industry

by

Greenville North Carolina


This is a bit of a departure from most of my online rants. If you do not live in North Carolina, the chances of your ever hear of Greenville diminish quickly with distance. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Greenville’s population stands at 88,728. Also, according to thecentersquare.com, Greenville’s poverty level stands at 24.3%, highest in the state. And yet, were you to drive the streets to the south and east of the city’s center, you would be impressed by how new everything is and how vibrant this city is. And so, what is going on?

I live in Ayden NC which sits about 10 miles to the south of Greenville and has a population of about 5200, a farming community to be sure. Other towns surrounding Greenville are Winterville, Farmville and Bethel. With the exception of Winterville, to drive to any of those other communities, you will be driving past corn fields, cotton fields and tobacco fields.

For Greenville itself, the largest employer is Vidant heath which owns the city’s only hospital and many clinics. Next is the Pitt County school system. In other words, there is no industry in this city. At one time, Greenville was a center of the textile industry in North Carolina. Not the largest by any means but easily the area’s largest employer. But in the 1950s and 60s, like most of America, those jobs dried up and the mills closed down as the textile industry shifted to Asia.

But once you leave Greenville you are going to drive at least 1/2 hour before you reach another city of any appreciable size. This part of North Carolina is most definitely rural.

Then why would my wife and I relocate from the Boston environs to this area? Well first, we wanted to get away from New England winters. I am getting up there in years and shoveling snow was becoming too difficult. And I also found that to have my driveway plowed would cost me about $200 per storm! I was not willing to pay that. Also, in the Boston area we were paying $2300 per month for an apartment rental whereas here we own a home with a monthly mortgage payment of $1200. That was a no-brainer! Last winter Greenville received about 4 inches of snow early one Saturday morning and the city quite literally shut down for the next 2 days! We had to laugh.

While we are still trying to find a really good Italian restaurant, we have added a fantastic North Carolina Barbeque restaurant, the Starlight Inn here in Ayden. We like this place not only because it came in 2nd place in an all–North Carolina competition but because we just really like it. We also found a Jamaican restaurant, a hole-in-the-wall place near the town of Snow Hill, about 1/2 hour from us.

Getting the beach from here is about 1-3/4-to-2-hour trip. But once you get there, it is glorious! Not the outer banks, but still a southern continuation of the outer banks which suits us just fine.

One thing you notice in the Greenville area is all the new houses being built. These homes are being bought almost as quickly as they are built. I have known of houses in the process of being built that were already sold! To me, this says that Greenville and its environs, is an area on the rise. The cost of living relative to the northeast is much lower with certain exceptions but those are things like gasoline and other commodities where pricing is on a national level rather than a regional or local one.

Whatever Greenville lacks in urban attraction is made up for by a trip to the Raleigh and Durham area which are about 90 minutes away. Greenville is a very attractive place for young people from an affordability view and the same is true for retirees. The city is also prime for the location of new large industry, something I expect will happen in the near future. Say what you like but Greenville is truly a good place to live.

by

Is This the Year We Return to 1912


I have a great deal of knowledge about 1912 in the U.S. because I did my master’s degree thesis on that year.  I am certain that more than one of you will wonder how I can possibly ask such a question considering what things were like then and what they are like now.  I am going to present here what 1912 looked like in many of America’s east coast and mid-American cities.  The west coast was not at all developed save for San Francisco, and to a lesser degree, Seattle.

Child labor

Child labor, such as seen above, was unfortunately very commonplace in 1912.  Many states had labor laws restricting children under the age of 14 from working in factories.  But states such as South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama had no such laws and children as  young as 10 were found in workplaces.  The picture above was taken in North Carolina in 1908.

These children were sent to work at such a young age because working class families were having great difficulties in just putting food on their tables.  Of course they also had trouble with living conditions, health care, and clothing.  They were forced to make choices between buying a pair of shoes or buying a loaf of bread.  The people most affected with the new immigrants of the day, mainly eastern and southern Europeans.

The early 1900s saw the rise of the Progressive movement.  These were people who immersed themselves frequently in immigrant neighborhoods.  Most notably were Jane Addams who founded “Hull House” in Chicago to help immigrant women, and Margaret Sanger who brought her nursing skills to the lower east side of New York to help the immigrant women there.  Both women believed that health care in the United States failed to meet the needs of these immigrants.  These immigrants clustered in particular portions of America’s cities.  These people were viewed as ignorant and draining the resources of the communities they lived in as well as taking jobs for those born in America.

Lawrence MA 1912

Images like the one above were unfortunately very common in 1912 but are we heading in that same direction today?

In 1912 there was no federal tax on personal income.  People took home every penny they earned.  Still, America’s wealth existed largely in the hands of a very few.  Industrialists of the day joined associations dedicated to their particular product.  These associations in turn lobbied Congress to do their will, usually successfully.  They convinced Congress that their desires were always good for all Americans.

In 1912 unions were extremely weak, and seldom won any strikes.  Industry was largely unregulated.  Child labor laws were basically non-existent.  There was no minimum wage.

I am not suggesting that we are definitely going to return to just the way it was in 1912, that would be foolish.  What I am saying is, there are those who are trying to change existing laws that would effectively return us to a state similar to that in 1912.