The history of African Americans in the Piedmont region is closely linked with that of the German Moravian Protestant group, which settled in nearby Piedmont in 1753.  In 1766 the Moravians established Salem. The Moravians did not see African Americans as equals, but they did see them as having more rights compared to other European Americans. Their greater concern was for the spiritual welfare of enslaved people. In other words they believed in slavery, but they also believed that Christian literacy was important for the soul. So within the Moravian enclave of Salem, enslaved people enjoyed more freedoms and literacy provided they strictly adhered to Moravian teachings. This social custom let European American Moravians bypass a moral dilemma with their faith while enjoying the fruits of slavery. 

    In 1808 Greensboro was named after patriot commander Nathaniel Greene who fought the British during the American Revolution. It soon became a commercial railroad hub, educational and commercial center in the foothills region of North Carolina.

    St. Philips Moravian Church in Salem was established in 1822, and became of center of learning for enslaved people. Unfortunately at the same time, the prevailing sentiments of European Americans towards slavery began to soak into the Moravian perspective. Respect for Black humanity and rights began melting away. Nearby tobacco, furniture and textile slave-holders, knowing that you can’t keep people enslaved if you don’t control their mind, helped enact a state law in 1831 that prohibited teaching literacy to enslaved people. Even the Moravians established separate places of worship in Salem.

    By 1849 Winston, a short distance from Salem, was established as county seat and quickly became another bustling commercial center in the region. Considering the stakes involved for slaveholders, they sought to repress any effort that threatened their privileged prosperity. Educating slaves was a threat! Thus, the African American Moravian church and their literacy movement were forced underground.

    From 1830 until the 1865, Quaker cousins Levi and Vestal Coffin formed the Grand Central Terminal of the Underground Railroad in the Greensboro/Highpoint area.  Imagine how dangerous that must have been considering that Greensboro was a railroad, troops and supply center for the Confederacy during the Civil War.  Southern generals regularly congregated there and in 1865 the Confederacy briefly relocated its capitol to Greensboro. For these reasons, many honor the Coffins as the Fathers of the Underground Railroad.

    After the Civil War skilled Black craftsmen in Winston-Salem and Greensboro emerged to market their services throughout the Carolinas, though many African Americans continued work on the tobacco farms and mills. The Moravian church remained a driving force in Winston-Salem, helping many of the skilled and literate to attain elevated social status. In 1873 Bennett College was established in Greensboro as a seminary for African American women. By 1881 Israel Clement was the first African American elected to the Winston school board. Sensing that integrated schools would not fly in 1883, years before the before infamous Plessy vs. Ferguson US Supreme Court decision, Winston organized separate black and white schools systems. Opened in 1887, Depot Street School was the first school organized solely for African Americans in Winston. With such a tradition of skilled craftsmen and literacy in the region, it is not surprising that the Agricultural and Mechanical College for the Colored Race (predecessor to North Carolina A&T University) was founded in 1891 in Greensboro. So active was the church-going community that 18 African American churches were established in Winston-Salem alone.

    Dr. Charlotte Hawkins founded Palmer Memorial Institute, a prep school for Greensboro’s African Americans in the early 1900s. Forsyth Savings & Trust was opened in 1907 as the first Black bank in he area. Many African Americans who worked for R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company off Third Street had a place to safely accumulate savings and to obtain mortgages and business loans. A thriving community emerged with more churches, schools, theaters, insurance companies and a Colored Merchants Association to assist business owners. There were bumps in the road, however. In 1912 Winston passed ordinances against integrated street blocks. This ordinance insured that the he Black community would have to depend on itself for many years to come.

    By 1925 Winston-Salem Teachers College, predecessor to Winston-Salem State University an HBCU, was granted state charter. In 1926 the Safe Bus Company received its state charter and began providing African Americans a way to and from work.  WAAA, became the state’s first Black radio station in Winston-Salem in 1950.  After returning from WWII and the Korean War, many African Americans became fed up with segregation. A substantial gathering of college graduates and successful businesses in the area also raised their aspirations. Despite many legal challenges and school board hearings in the 1950s, local leaders were pretty much consigned to the status quo of segregation.

    Emboldened by the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education U.S. Supreme Court decision, Greensboro’s Black leaders pressed to desegregate public schools. The same tactic occurred around the nation, but with few results. In late 1955, the Montgomery Bus Boycott added energy to the Civil Rights Movement. By 1958, local activists found a suitable case to test a U.S. Supreme Court decision that ruled it is unreasonable to force children to be bused further away from their closest public school – in this case Caldwell School. Caldwell became the cause celebre of the NAACP, who succeeded in forcing the school board to desegregate Caldwell School in 1959. White school board leaders used chicanery and logistical sleight-of-hand to avoid placing African Americans in the same buildings with European Americans, thus obeying the letter, but not the spirit of the law. They falsely convinced European Americans that hoards of Black kids were coming to take over school. The message to white parents was, the only way to ensure a quality education is to enroll your kids in other schools not under court-ordered desegregation. By 1959, not a single European American was enrolled in Caldwell School. This subterfuge tactic embittered civil rights leaders.

    Greensboro’s finest hour came on 1 February 1960 with the first sit-in by four courageous North Carolina A&T students at the Greensboro Woolworth’s lunch counter. Days later the tactic was repeated in Winston-Salem, Durham, Raleigh and Charlotte. Thus, the 1960 Greensboro Lunch Counter Sit-in launched the “Passive Confrontation” stage of the Civil Rights Movement. In the same week it drew Rev. Jesse Jackson, a North Carolina A&T student officer, into a leadership role for the movement. The sit-ins also encouraged many European American students and international clergy to support the Civil Rights Movement. It took many years of peaceful sit-ins to help break the back of Jim Crow, community by community into the 1970s.

    Today, Winston-Salem and Greensboro have African American elected officials at all levels and a thriving economy. It is not a perfect for African Americans, but it is headed in the right direction.