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978-0-89587-115-2
0-89587-115-7
$34.95 hardcover
9" x11"
310 pages black-and-white photographs,
bibliography, index
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When Bishop August Gottlieb
Spangenberg arrived at Muddy Creek in January 1753, he deserved a rest.
Sent by the Moravian Church to find land for a settlement, he headed
west from Edenton, North Carolina, and spent a tortuous 3 1/2 months
locating a site, nearly dying of malaria in Granville County, nearly
freezing to death near Boone. Today, most people would judge his efforts
worth the hardship. He christened the tract on Muddy Creek Der Wachau--Wachovia.
It was the future site of Winston-Salem.
The people who followed came
by an easier route. The Moravians who built Salem came from the North on
the Great Wagon Road. R. J. Reynolds, the man who built Winston-Salem,
came from the north, too, 120 years after the Moravians.
A local writer once said the
moving forces behind the hyphenated city were "the Salem conscience
and the Winston purse." The Moravians established a tradition of
diligence, resourcefulness, piety, and charity. The city's
capitalists--chief among them the Reynolds, Hanes, and Gray
families--built the greatest industrial center south of Richmond and
east of Mississippi. Wachovia Bank and Trust Company grew into one of
the best-run banks in the country. P. H. Hanes Knitting Company became
the nation's greatest producer of knitwear. R. J. Reynolds Tobacco
Company imported so much cigarette paper and tobacco that
Winston-Salem--200 miles inland--was declared a port of entry. During
its heyday, the company paid its local taxes by delivering a truckload
of money to the courthouse steps--daily.
Winston-Salem: A History
tells about the city's personalities: Marshall Kurfees, the persistent
politician; Simon Green Atkins, who educated the African-Americans who
made the city run; Z. Smith Reynolds, whose mysterious death defies
explanation; F. Ross Johnson, the most hated man in town; Joe Camel, the
reluctant advertising icon.
It also tells about the
city's coming of age. Since the traumatic buyout of RJR Nabisco in
1989--one of the largest business deals in history--Winston-Salem has
started redefining itself. In its efforts to attract new companies,
cultivate new leadership, and address problems like race relations, it
is confronting its future head-on and pointing confidently toward a new
millennium.
about the author
As a reporter and editor for the Winston-Salem Journal for
over 20 years, Frank Tursi has been in close contact with the people and
events that make local history. Among his numerous articles on
Winston-Salem was a series that saved the Leinbach House in Old Salem
from destruction and won an award from the North Carolina Society of
Historians. A graduate of East Carolina University, Tursi has also
written for such publications as USA Today and Civil War Times
Illustrated.
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