Retail

Looking east, 1940s. (Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper) I don't have much in the way of information or photos on the Biltmore Esso, at 402 East Pettigrew Street. It appears to have been established in the early 1930s, and was run by John Lee (Johnnie) Roberts, who also owned Roberts' Esso on Pine Street, and the Knox Street Grocery in Walltown.

Building One, looking southwest, 1950s. Building Two, Warehouse A+B, and Building One, 1901, moving from foreground to background (Courtesy Duke Archives) The history of Blackwell's Durham Tobacco (later American Tobacco) and the Golden Belt Manufacturing Co. are inextricably mingled. In 1887, the Golden Belt Manufacturing Co. originated in a...

A textile factory intimately linked with tobacco production, the Golden Belt Manufacturing Company started in the Old Bull Building at American Tobacco before Julian Carr constructed the large plant on East Main Street to cut and sew bags for loose leaf tobacco. The company later branched into hosiery production and paper products - cartons and packaging for Lucky Strike cigarettes were made here. After outlasting all of of its early textile contemporaries, Golden Belt closed in 1994. In 2008, the property was redeveloped as s a mixture of residences, artists studios, office space, and retail.

Building Two at Golden Belt was the original bag factory - where the sheeting from the Cotton Mill (Building One) was cut and sewn into bags for Bull Durham tobacco. As of 2012, it is a repurposed mixed-use building housing retail, office, and event space.

Building 6, 1950s (Courtesy Herald-Sun) The history of Blackwell's Durham Tobacco (later American Tobacco) and the Golden Belt Manufacturing Co. are inextricably mingled. In 1887, the Golden Belt Manufacturing Co. originated in a portion of the Bull Durham Tobacco Factory (the white building at the northern extent of the American Tobacco complex)...

931 East Main housed "The Morris Company" in 1919-1923, a "dry goods store" (which likely means that it primarily sold clothing) run by "Misses Ola and Valeria Morris." 1933: Harrington & Parker Grocers. 1952: Durham Forge and Welding 1955: " 1960: "

300 West Main St. looking east, 1900. (Courtesy Duke Rare Book and Manuscript Collection) 313 West Main is one of those downtown commercial structures that may be, in Durham terms, quite old, or sequentially replaced, or modified so heavily over the years that it isn't easily tied to its origins. Regardless, the earliest concentration of commercial...

---------------------- The south side of the 600 block of West Chapel Hill St. consisted of residential structures into the 1950s - bookended by a commercial area to the west at Vickers Ave. and the YWCA to the east, across South Gregson. Looking southeast at the intersection of South Gregson and West Chapel Hill St. (Courtesy Herald-Sun) In 1959...