Hub City Press to publish NORTH OF MAIN

Hub City Press is proud to announce the publication of a new local history book, North of Main: Spartanburg's Historic Black Neighborhoods of North Dean Street, Gas Bottom, and Back of the College, in October of 2024.

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. Major sponsors include the City of Spartanburg, the Spartanburg Public Libraries, and Wofford College.

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.

Learn more and preorder your copy at hubcity.org/northofmain. Support its publication and be acknowledged in the book with a donation of $100 or more: hubcity.org/support.