone began construction on their Proximity Mill. It was in 1891 that the Cone brothers decided to enter the textile business. Previously, they had been wholesale grocery and tobacco distributors. Oftentimes, they were paid in bolts of cloth from small local mills; they then turned around and sold that cloth. They thought they could produce a better-quality product and create a strong marketing organization. By the mid-1890s, the Cones’ company was offering services to 90 percent of the South’s textile-mill owners and getting about five cents on each dollar of the gross receipts. This company would evolve into Cone Mills.
In 1896, the first denim rolled off the looms of the Proximity Mill. Four years later, the Cones joined the Sternberger brothers in building the first flannel mill in the South. The Revolution Cotton Mill’s production allowed the owners to boast that they were the world’s leader in flannel production. In 1905, the White Oak plant began to produce denim. Cone Mills combined with other textile companies to make Greensboro one of the nation’s leading textile-manufacturing centers.
In the 1890s, the city’s leaders again showed their enthusiasm for education when the state announced plans to establish two new colleges—one for women and one for African-Americans. In 1891, the state selected Greensboro as the location for the Agricultural and Mechanical College for the Negro Race; to win the bid, the city came up with $8,000 in cash and a suitable site. This college would go on to become North Carolina A & T State University. Also in 1891, Greensboro was selected as the site for the Normal and Industrial School for Women, which would become the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. To finance this bid, the city raised $30,000 through a bond issue and donated a suitable location.
Thanks to the vision of its forefathers, Greensboro is a thriving business and educational center for the vibrant North Carolina Piedmont today. Its revitalization efforts in the Old Greensborough & Downtown Historic District and its well-planned Cultural District are tributes to the continued vision of its leaders.
JUST THE FACTS
Greensboro is located at the intersection of Interstate 40 and Interstate 85, which skirt the southeastern section of town.
Piedmont Triad International Airport, which is served by carriers including US Airways, Delta, Continental, American, Allegiant, and United, is centrally located among Greensboro, High Point, and Winston-Salem. Many hotels offer free transportation to and from the airport.
The Amtrak station is located at 236 East Washington Street (27401). Call 336-272-6755 for information.
The Greyhound/Trailways bus terminal is located in the restored train depot near Old Greensborough at 234-A Washington Street (27401). Call 336-272-8950 for information.
The best source for local information is the Greensboro Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, at 2200 Pinecroft Road, Suite 200 (27407). Call 800-344-2282 or 336-274-2282 or visit www.visitgreensboro.com.
The city’s daily newspaper is the Greensboro News and Record, which also publishes GoTriad, a free weekly tabloid that tells about activities in the area; visit www.gotriad.com.
Things to Do
Historic Places, Gardens, and Tours
Guilford Courthouse National Military Park is six miles north of downtown off U.S. 220 (Battleground Avenue) at 2332 New Garden Road (27410).
After a three-year standoff in the North, Lord Cornwallis, the British commander, decided to conquer the South. By 1780, the British controlled Georgia and South Carolina. After Cornwallis suffered a setback in October 1780 at Kings Mountain, he moved to Charlotte just as Nathanael Greene took command of the Americans’ Southern forces.
Greene divided his troops into two segments. To counter, Cornwallis divided his men into three columns. In January 1781, the British were defeated at Cowpens, but Cornwallis pursued Greene’s forces into North Carolina. By March, Greene had received reinforcements that brought his strength to 4,400 men. He chose Guilford Courthouse as the site for a battle. Greene wanted a location that would be easy for the militia to find, where the British would have to move through woods and make their final assault up a hill across a clearing, and where the Americans would not be trapped by water as they departed.
Cornwallis led his force of 1,900 men into the trap on March 15, 1781. The first exchange came just after one o’clock in the afternoon. The militiamen waiting in the woods were under orders to fire three rounds before retreating. A second line of mi-litia deeper in the woods was reinforced with cannons and cavalry. A third line was on a rise above the clearing. After two hours of fighting, the British drove the Americans from the field and claimed the day. But it was a Pyrrhic victory. Cornwallis lost one-fourth of his men. And nearly 30 percent of his officer corps was down. He later said, “I never saw such fighting since God made me. The fighting was furious.”
Too weak to pursue the rebels, Cornwallis began his seven-month journey that would end with the British surrender at Yorktown.
In 1886, David Schenck, a Greensboro-based attorney for the Richmond and Danville Railroad, wrote that he was going to “save the battlefield.” He helped form the Guilford Battleground Company, which purchased more than 125 acres where the battle was fought. In 1911, Congress appropriated $30,000 to erect an equestrian monument to General Greene; the statue was dedicated on July 3, 1915. Two years later, on March 2, 1917, the Guilford Battleground Company ceded the battleground to the United States government. Today, the park preserves 220 acres of historic fields and forests and 28 monuments.
Among the interesting statues is one of Kerenhappuch Turner, a woman who rode on horseback from Maryland to care for her son, who was wounded in the battle. Another interesting participant is memorialized at the battlefield. Peter Francisco stood six-foot-six when he joined the Continental Army at age 16. He was a foot taller and 100 pounds heavier than the average American soldier. The story goes that Francisco earned fame at Guilford Courthouse when he slew 11 soldiers with his sword in one brief encounter. A tablet that pays tribute to Francisco stands next to the Cavalry Monument. Guests can also see one of Francisco’s immense shoes on display in the visitor center. The battlefield is home to the graves of William Hopper and John Penn, signers of the Declaration of Independence, and Joseph Winston, the Revolutionary War hero for whom the town of Winston (now part of Winston-Salem) was named.
Guests can tour the park on foot, by bicycle, or by automobile. The visitor center includes exhibits, military memorabilia, films, and a bookstore. The battlefield is open from 8:30 A.M. to 5 P.M. daily except for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s. Admission is free. For more information, call 336-288-1776 or visit www.nps.gov/guco.
Adjacent to the Guilford Courthouse battlefield at 2200 New Garden Road (27410) is Tannenbaum Historic Park. This eight-acre park is the site of the restored 1778 Hoskins House. During the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, the house served as a staging area for British troops under Cornwallis. The North Carolina Colonial Heritage Center is also located at the park; there, guests can enjoy a diorama of the battle, a gallery of original maps, a museum store, and hand-on exhibits depicting colonial life. They can also stand in a pillory and feel the weight of a musket. The park is open Friday through Sunday from 8:30 A.M. to 5 P.M. year-round. Regular tours of the Hoskins House are available. Admission is free. For more information, call 336-545-5315 or visit http://www.colonialmuseum.com.
The city planners have done an excellent job of putting many of Greensboro’s museums and other cultural offerings together in a compact few blocks identified by street signs as the “Cultural District.” Here, you’ll find the Greensboro Historical Museum, the Greensboro Children’s Museum, the central branch of the Greensboro Public Library, the Greensboro Cultural Center at Festival Park (discussed in the “Cultural Offerings” section below), and the downtown branch of the YWCA.
The Greensboro Historical Museum, at 130 Summit Avenue (27401), has exhibits that focus on early settlement, military history (there’s an interesting display of weapons used during the Civil War), Native Americans, and transportation. Located in a building that dates to the turn of the 20th century, the museum is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Some of the more popular displays show items—a snuffbox, a collection of fine china, French gowns—once owned by Greensboro native Dolley Madison, the wife of President James Madison. Another display features items owned by Greensboro native William Sydney Porter, better known as O. Henry. These items include photographs, letters, and early editions of his books, as well as sketches he made when he worked at his uncle’s drugstore. A reproduction of that drugstore is also featured. One exhibit highlighting a more recent historical event includes stools and the countertop from the local Woolworth’s where four college students staged a sit-in demonstration that sparked the nation. Behind the museum, visitors can walk through a small cemetery where several Revolutionary War soldiers rest. They can also see examples of early Guilford County homes and a bust commemorating another local native, Edward R. Murrow. The museum is open from 10 A.M. to 5 P.M. Tuesday through Saturday and from 2 P.M. to 5 P.M. on Sunday. Admission is free. For more information, call 336-373-2043 or visit www.greensborohistory.org.
Across from the new Greensboro Public Library at 220 North Church Street (27401) is the Greensboro Children’s Museum. This active place offers hands-on exhibits and activities for children ages one to 10. The “Our Town” section has a grocery store complete with checkout registers, a bank, a theater, a media studio, a house under construction, and a post office. A craft room and exhibits about the continents, the furniture industry, and the textile industry are also on the premises. But the section that excites children the most is the transportation area. Here, they can climb into the cockpit of an airliner and sit in a NASCAR automobile, a police car, and a fire truck. They can also place objects on a Bernoulli blower, which demonstrates how an airplane flies; although the blower teaches the four forces of aerodynamics and Newton’s Third Law, most children have a ball just watching the air pressure shoot objects toward the ceiling. The museum is open from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Tuesday through Saturday, with extended hours to 8 P.M. on Friday; it is also open from 9 A.M. to noon on Monday for members only and from 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. on Sunday. Hours vary during the summers and holidays, so it’s a good idea to check the website for exact times. An admission fee is charged; discounted rates are available for groups of 10 or more. Teachers are admitted free with a valid identification. For more information, call 336-574-2898 or visit www.gcmuseum.com.
The Natural Science Center is located at 4301 Lawndale Drive (27544), northeast of the downtown area. This is a hands-on museum, zoo, and planetarium. Visitors can come face to face with a 36-foot model of a Tyrannosaurus rex, see endangered lemurs, look directly at sunspots over 200,000 miles across, pet a variety of small wildlife including merecats, tigers, and an anteater in the 30-acre zoo, and tour the herpetarium and the gem-and-mineral gallery. The center is open from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Monday through Saturday and from 12:30 P.M. to 5 P.M. on Sunday. The zoo has shorter hours; call for planetarium show times. An admission fee is charged. For more information, call 336-288-3769 or visit www.natsci.org.
Cultural Offerings
The Greensboro Cultural Center at Festival Park, at 200 North Davie Street (27401) in the Cultural District, comes close to providing one-stop shopping for the city’s visual and performing arts. All told, the center includes four levels of galleries, studios, classrooms, and rehearsal halls. It has a sculpture garden, a privately operated restaurant with outdoor café-style seating, and the Price Bryan Performance Place, an outdoor amphitheater. The complex houses offices for many of the city’s cultural organizations, as well as exhibit space for the Green Hill Center of North Carolina Art, the Guilford Native American Art Gallery, the African American Atelier, Art Alliance, the Center for Visual Artists, and the United Arts Council. For information, call 336-373-2712 or visit www.greensboro-nc.gov/Departments/Executive/events/hosting/culturalcenter.
Guilford County’s Quaker Heritage
Much of Guilford County’s heritage is tied to the Religious Society of Friends, more commonly known as the Quakers.
In 1740, Quaker pioneers from Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Nantucket Island began to settle in northwestern Guilford County. By 1754, they established the New Garden Meeting, which quickly became a center for Quakerism in North Carolina. The Battle of Guilford Courthouse, which raged around Quaker homes and farms in New Garden in 1781, saw the meeting house turned into a hospital for soldiers from both sides. Many of the dead were laid to rest in the Friends’ burial ground. Even the leader of the American forces at the battle, Nathanael Greene, was a Quaker. One historical figure from Guilford County with a Quaker connection was Dolley Madison, born in 1768 to parents who were members of the New Garden Meeting.
In 1818, some young people from the New Garden Meeting organized a “Sabbath School House.” By 1821, Levi Coffin, Jr., was teaching slaves to read the Bible there. Levi and his wife, Catherine, became leaders in giving assistance to fugitive slaves. In 1826, they moved to a settlement in Indiana, where their efforts to hide runaway slaves earned Levi the title of “president of the Underground Railroad.”
Since fugitive-slave laws provided severe penalties for anyone who interfered with the recovery of slaves, the efforts of such men and women had to be secretive. The Underground Railroad helped slaves escape to the Northern states and Canada by setting up “stations” every 10 to 20 miles along the way. The wagons and carriages used to transport the slaves were called “trains.” The runaway slaves usually traveled at night in groups of two or three. The drivers who assisted them were called “conductors.” One Quaker couple who proved a vital link in the North Carolina segment of the Underground Railroad was Joshua and Abigail Stanley, who lived in the Centre community. Levi Coffin and Abigail Stanley had grown up together in New Garden.
Today, a wagon with a false bottom used to transport fugitive slaves on the Underground Railroad is on display at the Mendenhall Plantation in Jamestown. A nearly identical wagon is housed at the Levi Coffin House and Museum in Fountain City, Indiana. At both the Mendenhall Plantation and the nearby Museum of Old Domestic Life, visitors can see artifacts left by the Quakers.
The New Garden Friends Meeting still holds worship services at 801 New Garden Road (27410) near Guilford College, which also has its roots in the Society of Friends.
The Eastern Music Festival is an internationally acclaimed classical music event founded in 1962. From late June to early August, 200 exceptionally talented students between the ages of 14 and 20 combine with a faculty of outstanding musicians from leading symphony orchestras and music schools for an intensive training program on the campus of Guilford College. They stage more than 50 orchestral concerts and chamber-music performances during the festival. These concerts, especially the ones featuring the faculty orchestra, offer some of the best classical performances available for the money. Top guest artists are brought in to perform with the professional ensembles. In recent years, the festival has added the EMF Fringe Series, which features diverse musical acts ranging from Americana to Latin, roots to rock, country to bluegrass, and gospel to rhythm-and-blues. For more information, call 336-333-7450 or visit www.easternmusicfestival.org.
Although Guilford College, Greensboro College, and North Carolina A & T State University all have galleries that host touring exhibits, the Weatherspoon Art Gallery at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro is special, primarily because of Etta Cone’s donation in 1949. Miss Cone was a part of the intellectual scene in Paris that included Gertrude Stein. Her bequest of a remarkable collection of lithographs and bronzes by Henri Matisse helped form the core of this collection. Today, the Weatherspoon boasts one of the best university collections of 20th-century American art. Located at the corner of Spring Garden and Tate streets on the university campus, it is housed in a building that won architectural awards for its design. The structure contains six galleries and a sculpture courtyard. The gallery is open from 10 A.M. to 5 P.M. on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday; from 10 A.M. to 9 P.M. on Thursday; and from 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. on Saturday and Sunday. For more information, call 336-334-5770 or visit http://weatherspoon.uncg.edu/.
One of Greensboro’s enduring landmarks is the Carolina Theatre. Since its opening in 1927 as a vaudeville theater, it has survived as one of the city’s principal performing-arts centers, offering theater, dance, concerts, and films. The impressive structure, listed on the National Register, is downtown at 310 South Greene Street (27401). For more information, call 336-333-2605 or visit www.carolinatheatre.com.
If you’re looking for live theater, check what’s scheduled at Triad Stage. Founded by two men who met as graduate students at the Yale School of Drama, Triad Stage has been called “one of the best regional theaters in America” by New York’s Drama League. Its 300-seat performance space offers an intimate setting for original productions as well as classical plays. The theater is located downtown at 232 South Elm Street (27401). For more information, call 336-272-0160 or visit www.triadstage.org.
Special Shopping
In recent years, the Old Greensborough & Downtown Historic District has become a revitalized turn-of-the-20th-century commercial area. The district is located in and around South Elm Street from the 100 block to the 600 block. It also includes blocks of South Davie, South Greene, and East and West Washington streets. The area is alive with antique shops, antiquarian book dealers, chic restaurants, bars, and art galleries.
State Street Station, located north of downtown between Church and Elm streets a block south of Cornwallis Drive, is a group of unique boutiques and restaurants that cater to a decidedly upscale clientele. The buildings were once part of a small mill community, so the shops have the feel of a village within a city. For information, call 336-282-1450.
The major shopping centers are Four Seasons Town Centre, located at the High Point Road exit off Interstate 40, and Friendly Center and the newly opened neighboring Shops at Friendly Center, located on Friendly Avenue off Wendover Avenue. For information, visit www.shopfourseasons.com and www.friendlycenter.com.
For something entirely different, check out Replacements, Ltd., the world’s largest retailer of old and new china, crystal, flatware, and collectibles. Founded in 1981, the warehouse has over 3 million pieces, all of which are entered in its state-of-the-art computer system. The 225,000-square-foot gift facility includes new stock and over 2,000 unique pieces of china, crystal, and silver. It is located just east of Greensboro at 1089 Knox Road in McLeansville (27301); from Interstate 85/40, take the Mount Hope Church Road exit (Exit 132). It is open from 9 A.M. to 7 P.M. daily. Complimentary tours are offered every 30 minutes. For information, call 800-737-5223 or 336-697-3000 or visit www.replacements.com.
Recreation
Greensboro has a wide variety of public parks. Couple these with the more than 200 acres available for walking, running, or biking at Guilford Courthouse National Military Park and you have a lot of green space. A complete list is available by contacting the Greensboro Area Convention and Visitors Bureau or by visiting http://www.greensboro-nc.gov/Departments/Parks/default.htm.
If you like golf, you’ll feel you’ve died and gone to heaven. The Greensboro area offers over 20 public golf courses. For a complete list, contact the Greensboro Area Convention and Visitors Bureau by calling 800-334-2282 or 336-274-2282 or visiting www.visitgreensboro.com.
The Bryan Park Complex and Lake Townsend offer two 18-hole championship courses. The Players Course, designed by George Cobb and modified by Rees Jones, opened in 1974. The Champions Course, which opened in 1990, was designed by Rees Jones; seven of its holes border scenic Lake Townsend. The park also offers a conference center, horseshoe pits, picnic shelters, tennis and volleyball courts, and an 11-field soccer complex. Sailing, boating, and fishing are popular on Lake Townsend. Located off U.S. 29 North at 6275 Bryan Park Road in Browns Summit (27214), the park is open daily from 8 A.M. to sunset; the golf courses have seasonal hours. For more information, call 336-375-2200 or visit www.bryanpark.com.
If you like minor-league baseball, you’ll enjoy the Greensboro Grasshoppers, a class A farm club for the Florida Marlins. Affiliated with the South Atlantic League, the Grasshoppers play in the state-of-the-art First Horizon Park, located near Old Greensborough on the corner of Bellmeade and Edgeworth streets. For information, call 336-268-BALL or visit www.gsohoppers.com.
Seasonal Events
A reenactment of the Battle of Guilford Courthouse is held every year at Country Park, located at 3905 Nathanael Greene Drive (27455). The event takes place on the weekend closest to the March 15 anniversary of the conflict. Hundreds of reenactors portray British and American soldiers fighting in the American Revolution. The battle is staged at 2 P.M. Admission is free. Call 336-373-3648 for information.
The Wyndham Championship, part of the FedEx Cup, is the third-oldest event on the PGA tour. The tournament is currently played at Sedgefield Country Club. For dates and ticket prices, contact the tournament office at 401 North Greene Street (27401), call 336-379-1570, or visit www.wyndhamchampionship.com.
Places to Stay
Resorts, Hotels, and Motels
Every major chain is represented somewhere in the Greensboro area. Most hotels are grouped at the various exits off Interstates 85 and 40. The greatest concentration is at the N.C. 68 exit off Interstate 40 west of town; this is the exit for Piedmont Triad International Airport, so the crowd of hotels makes sense. Many of the accommodations listed below are deluxe or expensive. If you are looking for a more moderate price, the budget chains are your best bet.
Grandover Resort and Conference Center. Deluxe. 1000 Club Road, 27407 (800-472-6301 or 336-294-1800; www.grandover.com). Located just southwest of town, this resort is nestled among 1,500 acres of land. One big draw is its two 18-hole golf courses just outside the lobby. The lobby evokes an Old World feel, with contrasting floor patterns of Italian travertine, Tasmanian gold limestone, and black granite. Several types of guest rooms are available. Basic rooms include cable television, two dual-line telephones with voice mail, a data jack, a refrigerator, a wet bar, and a complimentary newspaper. The resort offers a spa, tennis and racquetball courts, a whirlpool, a pool, a fitness center with sauna and steam room, and restaurants.
O. Henry Hotel. Deluxe. 624 Green Valley Road, 27408 (800-965-8259 or 336-854-2000; www.ohenryhotel.com). Located off Wendover Avenue at Benjamin Parkway near Friendly Center, this 131-room grand hotel has an intimate feel. The O. Henry earned a Four Diamond rating from AAA in its first year, and you’ll see why the minute you enter the wood-paneled lobby. The regular room amenities include color television, high-speed Internet access, a dressing room with two vanities, a safe, in-room movies and video games, a microwave, a refrigerator, a makeup mirror, a complimentary newspaper, and voice mail. In the suites, you get all these amenities plus a gas-burning fireplace in the separate sitting area, a stereo, a DVD, and a huge dressing room. The hotel offers a fine restaurant, afternoon tea and cocktails in the lobby, a business center, an exercise facility, and an outdoor pool. A complimentary home-cooked breakfast buffet is served daily. And of course, each room has a collection of O. Henry short stories to remind guests of a local boy who made good.
Proximity Hotel. Deluxe. 706 Green Valley Road, 27408 (800-379-8200 or 336-379-8200). This hotel, designed to look like a remodeled textile factory, was the first in America to be awarded LEED Platinum certification by the U.S. Green Building Council. The 147-room, AAA Four Diamond hotel offers stylish loft-like guest rooms with such amenities as flat-panel TVs, microwaves, CD players with MP3 connections, high-speed Internet, and WiFi. The hotel has a fitness studio, a spa, and an outdoor pool.
Greensboro Marriott Downtown. Expensive. 304 North Greene Street, 27401 (336-379-8000; www.marriott.com). This is the only full-service hotel in the downtown area. It has 281 guest rooms, including seven suites. You’ll find the usual Marriott amenities. The hotel offers meeting space for conferences.
Sheraton Greensboro Hotel at Four Seasons. Expensive. 3121 High Point Road, 27407 (800-242-6556 or 336-292-9161; www.kourycenter.com). The Joseph S. Koury Convention Center, which connects with this hotel, calls itself the largest hotel and convention center in the Carolinas. Located at the High Point Road exit off Interstate 40, the hotel has over 1,000 guest rooms and access to 250,000 square feet of meeting and banquet space. As a result, it attracts numerous conventions. Amenities include cable television, high-speed Internet access, hair dryers, and voice mail. It offers a full-scale business center, a health club, a pool, a whirlpool, a sauna, and a racquetball court. Because the same developers own the Grandover Resort, the Sheraton staff can make reservations for you at the Grandover spa or tennis and golf courses. Greensboro’s major shopping mall, Four Seasons Town Centre, is next door.
Inns and Bed-and-Breakfasts
Andrea’s Troy-Bumpas Inn. Expensive. 114 South Mendenhall Street, 27403 (800-370-9070 or 336-370-1660; www.troy-bumpasinn.com). Built in 1847, this home is listed on the National Register. Close to the campuses of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and Greensboro College, it offers four rooms with telephones, private baths, hair dryers, cable TV with DVD players, and robes. All are furnished with antiques or antique reproductions.
The Biltmore Greensboro Hotel. Expensive. 111 West Washington Street, 27401 (800-332-0303 or 336-272-3474; www.thebiltmoregreensboro.com). This hotel, which bills itself as “a unique European boutique hostelry,” is located in the Old Greensborough & Downtown Historic District. Guests enter the elegant walnut-paneled lobby through crystal front doors. In the morning, a deluxe continental breakfast is served; in the evening, a reception featuring an informal wine tasting and hors d’oeuvres is offered. The rooms have king-sized four-poster canopy beds and 16-foot ceilings. Amenities include cable televisions, telephones with data ports, refrigerators, hair dryers, DVD players, coffee makers, and irons and ironing boards. Free parking is provided.
Greenwood Bed-and-Breakfast. Expensive. 205 North Park Drive, 27401 (866-374-5456 or 336-274-6350; www.greenwoodbb.com). The Greenwood is a turn-of-the-20th-century Craftsman-style home located just off Elm Street in the historic Fisher Park neighborhood. Each of the five guest rooms has a private bath and wireless Internet.
Because of space constraints, some excellent restaurants are not mentioned here. Despite an effort to balance the offerings in each price category, most of the exceptional restaurants in Greensboro fall within the expensive and moderate ranges. Also included below are restaurants that continually appear on everyone’s list of favorites.
Bistro Sofia. Expensive. 616 Dolley Madison Road, 27410 (336-855-1313; www.bistrosofia.com). The cuisine here is European and New American, influenced by Eastern Europe—hence the name Sofia, in honor of the Bulgarian capital. The chef, who graduated from nearby Guilford College, trained at the New England Culinary Institute. The restaurant offers prix fixe menus on certain weekdays and before certain times, so check the website. Dinner is served Tuesday through Sunday.
Marisol. Expensive. 5834-E High Point Road, 27407 (336-852-3303; www.the-marisol.com). Although this is one of the most expensive restaurants in the Triad, it also makes all the lists of the top places to dine. It’s the sort of place where people celebrate special occasions. The main dining room has a café ambiance; Marisol also has a separate piano bar with leather seating. The printed menu lists first courses only; the servers recite the entrée descriptions orally. Each entrée is part of a complete conception including vegetable portions. Lunch is served Tuesday through Friday and dinner Tuesday through Saturday.
Undercurrent Restaurant. Expensive/Moderate. 327 Battleground Avenue, 27401 (336-370-1266; www.undercurrentrestaurant.com). Located near the stadium where the Grasshoppers play baseball, this restaurant features New American and classical cuisine with Asian influences. The New York Times called this a “smart restaurant.” Lunch is served Monday through Friday and dinner Tuesday through Saturday.
Green Valley Grill. Moderate. 624 Green Valley Road, 27408 (336-854-2015; www.greenvalleygrill.com). This grill is the restaurant wing of the O. Henry Hotel. Green Valley’s owners have established a reputation for developing relationships with local farms and dairies and for presenting innovative food programs to the public. The restaurant uses a wood-fired oven for pizzas and a wood-fired grill to roast chicken and beef on a spit. Lunch and dinner are served daily.
Liberty Oak. Moderate. 100-D Washington Street, 27401 (336-273-7057; www.libertyoakrestaurant.com). Liberty Oak has been around for over two decades, which says a lot in this business. Its relocation to downtown helped jump-start the area’s revival. Reasonable prices combine with quality ingredients to make the dishes here probably the best value in the area. The blue-plate entrées are especially enticing. Liberty Oak was one of 11 restaurants chosen for Southern Living’s “Top Food Finds” in the “Uptown Food” category. Lunch and dinner are served Monday through Saturday.
Solaris Tapas Restaurant and Bar. Moderate. 125 Summit Avenue, 27401 (336378-0198; www.gettapas.com). A tapas menu offers a wide variety of smaller-than-usual servings, priced accordingly. This style of dining allows guests to select several dishes that can be shared for the same price as a normal entrée. The wine list at Solaris features Spanish vintages; a martini list is offered as well. Lunch is served Tuesday through Friday and dinner Tuesday through Saturday.
Southern Lights. Moderate. 105 North Smyres Place, 27403 (336-379-9414). In business since 1986, this restaurant offers an informal ambiance and reasonably priced dishes prepared with fresh ingredients. On weeknights, the featured entrées are quite a bargain. Guests can order sandwiches and burgers as well as creative chicken, beef, and seafood dishes. Lunch is served Monday through Friday and dinner Monday through Saturday.
Stamey’s Barbecue. Inexpensive. Across from the Greensboro Coliseum at 2206 High Point Road, 27401 (336-299-9888), and at 2812 Battleground Avenue, 27408 (336-288-9275). You can’t come to North Carolina and not try the barbecue. Stamey’s serves what is called Lexington-style barbecue, which has a vinegar-and-tomato sauce. Its dining rooms are large and busy, but you can also use the drive-through lanes. Both places serve barbecue cooked the old-fashioned way in a smokehouse behind the High Point Road location. Lunch and dinner are served Monday through Saturday. For information, visit www.stameys.com.
On February 1, 1960, four students from North Carolina A & T State University—David Richmond, Franklin McCain, Jibreel Khazan (Ezell Blair, Jr., before his conversion to Islam), and Joseph McNeil—paid a visit to the F. W. Wool-worth store in downtown Greensboro that would change the world. Though they knew that Jim Crow laws prohibited an integrated lunch counter, the four men took seats and politely requested coffee around 4:30 P.M. After being told that “coloreds” were not served at the counter, the four remained seated in silence until the store closed at 5:30.
They returned the next day around 10:30 A.M. with a group of 20 students. The students made small purchases elsewhere in the store, then sat at the lunch counter in groups of three or four as spaces became available. They sat there until noon without being waited on, while white customers were served.
Sit-in demonstrations had been tried previously in other cities. No one knows exactly why the spontaneous actions of four students in Greensboro sparked a movement. They were soon joined by more students from A & T, as well as students from Bennett College and from what is now the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Within two weeks, sit-ins were staged in 11 other cities. Eventually, 54 cities in nine states saw similar demonstrations.
It took the Greensboro students six months before Woolworth’s relented on its policy of respecting “local custom.” The actions of these young students played a vital role in the early days of the civil-rights movement, which changed our nation’s policies and laws regarding racial segregation.
When the F. W. Woolworth Company announced the closing of the Elm Street location in 1993, a group of citizens organized to preserve the architecturally significant Art Deco building and its historically significant lunch counter. The seemingly never-ending project has been marked by controversy, but progress is being made to convert the building into the International Civil Rights Center and Museum.
In 1998, the Greensboro Public Library and the online division of the Greensboro News and Record joined forces to launch an impressive website about the sit-ins. By visiting www.sitins.com, you can hear nearly 100 audio clips in which the participants themselves describe what happened. You can also read the original news articles and see historic photographs.
A portion of the lunch counter and four of the original stools are currently on display at the Greensboro Historical Museum. The faded Formica lunch counter and four 1950s stools are featured in the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.
By Carolyn Sakowski
When John Motley Morehead brought the North Carolina Railroad to Guilford County, a survey revealed that the tracks would intersect with the existing plank road that connected Fayetteville to Salem. That intersection, located 912 feet above sea level, would be the highest point on the rail line. It was obvious that this new transportation hub would draw speculators. By 1859, the village at that site had 525 people, two hotels, two churches, and seven stores. In May of that year, the two-mile-square town was chartered under the name High Point.
High Point has been linked to the furniture industry since the 1880s. Today, its residents are proud to call their city “the Home Furnishings Capital of the World.”
If you’re looking for a fun photo opportunity, check out “the World’s Second-Largest Chest of Drawers,” located two blocks east of Main Street at the corner of Westwood and North Hamilton. Built in 1926 and restored in 1996, it is actually the facade of a building shaped like an 18th-century chest of drawers. The socks hanging out of one of the drawers represent the city’s hosiery industry. The honor of having the largest chest of drawers is claimed by Furnitureland South, which built an 85-foot-tall replica as a facade for its showroom.
High Point is southwest of Greensboro. It may be reached via Interstate 85 Business or U.S. 311.
Piedmont Triad International Airport is centrally located among High Point, Greensboro, and Winston-Salem. Its carriers include US Airways, Delta, Continental, United, American, Allegiant, and Northwest. Some local hotels offer free transportation from the airport. Call 336-454-3213 or 336-665-5600 for airport information.
The Amtrak station is located at 100 West High Street (27260), off Main Street near the center of downtown. A pedestrian walkway connects the renovated historic depot to the city’s bus transfer center. For information, call 336-841-7245 or visit www.amtrak.com.
The Trailways bus station is located at 100 Lindsay Street (27262). Call 336-882-2000.
A good source for information is the High Point Convention and Visitors Bureau, at 300 South Main Street (27260). Call 800-720-5255 or 336-884-5255 or visit www.highpoint.org.
The city’s daily newspaper is the High Point Enterprise. You can also check out GoTriad, a free weekly tabloid. Its website is www.gotriad.com.
Things to Do
Historic Places, Gardens, and Tours
Tours of furniture manufacturers’ market showrooms are available to groups of 15 or more. Reservations must be made in advance by calling the High Point Convention and Visitors Bureau at 800-720-5255 or by visiting www.highpoint.org. No tours are available when the furniture markets are held.
Mendenhall Plantation is located at 603 West Main Street/U.S. 70 Alternate in neighboring Jamestown (27282). James Mendenhall, a Pennsylvania Quaker, received a land grant in 1762. The settlement that grew up around his farm was called Jamestown in his honor. In 1811, his grandson Richard built the original part of what is now known as Mendenhall Plantation.
This wonderful example of early-19th-century Quaker architecture has been enlarged several times but retains its simple character. The grounds feature a “bank barn” built into a hillside, in the tradition of the Pennsylvania settlers. One of the nation’s few surviving false-bottomed wagons, used to help slaves to freedom on the Underground Railroad, is on the site. The house and grounds are open from 11 A.M. to 3 P.M. Tuesday through Friday, from 1 P.M. to 4 P.M. on Saturday, and from 2 P.M. to 4 P.M. most Sundays. An admission fee is charged. For information, call 336-4543819 or visit www.mendenhallplantation.org.
Museums and Science Centers
High Point Museum and Historical Park is located at 1859 East Lexington Avenue (27262). The park contains the 1786 Haley House, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, as well as a blacksmith shop and a weaving house from the mid-1700s. The renovated museum has furniture displays, military artifacts including rifles made in Jamestown, pottery, and more. It is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. and Sunday from 1 P.M. to 4:30 P.M. The historical structures in the park are open only on weekends. For information, call 336-885-1859 or visit www.highpointmuseum.org.
Cultural Offerings
The North Carolina Shakespeare Festival is headquartered in the High Point Theatre, at 220 East Commerce Avenue (27262). This professional troupe performs plays—most of them by Shakespeare—at different venues in the Triad during the late summer and fall. It also stages A Christmas Carol in December. To learn more, contact the festival at P.O. Box 6066 (27262), call 336-841-2273, or visit www.nc-shakes.org.
Special Shopping
Although High Point has dozens of retail stores that feature a vast array of home furnishings to suit every taste and budget, one special outlet is described below. The High Point Convention and Visitors Bureau offers free furniture-shopping directories. The best deals are usually to be found in August and right after the furniture markets in April and October.
The phenomenal Furnitureland South is located at 5635 Riverdale Drive in Jamestown (27282), just off Interstate 85 Business between High Point and Greensboro. It bills itself as “the World’s Largest Home Furnishings Showplace.” The complex is over 800,000 square feet and still growing. From the moment you see the 85-foot-tall chest of drawers from the highway, you’ll know this is not an ordinary furniture store. It’s so big that you’ll even be given a map. You are free to browse the several buildings, where furniture is shown in gallery settings and grouped according to type and style. When you need assistance, just pick up the nearest telephone. The showrooms are open Monday through Thursday and Saturday from 8:30 A.M. to 5:30 P.M. and Friday from 8:30 A.M. to 8:30 P.M. For information, call 336-436-8056 or visit www.furniturelandsouth.com.
Recreation
Oak Hollow Lake Park and Marina, at 3431 North Centennial Street, has an 18-hole Pete Dye–designed golf course with a practice range and a clubhouse. The 1,500-acre park offers boating, water-skiing, and sailing; small sailboats can be rented for use on the lake. It also includes tennis courts and 90 campsites with full hookups. The administrative office is at 136 Northpoint Avenue (27262); call 336-883-3494 or visit http://www.high-point.net/pr/marina.cfm.
City Lake Park, at 602 West Main Street in Jamestown (27282), is a 969-acre site with a 340-acre lake. Visitors enjoy the fishing, the paddleboats, and the fishing-boat and canoe rentals. The park has amusement rides, a train, a water slide, the largest outdoor swimming pool in the state, a miniature golf course, a gymnasium, a playground, and an excursion boat. Call 336-883-3498 or visit www.high-point.net.
Piedmont Environmental Center was founded in 1972 to provide environmental education through outdoor experiences. Located at 1220 Penny Road (27265) adjacent to High Point Lake, its 376 acres of protected land offer 11 miles of trails for jogging and hiking. The Bicentennial Greenway, a 10-foot-wide, 6.5-mile-long paved trail, also runs through the site. The center’s educational building is a study in recycled-materials construction—beverage cans were used for the red roof, newspapers for the gray roof, ketchup bottles for office carpeting, and car windshields for the bathroom tiles. The center has a nature preserve; a nature store; animal exhibits including a red fox, a white-tailed deer, hawks, raccoons, and owls; and a large “walk-on” relief map of North Carolina that demonstrates the state’s geology, geography, and physiography. It is open Monday through Saturday from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. and Sunday from 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. The trails are open from sunrise to sunset seven days a week. Admission is free. For information, visit www.piedmontenvironmental.com or call 336-883-8531.
Seasonal Events
Say no more—the big events in town are the two High Point Markets, held in the spring and fall (see page 365).
Places to Stay
Good locally owned accommodations are few in High Point. Most of the major chains are represented around the intersections of Interstate 40 and N.C. 68 (the airport exit) and Interstate 40 and High Point Road. Both areas are within a quick drive of downtown. Also see the Greensboro listings, since the two cities have virtually run together.
Resorts, Hotels, and Motels
Best Western High Point Hotel. Expensive. 135 South Main Street, 27260 (336889-8888; www.hotelhighpoint.com). Located next to the largest of the furniture showroom buildings, this hotel is the best in downtown High Point. It has over 200 rooms, a restaurant, a bar, a fitness room, an indoor pool, and meeting space. The hotel provides free airport transportation.
Inns and Bed-and-Breakfasts
J. H. Adams Inn. Deluxe. 1108 North Main Street, 27262 (888-256-1289 or 336-882-3267; www.jhadamsinn.com). When built in 1918, this place was the home of a family that made its fortune in the local hosiery business that for decades was the only North Carolina company on the New York Stock Exchange. Now listed on the National Register, the home was renovated and opened as an inn in 2001. Each of the 31 rooms and suites showcases a distinct furniture collection from the best manufacturers in the world. The amenities are comparable to those in world-class inns.
Places to Eat
Blue Water Grille. Expensive. 126 East State Avenue, 27262 (336-886-1010; www.bluewatergrillenc.net). The cuisine here is an interesting fusion of French, Asian, Caribbean, and Low Country influences. Although you can expect excellent seafood entrées, as the name suggests, you can also enjoy a variety of other offerings. Dinner is served Monday through Saturday.
Gullah Gullah Cuisine. Expensive. 2801 North Main Street, Suite 113, 27265 (336-883-2009; www.tastegullah.com). A graduate of Johnson & Wales, owner-chef Carlos Brown brings a classic French sensibility to his Low Country–inspired cuisine. Lunch is served Tuesday through Saturday and dinner Tuesday through Sunday.
Southern Roots. Expensive. In the J. H. Adams Inn at 1108 North Main Street, 27262 (336-882-3267; www.jhadamsinn.com/southern.html). As the name implies, much of this restaurant’s menu derives its inspiration from Southern tradition. For example, Southern Roots offers pan-seared sea scallops served on ham-braised cabbage and kale over creamy cheese grits. Lunch is served Monday through Friday and dinner Monday through Saturday; brunch is offered on Sunday.
Emerywood Fine Foods. Moderate/Inexpensive. 130 West Lexington Avenue, 27262 (336-882-6971; www.emerywood.com). Emerywood serves a large variety of classic and gourmet sandwiches and salads, as well as outstanding entrées in the evening. It also runs a popular catering service. Lunch is served Monday through Saturday and dinner Tuesday through Saturday.
The Furniture Industry and High Point
Drawing on the nearby hardwood forests, local furniture factories owned and run by Northern industrialists were shipping their products out of High Point by the trainload in the 1880s. In 1889, High Point Furniture Company became the first locally owned furniture manufacturer. Others soon followed. Local entrepreneurs realized that the quality of their furniture exceeded that produced in the North. They just needed to come up with some way to display their wares. In 1905, the High Point Exposition Company opened its first furniture show. In 1909, the city’s furniture manufacturers began hosting biannual expositions, but they couldn’t compete with the ones held in the North.
In 1911, J. J. Farris, editor of the High Point Enterprise, suggested that High Point construct a large display building. The Southern Furniture Manufacturers’ Association led the movement to create a display building that would make High Point the center for Southern furniture. In June 1919, construction began on a 10-story, $1 million structure that would have 261,000 square feet of exhibit space. When the building opened in 1921, more than 700 furniture buyers showed up to view the 149 exhibits. By 1924, the building’s exhibit space was completely rented. Over the years, the Southern Exposition Building underwent repeated expansions. When the first postwar market was held in January 1947, some 5,147 retail furniture buyers came to town. By 1955, the display area increased to 500,000 square feet.
Now known as the International Home Furnishings Center, the showrooms have completely taken over downtown High Point. The city boasts 12 million square feet of display space. It plays host to “the market” twice a year—in the spring and fall. The market attracts over 2,000 manufacturers, as well as more than 85,000 visitors from every state and 110 countries. Because accommodations are scarce during these times, many local residents rent their homes to market attendees and use the money to go on vacation.
Although the markets are not open to the public, the city’s huge furniture retailers are. People from all over the country come to High Point to take advantage of prices 40 to 50 percent off retail. When you’re shopping, remember that these retailers do not have huge warehouses stocked with ready-to-ship furniture. Rather, the retailers place orders with the manufacturers; it usually takes eight to 12 weeks for customers to receive their shipments. Some manufacturers require local retailers to exhibit complete collections in order to get volume discounts. This means that customers have a better selection in High Point than in traditional stores.
In addition to full-service stores, several clearance centers are located in High Point. The area around South Main Street near Interstate 85 Business could be called “Clearance Row.” These stores stock unclaimed merchandise, discontinued items, and pieces moved out of the galleries to make room for new collections. Items that were originally 40 to 50 percent off retail in the main stores are discounted even further.
When you come to High Point, you will see that this is indeed “the Home Furnishings Capital of the World.”
By Anne Holcomb Waters and Carolyn Sakowski
North Carolina Zoological Park, centrally located at 4401 Zoo Parkway in Asheboro (27205), is the largest walk-through natural-habitat zoo in the country. Designed to display animals and plants in settings as similar to their native habitats as possible, the zoo offers five miles of meandering trails through indoor exhibits and two vast “continental regions”—North America and Africa. In all, the park covers more than 500 acres in the Uwharrie Mountains, with over 900 acres available for expansion. Because of the zoo’s size, officials recommend spending five hours for a visit, though the highlights can be seen in just a couple of hours.
You can start your visit at either the North America or the Africa entrance, where you’ll find lockers, ATMs, and wheelchairs and strollers for rent. Be sure to check out the animal status boards outside the admissions windows; the boards state times for animal feedings and keeper talks and indicate which animals may be off exhibit. Although the zoo has a tram, walking is the best way to see the animals, so wear comfortable shoes. The habitats range from wide-open fields like the “African Plains and Prairie” exhibit, where spotting antelope and bison can be challenging, to indoor-outdoor exhibits like the “Rocky Coast,” where you can watch polar bears and sea lions dipping and diving underwater. You’ll see alligators in the “Cypress Swamp” and gorillas in the “Forest Glade.” In short, the wild, wonderful world of animals awaits.
The zoo has three restaurants, seasonal snack shops, several picnic areas, and two gift shops. Buses will take visitors back to their cars at the end of their visits. The zoo is open every day except Christmas; it closes during severe weather. It is open 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. from April through October and 9 A.M. to 4 P.M. from November to April. Admission is charged; no rain checks are given. To reach the zoo, take U.S. 220 South from Asheboro and follow the signs. For more information, call 800-488-0444 or visit www.nczoo.org.
The unique hamlet of Seagrove is the pottery center of North Carolina. Located 30 miles south of the Triad at the north end of the Uwharries, it is home to scores of potters who practice their craft in the tiny town and its environs. While some carry on family traditions over 200 years old, others are relative newcomers who have congregated in this artists’ community, thus making the pottery available here richly diverse. Along with traditional face jugs and salt-glazed jugs, you’ll find fine raku and museum-quality porcelain.
Start your visit at the North Carolina Pottery Center, at 233 East Avenue (27341), where you can pick up a free map with brief descriptions of potteries even if the center is closed. However, this interpretive and educational facility is well worth a visit if you’re interested in the history of North Carolina pottery. It is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 A.M. to 4 P.M. Admission is charged. Call 336-873-8430 or visit www.ncpotterycenter.com for more information. Two marketing associations also offer websites; visit www.discoverseagrove.com and www.seagroveheritage.com. Many, though not all, of the potteries are closed on Sunday.
Tanglewood Park is the former estate of William Neal Reynolds, brother of tobacco entrepreneur R. J. Reynolds. Perched on the banks of the Yadkin River, this lush 1,100-acre park has been turned into northwestern North Carolina’s premier recreation area. In addition to lovely gardens, a riding stable, a small lake with paddleboats, and miles of trails for riding and biking, Tanglewood boasts the Championship Course, designed by Robert Trent Jones, Jr., as well as another 18-hole golf course and a par-three course. More recent enhancements include the splendid Pete S. Brunstetter Aquatic Center and lighted clay and hard-surface tennis courts. Picnic facilities abound, including several shelters that can be reserved for large parties. Tanglewood also offers accommodations at the lovely Manor House Bed-and-Breakfast, Reynolds’s former home; for information, call 336-778-6370.
Tanglewood hosts special events throughout the year, including the Independence Day Fireworks Celebration, the North Carolina Wine Festival in the spring, and the Festival of Lights during the holiday season.
The entrance to Tanglewood is about 10 miles southwest of Winston-Salem at 4061 Clemmons Road in the village of Clemmons (27012); it is easily accessible from Interstate 40. The park is open daily from 7 A.M. to sunset except on Christmas. Admission is charged. Call 336-778-6300 or check www.co.forsyth.nc.us/Tanglewood for more information.
Alamance Battleground State Historic Site is located at 5803 N.C. 62 South (27215) near Burlington, east of Greensboro. This is the site of a 1771 battle between Royal Governor William Tryon’s militia and the rebellious back-country farmers known as Regulators. The Regulators objected to the control exercised over the colonial government by the merchants and planters to the east; their dissatisfaction eventually led to the short-lived War of Regulation. They were crushed by Tryon here at Alamance, which ended the Regulator Movement. On the other hand, many interpret the battle and the Regulators’ grievances as a warmup for the American Revolution.
The battleground is currently open from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Monday through Saturday. Admission is free. Be sure to call ahead; the number is 336-227-4785. The website is www.nchistoricsites.org.
Charlotte Hawkins Brown Memorial State Historic Site was North Carolina’s first state historic site honoring the contributions of an African-American citizen. Located about 10 miles east of Greensboro at 6136 Burlington Road in Sedalia (27249), this was also the first state historic site to honor a woman. To reach it, take Exit 135 (Rock Creek Dairy Road) off Interstate 85, follow the signs to U.S. 70, turn left, and travel 1.5 miles to the site.
Charlotte Hawkins Brown was born in North Carolina but grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Dissatisfied with the lack of educational opportunities for blacks in the Jim Crow South, she returned to North Carolina in 1901 to teach African-American youths in Sedalia. When the school where she was working closed after she had taught only one term, she raised money in New England to found her own school, which she named Palmer Memorial Institute. In its early years, the day and boarding school emphasized agricultural and industrial education for rural living. During her 50-year presidency, Dr. Brown saw more than 1,000 students graduate from her school.
The historic site focuses not only on Palmer Memorial Institute but on the educational and social history of North Carolina as well. It offers exhibits, tours of historic structures, and audiovisual presentations. It is open Monday through Saturday from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Admission is free. Be sure to call ahead; the number is 336-4494846. The website is www.nchistoricsites.org.
Horne Creek Living Historical Farm is located north of Winston-Salem off U.S. 52 at 308 Horne Creek Road in Pinnacle (27043). This state historic site interprets everyday farm life on a typical middle-class North Carolina farm during the early 1900s. It is open Tuesday through Saturday from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. It is closed on major holidays. Admission is free except for special events. Call 336-325-2298 or visit www.nchistoricsites.org/horne/horne.htm for more information.
Midway between the Triad and Charlotte off Interstate 85 are the towns of Salisbury and Spencer, which lie only minutes from the interstate but a century from its congestion, thanks to the legacy of the railroad. The older of the two, Salisbury, was established before the American Revolution, but it took the arrival of the North Carolina Railroad in 1855 to rejuvenate the century-old town. Spencer owes its very existence to the railroad.
If you’re approaching from the north, take the Spencer exit (Exit 82, a left-hand exit), which will bring you over the Yadkin River on U.S. 29. Here, in April 1865, a band of Confederates (with the help of some Union prisoners turned Confederate sympathizers) thwarted the efforts of Union major general George Stoneman and his men to burn the railroad bridge. Continue on U.S. 29 to arrive in Spencer, then Salisbury.
In the 1890s, Southern Railway’s president, Samuel Spencer, decided to establish a locomotive repair facility at the midpoint between Atlanta and Washington, D.C. And so the town of Spencer was born. Incorporated in 1905, it thrived until the 1950s and 1960s, when the Spencer Repair Shops began to be phased out.
The North Carolina Transportation Museum and Historic Spencer Shops are located at 411 South Salisbury Avenue in Spencer (28159) on the site of what was once Southern Railway’s largest steam-locomotive repair facility. The site features an authentic train depot, antique automobiles, and a 37-bay roundhouse that includes 25 locomotives, dozens of rail cars, and other exhibit areas. The museum offers seasonal train rides, guided tours for scheduled groups, and special events throughout the year. Included among these is the semiannual appearance of Thomas the Tank Engine—a must for tiny tykes. Admission is free, but donations are appreciated; admission may be charged for special events. Small fees are charged for the train and turntable rides. From May through October, the facilities are open from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Monday to Saturday and from 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. on Sunday. From November through April, the hours are 9 A.M. to 4 P.M. Tuesday to Saturday and 1 P.M. to 4 P.M. on Sunday. For more information, call the museum at 877-NCTM-FUN or 704-636-2889 or visit www.nctrans.org.
Continue on U.S. 29, which becomes Salisbury Avenue, then Main Street as you approach downtown Salisbury. Chartered in 1755, Salisbury is steeped in history and is devoted to preserving it, as evidenced by its 10 historic districts encompassing 30 blocks. Throughout the town are lovely 19th-and 20th-century homes, churches, and businesses where you can still buy homemade ice cream and get Mary Janes and Bit-O-Honeys out of bins.
Start your visit at the Rowan County Convention and Visitors Bureau (800-332-2343 or 704-638-3100; www.visitsalisburync.com), located at 204 East Innes Street (28144). To get there, turn left off Main Street onto Innes and go two blocks; the bureau is on the left.
Here, you can pick up information for self-guided walking and driving tours and trolley tours. Among the sites are the following.
The Rowan Museum, at 202 North Main Street (28144), occupies the 1854 courthouse, a fine example of Greek Revival architecture from before the Civil War. Among its holdings are Civil War–era artifacts and memorabilia of Salisbury native and author Frances Fisher Tiernan, who penned her works under the name Christian Reid.
The handsome Josephus Hall House, at 226 South Jackson Street (28144), was built in 1820 as an academy for young women. Later converted into a private residence, it was owned by the Hall family for generations before being purchased by the Historic Salisbury Foundation, which operates it as a museum. It is open Saturday and Sunday from 1 P.M. to 4 P.M. Admission is charged.
Historic National Cemetery and Confederate Prison Site, at 202 Government Road (28144), was established in 1865 to honor the thousands of Union soldiers who died at the Salisbury prison during the Civil War. Today, the cemetery is a burial ground for veterans of all of America’s wars. For information, call 704-636-2661.
And last but certainly not least is the Salisbury Railway Passenger Station, at 215 Depot Street (28144). A fine example of the Spanish Mission style, it was designed by noted architect Frank Milburn in 1906. Two Amtrak trains, the Piedmont and the Carolinian, pass through daily between Charlotte and New York, continuing a century-old tradition. Indeed, Norfolk Southern and Amtrak trains rumble through town with such regularity that a former loading dock along the rails has become an informal train-spotting platform. Each weekend, (mostly) men come out and set up their lawn chairs to watch. Some residents refer to them affectionately as “train nuts,” since trains pass so frequently here that they are regarded more as noisy nuisances then objects of fascination.
Lexington, approximately 25 miles south of Winston-Salem on U.S. 52, is the county seat of Davidson County and the undisputed “Barbecue Capital of North Carolina.” Home to more than 20 barbecue restaurants, Lexington is known for its western-style (or Lexington-style) barbecue, which features pork shoulders with a vinegar sauce that includes tomato. This distinguishes it from eastern-style barbecue, which involves roasting the whole hog and using a zestier vinegar-only sauce. If this seems a small distinction, you’re wrong. The relative merits of the two styles are hotly debated in the state. Lexington’s famous Barbecue Festival takes place each October. Call 336-956-1880 or visit www.barbecuefestival.com for information.
Lexington’s favorite son is Bob Timberlake, a gifted and extraordinarily successful painter. Inspired to take up painting as an adult by an article about Andrew Wyeth, Timberlake has since branched out into furniture making, clothing design, and, most recently, architecture. Almost everything Timberlake puts his name on sells like hot cakes and can be found at the Bob Timberlake Gallery, located at 1714 East Center Street Extension (27242). Visit www.bobtimberlake.com or call 800-244-0095 for more information.
The quaint town of Mount Airy is a must for those who love The Andy Griffith Show. If you’re a fan, you probably already know that Mount Airy is Griffith’s hometown and the model for Mayberry. Located on U.S. 52 about 30 miles northwest of Winston-Salem, Mount Airy is a living monument to Griffith and the popular television show, boasting Floyd’s Barber Shop, the Old Mayberry Jail, and Griffith’s childhood home. If you visit at mealtime, be sure to try a porkchop sandwich at the Snappy Lunch, Mount Airy’s oldest restaurant. The visitor center is located at 200 North Main Street (27030). For information, call 800-948-0949 or visit www.visitmayberry.com.
Each September, Mount Airy commemorates The Andy Griffith Show with its Mayberry Days festival, which attracts fans worldwide. Call the Surry Arts Council at 800-286-6193 or visit www.mayberrydays.org for information.
Speaking of Mayberry, Pilot Mountain State Park is right next to the town of Pilot Mountain, the basis for Mount Pilot on The Andy Griffith Show. The park is located off U.S. 52 at 1792 Pilot Knob Park Road in the Surry County community of Pinnacle (27043). Though many visitors think Mount Pilot is the correct name, it’s not. And don’t go looking for any “fun girls” here either. Pilot Mountain is the most distinctive peak in the Sauratown range and a well-known landmark of the Triad. The state park offers picnic grounds, campsites, bridle paths, and plenty of hiking trails. The quartzite dome atop Pilot Mountain, however, is a fragile ecosystem unto itself; climbing it is not allowed. Call 336-325-2355 or visit http://www.ncparks.gov/Visit/main.phd for more information.
Hanging Rock State Park, located about 15 miles east of Pilot Mountain off N.C. 89 at 2015 Hanging Rock Park Road near Danbury (27016), is the largest state park in the Piedmont. Three sheer rockfaces—Cooks Wall, Moores Knob, and Hanging Rock itself—dominate the park. Climbing is popular on the first two but not on Hanging Rock. Campsites, cabins, picnic areas, swimming, fishing, and 20 miles of hiking trails are the attractions here. Many visitors like to canoe the Dan River, a gentle, slow-moving river except after storms. Call 336-593-8480 or visit http://www.ncparks.gov/Visit/main.phd for more information.
Nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge, Wilkes County comes alive the last weekend in April thanks to Merlefest, an annual celebration of Americana music. Held to honor the late son of flat-picking legend Doc Watson, this four-day music festival grew from a few of Doc and Merle’s musician friends playing on the back of a flatbed truck for 4,000 people in 1988 to a crowd of over 40,000 fans who come to see some of the best bluegrass, Celtic, and Cajun musicians in the business. Numerous stages are spread over the hillsides of the campus of Wilkes Community College. What makes this festival so special is the magic that often occurs when musicians who rarely play together team up for intimate jam sessions at some of the smaller venues. You can learn more by writing Merlefest at P.O. Box 120 in Wilkesboro (28697), calling 800-343-7857, or visiting www.merlefest.org.
The Yadkin Valley: North Carolina’s Wine Country
Situated in the heart of the North Carolina Piedmont, the Yadkin River Valley has emerged as the state’s premier wine region. Spurring this wine revolution is the gradual decline of the tobacco industry. Since the 1990s, area farmers have been planting former tobacco fields with grapevines and other alternative crops. The cultivation of vinifera and European varietal grapes has been so successful here, in fact, that the region was recognized in 2003 as North Carolina’s first American Viticultural Area, or “appellation.”
For wine enthusiasts, a tour of the Yadkin Valley wineries offers the chance not only to sip some award-winning Chardonnays and Cabernets but also to travel the rolling valleys and picturesque foothills of the Piedmont. The valley boasts 23 vineyards and wineries, with more on the horizon. The following tour follows a roughly circular route to visit four wineries of distinction. I strongly urge you to expand your tour of the wine country if you have time.
In the 1970s, the pioneering efforts of the late Jack Kroustalis and his wife, Lillian, at Westbend Vineyards proved that vinifera grapes could grow in the Piedmont. Named for a western bend in the Yadkin River, Westbend began as a vineyard only, growing grapes for other wineries, before becoming a bonded winery in 1988. Its first wines were released in 1990, and the awards have flowed in ever since. It is open for wine tastings Tuesday through Saturday from 11 A.M. to 5 P.M. and Sunday from noon to 5 P.M.; the hours may vary in winter. Wine tours cost three dollars. For more information, call 336-945-5032 or visit www.westbendvineyards.com. Westbend is located at 5394 Williams Road in Lewisville (27023) on the western outskirts of Winston-Salem. From Winston-Salem, take U.S. 421 North to Shallowford Road (Exit 246). Turn left, go 2.4 miles, and turn left onto Williams Road. Westbend is the fourth drive on the left.
RayLen Vineyards and Winery is located at 3577 U.S. 158 in Mocksville (27028). Joe and Joyce Neely received a big boost when Westbend Vineyards’ longtime winemaker, Steve Shepard, decided to join their fledgling vineyard in the late 1990s. Every one of RayLen’s initial releases in 2000 earned medals in competitions. Named for the Neelys’ two daughters, Rachel and Len, the vineyard has a spacious tasting room with tables and chairs and a wraparound porch with rocking chairs for use in fair weather. A full-flight wine-tasting costs eight dollars, while a red- or white-flight only is five. The winery is open year-round from 11 A.M. to 6 P.M. Monday through Saturday. For information, visit www.raylenvineyards.com or call 336-998-3100. To reach RayLen from Winston-Salem, head west on Interstate 40 to Exit 180 and turn left on N.C. 801 South. The entrance is four miles on the right.
Shelton Vineyards, at 286 Cabernet Lane in Dobson (27017), is owned by brothers Ed and Charlie Shelton, who first planted 60 acres of European varietals on an old dairy farm in 1999. By 2001, that acreage had expanded to more than 200, making this the largest family-owned estate winery in North Carolina. In addition to investing in their own state-of-the-art facility, the Shelton brothers sponsored the application for the area’s appellation designation and started the viticulture and oenology program at Surry Community College in Dobson. The vineyard is open from 10 A.M. to 6 P.M. Monday through Saturday and from 1 P.M. to 6 P.M. on Sunday during daylight saving time. The winter hours are 10 A.M. to 5 P.M. Monday through Saturday and 1 P.M. to 5 P.M. on Sunday. The cost is five dollars per person. Guests receive a guided tour of the 33,000-square-foot winery, an overview of the art of winemaking, a tasting of five wines, and a souvenir glass. For information, call 336-998-3100 or visit www.sheltonvineyards.com. To reach Shelton Vineyards from Mocksville, take U.S. 601 North to Dobson.
Named for a prizewinning Holstein cow, RagApple Lassie Vineyards & Winery is located at 3824 RagApple Lassie Lane in Boonville (27011). When the winery was honored as one of two finalists for the distinction of being the “Best New Winery in the United States,” owners Frank and Lenna Hobson were quick to credit the Yadkin Valley appellation. Winemaker Linda King also deserves some of the praise for RagApple Lassie’s early, heady success. Tastings, available daily, cost $12 dollars to sample 13 wines or six dollars to sample five of the reds, whites, or dessert wines; participants receive a souvenir glass. If you want a tour, just ask. Call 866-724-2775 or visit www.ragapplelassie.com. To reach the winery from Dobson, go east on N.C. 67 off U.S. 601 and look for the sign.
For additional information about North Carolina’s vineyards and wineries, visit www.ncwine.com or call 877-3NC-WINE. For a member list of the Yadkin Valley Wine Growers Association and an interactive map, call 336-366-4734 or visit www.yadkinvalleywineries.com.
