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New neighborhoods began emerging north of Main Street in Spartanburg, South Carolina in the 1870s as emancipated Black men and women spent their hard-won post-slavery wages to purchase lots and build homes. As the decades rolled by, they and their descendants established a string of neighborhoods encompassing hundreds of houses, stretching from modern-day Barnet Park to the edge of Spartanburg Medical Center.
North of Main is the story of how this district rose and how it disappeared. In its pages, meet the pioneering Black men and women who lived and worked in these early neighborhoods: clergymen, educators, newsmen, artisans, attorneys, physicians, activists, musicians, caregivers, and more. In the face of frequent oppression, they laid a strong foundation for those who followed them. The history of the place they built is extraordinary in its demonstration of the heroism, courage, determination, and pride of Black citizens of Spartanburg who built dynamic and historically significant neighborhoods in treacherous times.
This title is the most in-depth Spartanburg Black history book ever produced, particularly for the years post-emancipation, and a sequel to the classic 2005 Hub City Press book, South of Main. This beautiful 250-page hardcover book also includes over 150 historic photographs and maps.
"This finely crafted, deeply researched, and beautifully illustrated volume is a masterful reconstruction of African American history in Spartanburg. Drawing upon oral interviews, newspaper accounts, archival records, photographs, and personal collections, North of Main admirably chronicles the aspirations, triumphs, resilience, and painful losses of people, institutions, organizations, and neighborhoods who were determined to 'make a way out of no way.' North of Main is a monumental achievement and a model of community-based history." —Dr. Bobby Donaldson, Executive Director Center for Civil Rights History & Research at University of South Carolina
Dr. Jim Neighbors teaches ethnic literature written in the U.S at Wofford College and co-coordinates the African/African American Studies Program. He holds a Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
Brenda Lee Pryce is the co-author of South of Main (Hub City Press, 2005). She served as the first Black female state legislator in South Carolina, received an honorary doctorate in humanities from Wofford College in 2023, and is a founding member of the Spartanburg African American Heritage and Culture Committee.
A former journalist at four newspapers in the Carolinas, Betsy Wakefield Teter served as executive director of the Hub City Writers Project and director of Hub City Press for 22 years. She edited Textile Town (Hub City, 2002) and numerous other Hub City titles.