Towns
of Gaston County

Gastonia
www.cityofgastonia.com

Geography: The largest city of Gaston County Gastonia is also considered a part of the Charlotte metropolitan area and occupies 13% of the total area of the County. Centrally located in Gaston County, I-85 and Rt. 17 intersect in Gastonia.

History: Gastonia received its name from congressman and state Supreme Court judge, William Gaston who named it after the county. Gastonia is the county seat for Gaston County

Where To Go: Located east of downtown on Garrison Blvd. is the Schiele Museum of Natural History. Across the street is the main branch of the Gaston-Lincoln Regional Library System. Another attraction is The Gastonia Grizzlies part of the Coastal Plain League (CPL) play baseball at Sims Legion Park. The team is featuring players at the collegiate level. The season runs from the end of May to August.  Gastonia also features 2 public golf courses as well as several parks for family fun.

Gastonia has for years attracted shopping-minded visitors and presently feature 4 major shopping centers; Westfield Eastridge a large regional mall, Franklin Square is the other one of Gastonia's premier shopping centers. The complex is divided into for Phases. Phase I features a The new Shops at Franklin and The Gaston Mall, which is currently in the process of a redevelopment that will possibly include a houses a large and popular fabric store called Mary Jo's, and one of the oldest operating Harris Teeter grocery stores in the chain. 

Belmont
www.cityofbelmont.org

Geography: Located about 15 miles west of uptown Charlotte, NC, and flanked by two rivers, the Catawba and South Fork Catawba. Adjacent to Belmont, the rivers make up two arms of Lake Wylie and form a peninsula on which the city is situated.

History: Once known as Garibaldi, the city named in honor of August Belmont, a prominent New York banker. Settlement in the Belmont area began around the colonial-era Fort at the Point, built in the 1750s by Dutch settler James Kuykendall and others. The fort was built because of ongoing hostilities with the Cherokee, but it was apparently never attacked. The South Point Community, located about 2-1/2 miles south of present-day downtown Belmont, was the site of Stowesville Mill. Founded by Jasper Stowe and Associates in 1853, it was one of the first three cotton mills in operation in Gaston County.

Where To Go: The Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden is a 450-acre  world-class botanical garden located on New Hope Road southwest of Belmont. The Downtown Belmont Historic District has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1996. Roughly bounded by the former campus of Sacred Heart College, the Norfolk Southern Railway line, Main, Glenway, and Bryant Streets, Keener Blvd., and Central Ave, the district covers 1,700 acres It contains 264 buildings and 2 structures built between 1850 and 1949, including examples of Tudor Revival, Bungalow/Craftsman, and Colonial Revival architectural styles. It includes the Colonial Revival-style former US Post Office at 115 N. Main Street, now the Belmont City Hall. The Belmont Hosiery Mill at 608 S. Main Street is also listed on National Register. Stowe Manor, at 217 South Central Avenue, is the 1920's mansion built for textile magnate S.P. Stowe. The campus of Belmont Abbey has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places as an Historic District since 1973. The Abbey Basilica of Mary Help of Christians is the central feature of the campus. The Belmont Historical Society Cultural and Heritage Learning Center, believed to be the third oldest home in Belmont. The property also contains a free-standing kitchen, a mill house, and a garage. Displays include furnishings, artifacts, and pictures which tell the history of Belmont from the time of its Native Americaninhabitants through the textile age.

Recently, the downtown area of Belmont has been expanding and adding new attractions like restaurants, bars, and comedy clubs. There also is a coffee shop in the downtown part of Belmont called "Caravan," that hosts an open mike night on Thursday and Friday nights. With coffee being enjoyed by those in all aspects of life, Caravan attracts all different types of people in Belmont, some you may not have known lived in Belmont before and then again, you might see an old friend. Since it is right beside Stowe Park, it is a good rest area to get a cold drink during the summer or a hot cup of coffee during the colder parts of the year.

There is a general store by the name of Stowe Mercantile Co. that provides everything you need from fixing things around the home to toys for the children. Belmont is home to Bills Belmont Drive-In, more commonly known just as the "Drive-In". the drive in stays busy during the warm summer nights when students are out of school for the summer. These have both been a part of Belmont for a long time, but they still are a major part of the community. 

Mount Holly

www.mtholly.us

Geography: The city is situated on the western bank of the Catawba River north of I-85 and south of NC 16.

History: King George II of Great Britain first issued land grants for the Mount Holly area around 1750. A few years later in 1754, James Kuykendall of Holland was issued a grant for an area known as Dutchman's Creek. By 1875, Mount Holly finally received the name it has today and was named after the Mount Holly Cotton Mill. The name "Mount Holly" was used in recognition of the famed yarn made at a spinning mill in Mount Holly, New Jersey.

A.P. and D.E. Rhyne and Ambrose Costner originally owned the Mount Holly Cotton Mill. It was the fourth mill to be built in Gaston County and is the oldest surviving mill today. The mill's success and the prosperity of the area as a whole led local residents to petition the North Carolina General Assembly for incorporation of Mount Holly in 1879.

The first railroad in Gaston County, the Carolina Central Railway, began serving Mount Holly in 1860. The line, which runs parallel with North Carolina State Highway 27, is still in service and operated by CSX. In 1911, construction began on the area's second railroad known as the Piedmont and Northern Railway. On May 20, 1912 it made its first run from Charlotte to Gastonia.

Electricity became available to homes and businesses around the turn of the twentieth century. The Woodlawn Mill, located on Woodlawn Avenue, was built in 1906 and was the first mill in Gaston County to be served with electricity.

Farmers Market Open on Saturdays from May through September. Public Golf 

Bessemer City

Geography: Settled in 1756 and founded in 1893, the city's motto is City with a Heart. The community was named for Henry Bessemer, inventor of steel-making process.

History: Bessemer City is named for Sir Henry Bessemer who created the Bessemer Process for smelting iron. Bessemer City was founded on land purchased from the Ormand family, near the Sloan-Washington-Ormand Iron Furnace. Ironically, it was the Bessemer Process which made Bessemer City's early iron smelting industry obsolete.

European settlement in the Bessemer City area dates to 1754, when King George II of England granted adjoining 350-acre (1.4 km2) tracts to James Ormand and Adam Meek. Ormand established the Ormand Mining Company to extract iron ore. It is unknown when a furnace was built on the land, but it is mentioned in a deed after 1786 when it was called the Washington Furnace. The Old Ormand Furnace was used to process some of the iron ore that was mined in the area and today is one of the oldest remaining furnaces in the country. Despite a local tale that cannon balls were made during the American Revolutionary War, there is no proof the furnace was built that early. The furnace made iron implements for local use and was in operation until the mid 1800's (when the Bessemer process made small furnace operations uneconomical). The "Old Furnace" is still owned by the Ormand Family Foundation and the site is used as a gathering place for the Ormand Family Reunion, one of the oldest family reunions in America, held annually ever since 1897.

During the late 1840s, corn and cotton were the region's two main crops. Whiskey production was also profitable. Gaston County had more licensed whiskey distilleries than any county in North Carolina.

In 1871, the Atlanta & Charlotte Division of the Richmond & Danville Railroad Company built through Gaston County. Laying the track through Whetstone Mountain, located west of modern-day Bessemer City, was considered a great engineering accomplishment. John Wooten built a general store next to the railroad on the site of present-day Bessemer City and called the store and depot "Wooten's Station"

In 1891, John Askew Smith, previously of Reidsville, North Carolina, moved with his wife Fannie and brother-in-law, John A. Pinchback, to Gaston County. Smith purchased 1,700 acres (6.9 km2) and wanted to establish a town on to the east of Whetstone Mountain. By 1893, Smith and other residents petitioned the North Carolina legislature to incorporate the town. On March 6, 1893, Bessemer City was officially chartered. Smith hired W.R. Richardson, an engineer from Guilford County, North Carolina, to lay out the town. Smith's "Highacre" house, built in the early 1900s, is now occupied by the Eury family.

The population of Bessemer City at the time of its charter was very small, with only a few families, but by 1900 it had grown to between 500 and 600 people. In 1895, Stonewall Jackson Durham and John M. Odell incorporated Southern Cotton Mills and as their first venture completed and opened the failed Smith/Pinchback Mill. A series of textile mills opened by Smith and Pinchback; Durham and Odell; Frank, Robert and Max Goldberg; as well as the Ragan Spinning Company, gave Bessemer City its industrial foundation.

Business and Industry: One of the largest industries in Bessemer City is FMC Lithium, Inc., the largest producer of lithium in the Americas. Lithium is used in many products including pharmaceuticals, batteries, ceramics, and construction products. Advanced Drainage Systems, the largest polyethylene pipe and fittings manufacturer in the country, operates a 50,000-square-foot (4,600 m2) facility in Bessemer City employing 100 people. Other manufacturers include Hunter Douglas (Designer Shades Division) and Dole. There is also still some agriculture in the form of Kiser's Dairy Farm, among others. Mr. Kiser is a descendent of one of the founding families of Bessemer City and he has about 200 animals.

 Dallas

Geography: Approximately three miles north of the City of Gastonia. lies within the Long Creek watershed. Long Creek is a right tributary of the South Fork Catawba River.

History: The community was named for Vice President George Dallas under James K. Polk.

Dallas was officially incorporated in 1863 and is the oldest incorporated town in Gaston County. It served as the original county seat for Gaston County from 1846 until 1911. The old Gaston County courthouse, renovated in 1868 after a fire, still stands in the main square of the town and serves as the Dallas Police Department.

Dallas began to decline in importance when the town commissioners refused to appropriate money for construction of bridges over several creeks for theAtlanta and Richmond Air-Line Railway in the 1872. The commissioners said the reason was because residents thought that trains would wake them during the night and frighten their livestock. After this the county seat was relocated to Gastonia in 1911.

The Dallas Historic District, bounded by Holland, Main, Gaston and Trade Streets, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The District consists of eight buildings, including the former Gaston County Courthouse (built in 1848), former Gaston County Jail (1848), the Smyre-Pasour House (1850), Rhyne Store (1850), and the Hoffman Hotel (1852). The Hoffman Hotel is now home to the Gaston County Museum.

What To Do/Where To Go: North Gaston High School in Dallas was the location for filming of the 1999 movie Carrie 2.

Biggerstaff Park in Dallas will be the location for the 2008 "Shelby Hamfest", a gathering of amateur radio operators. This is one of the oldest and largest such festivals in the country.

Tony's Ice Cream Gaston County Park, Applecreek Golf Course

 McAdenville

Geography: Located on the South Fork Catawba River,is centered around a small lake which was formed by a dam on the river.

History: McAdenville was incorporated in 1881. It was named after Rufus Yancey McAden, president of McAden Mills, the town's textile mill. McAden had served in the North Carolina House of Commons from 1862 to 1867, and was Speaker of the House in 1866. He came to Charlotte in 1867 to become president of the two-year old First National Bank.

Where To Go/What To See: A Christmas tradition in the town for many years have been the decorating of the entire town in Christmas lights. The event is called Christmas Town USA. The lights attract visitors from all over the country and is one of the biggest light shows in the US. Begun in 1956 with the assistance of Pharr Yarns, the largest employer and land owner in the town, virtually every square inch of the town is covered in Christmas lights and some form of decoration. More than 300,000 vehicles visit each year. The lights are entirely maintained by volunteers from the community and no admission is charged. Pharr Yarns even goes to the extent to pick up the electric bill for the event.

Business/Industry: McAdenville is the headquarters of Pharr Yarns. The company has operated a yarn manufacturing plant in the town since 1939. It is the town's largest employer and the 7th-largest employer in Gaston County.

Stanley

History: is a small town, but one of the oldest in Gaston County, actually beginning in the early to middle 1700's. An elusive prospector named Stanley panned for gold in a creek that came to bear his name. Mr. Stanley left the area and his exact identity was lost to time, however, a community sprang up along the creek which became known as Stanley's Creek Community. During the Civil War years, the town's railroad depot, Brevard's Station, named for the original landowners, the Alexander Brevard family, was a major departure point for soldiers leaving for the war, and also for sending provisions to soldiers in the field.

Where To Go: The Brevard Station Museum seeks to present and interpret for the public its collection of interesting stories, facts, recollections, pictures and tidbits relating to the history of Stanley, Gaston County, North Carolina. The Brevard Station Museum was created to collect, exhibit, and store items particularly pertaining to the past of Stanley. The museum seeks to stir the memories of the older residents while teaching newcomers and passers-through something about what evokes pride in the town of Stanley. Of special importance to the Brevard Station Museum is to make a contribution to helping Stanley's school children develop an interest in local history.

Lowell

Geography: The town of Lowell is bordered by both the South Fork Catawba River and I-85 to the south. It is easily accessed by exit 22 off of I-85.

Lowell was incorporated in 1879. It was named after Lowell, Massachusetts, in hopes the city would become a similar textile center. The settlement dates back to 1850, when Woodlawn Mill was built on the South Fork Catawba River. When grading was done for the Atlanta and Richmond Air Line Railway in 1870 and a small depot was built in the community, it was given the name "Wright's Station", because the nearest resident was William Wright.

George Poston Park is located northwest of Lowell on Lowell-Spencer Mountain Road. This Gaston County-operated park includes a playground, 4 lighted softball/little league fields, 4 lighted soccer fields, and a mountain bike trail.

Ranlo

History: Ranlo was named for John Calvin Rankin and William Thomas Love, two prominent area industrialists - "Ranlo" was a contraction of RANkin and LOve. The community grew up around their textile mills which produced cotton goods. Rex Spinning Company was begun in 1915, Ranlo Manufacturing Company in 1916, and Priscilla Spinning Company in 1921. Nearby, the community of Smyre was developed around the A. M. Smyre Manufacturing Company, which was founded in 1917. In 1963, the two communities of Ranlo and Smyre were incorporated as Ranlo, in reaction to the concern over possible annexation into Gastonia. However, the part of the Smyre mill village south of the Norfolk Southern Railway was not included, and was eventually annexed by the City of Gastonia in June 1996.

Row houses were erected in the 1920s and 1930s and still stand today. At the time they were owned by the mill and rented at very low rates to workers. They have long since been sold to individuals and the mills are 75-80% closed. Only one or two still operate and they are at low capacity. The town, however, has become a "bedroom community" and prides itself on its facilities and growth. New industry has started to move in and new neighborhoods are being built.

Cherryville

Geography: Cherryville is located along a divide between three watersheds. The western end of Cherryville is in the watershed of Muddy Creek, a right tributary of Buffalo Creek and part of the Broad River catchment basin. The north side of Cherryville is in the Indian Creek watershed, drained by Lick Fork Creek and an unnamed tributary of Indian Creek. The south side Cherryville Township is in the Beaverdam Creek watershed, drained by unnamed right-hand tributaries of Beaverdam Creek. Indian Creek and Beaverdam Creek are tributaries of the South Fork Catawba River.

History: During the last half of the 18th century, German, Dutch, and Scots-Irish families from the Colony of Pennsylvania migrated south and settled in the Cherryville area. Land grants made by King George III of England date back to 1768, and as early as 1792 Governor Samuel Ashe of North Carolina made grants in and around "White Pine", as the settlement was known at the time. A village began to develop at a crossroads on the Old Post Road, a main thoroughfare between Salisbury, North Carolina and Spartanburg, South Carolina.

In 1862, the Wilmington, Charlotte and Rutherford Railroad (later known as Carolina Central Railroad) reached White Pine. The town served as a water and coal stop. Along the railroad, a local resident planted cherry trees, and the train engineers soon began calling the settlement "Cherryville". The town was incorporated under this name in 1881.

Business/Industry: Agriculture was Cherryville's main economic base for many years. However, during the late 1800s, the textile industry became established in the town. Cherryville's first cotton mill, Cherryville Manufacturing Plant, was incorporated in 1891. It was soon followed by the opening of three other mills. By the turn of the century, the rural village had become an industrial community of a thousand people. Eventually, 13 mills would be opened in Cherryville, including Gaston Manufacturing Company (later operated as Dora Yarn Mills), Vivian Manufacturing Company ("Old Sardine", later operated as Nuway Spinning Company), Melville Manufacturing Company (later Burlington Industries' Pinnacle Plant), Howell Manufacturing Company, Rhyne Houser Manufacturing Company (later part of Burlington Industries' Madision Division), and Carlton Yarn Mills, Inc. All of these plants have since closed.

In 1932, a trucking company began operating in Cherryville with one truck hauling produce from Florida to Cherryville. This company would become one of the largest freight carriers in the nation, known as Carolina Freight Carriers Corporation. After operating for more than sixty years, Carolina Freight was bought by the Arkansas Best Trucking Company in October 1995 and operations moved from Cherryville.

Points of Interest: The Cherryville Historical Museum preserves the history of the Cherryville area, and is open to the public each week during specified days. The C. Grier Beam Truck Museum, interpreting the history of freight trucking and Carolina Freight Carriers, is in the former Beam's Shell Service Station and Office, 117 N. Mountain St., listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The 1922 Noah Benjamin Kendrick House at 402 N. Mountain Street is a Designated Gaston County Historic Property. Recreational sites in Cherryville include the semi-private Cherryville Country Club, with a nine-hole golf course, on the northeast side of town. The Cherryville Little Theatre.

The New Year's Shooters preserve the area's German heritage by honoring the custom of beginning each year with a chant and the shooting of muskets.

High Shoals

Geography: Located in Dallas Township, High Shoals the town has a total area of 1.8 square miles. The South Fork Catawba River flows through High Shoals. Areas northeast of the river are assigned to the Hoyle Creek watershed, while those southwest of the river are in the Beaverdam Creek watershed. Sulfur Branch flows through western High Shoals (including Briarcreek Golf Course) and enters the South Fork at the south end of town. Most of High Shoals is located in Dallas Township, except for a western portion of the town which is in Cherryville Township.

History: High Shoals was the location of the High Shoals Iron Works, founded by Swiss-born John Fulenwider in about 1795. Fulenwider developed one of the earliest methods of making pig iron with the charcoal process. During the War of 1812, his High Shoals ironworks produced cannon balls for use by the United States Army. Fulenwider died in 1826 and is buried at High Shoals cemetery. The ironworks he developed remained in operation until 1875.

In the last decade of the 19th Century, the community of High Shoals became totally-owned by High Shoals Mills, a textile company founded byCharlotte, North Carolina industrialist Daniel A. Tompkins.

Eventually, the mill homes were sold to private owners. High Shoals was incorporated on November 6, 1973, the most-recently incorporated municipality in Gaston County.

Cramerton

Geography: Located in the southwestern part of town are Berry Mountain (922 ft.) and Cramer Mountain (850 ft.). The South Fork Catawba River crosses through the center of own.

History: Cramerton was founded in 1906 when J.H. Mays built a spinning mill along the banks of the South Fork of the Catawba River, just east of Gastonia, NC. In 1910, textile engineer and Thomasville, North Carolina native, Stuart Warren Cramer became owner and president of the mill and property. He turned the mill and the surrounding community into a model mill village. In 1922 Mr. Cramer changed the name of the mill to Cramerton Mills, and the name of the town to Cramerton. In 1923, Cramer built the Mayflower Weave Mill.

Business/Industry: Cramer is credited with designing and equipping "about one-third of the new cotton mills in the South" between 1895 and 1915, and simultaneously acquiring extensive holdings in textile mills. Among Cramer's numerous industrial engineering patents was one for the "Cramer System of Air Conditioning," which included the automatic regulation of temperature and humidity. These early innovations in air conditioningresulted more from the need to remove lint from the air (a persistent problem in the textile mills) than to cool the factory atmosphere. The term "air conditioning" is attributed to Cramer. In 1946 the mills and homes were sold to Burlington Industries who in turn sold the homes to residents. The Town of Cramerton incorporated in 1967 and began providing municipal services.

The textile industry has long been central to Cramerton's economy, but globalization has caused many of the local plants to close. Burlington Industries, which had operated the former Cramerton Mills, went bankrupt in 2001. Employers like Eagle Mountain Finishers and Lakewood Dyed Yarns (both subsidiaries of Joan Fabrics Corp.) were closed in 2006 and 2007. Textile companies Brookline Inc. and Wagner Knitting, Inc. have also been affected by the economic downturn. Syncot Fibers and Plastics, Inc. operates a facility in Cramerton specializing in the recycling of nylon.

Point Of Interest: A well-known feature is the Cramer Mountain gated development featuring luxurious homes and an 18-hole golf course at Cramer Mountain Country Club.

Spencer Mountain

Geography: Spencer Mountain is located at the foothills of a mountainous ridge.

History: Settled in 1772 and named after Zachariah Spencer, a loyalist who became a patriot during the Revolutionary War. In 1874, J. Harvey Wilson II built a water-powered textile mill (Wilson & Moore Cotton Mill) at the base of Spencer's Mountain. W. Thomas Love and John C. Rankin purchased the mill in 1895 and changed its name to Spencer Mountain Mills. A predecessor of Duke Power purchased the mill and the hydroelectric plant that powered it in 1926. The mill was purchased by Pharr Yarns in 1957 and was shut down in 1999.

Dellview

Dellview is an inactive incorporated town in Gaston County, NC. With a population of 16 (1990 Census figures), it was the smallest municipality in the state, and arguably the smallest incorporated town in the United States. Its population is currently 11, and was at one point as low as 10.

Dellview is located in the Muddy Creek Watershed. The town collects no taxes from its residents, almost all of whom are relatives. Dellview also doesn't request any state money. The town has no police department, nor a water or sewer system. Since it is inactive, the town has no elected officials or municipal elections, and is now governed by Gaston County.

Dellview Road, the community's only paved road, forms the town's northern border. North of it lies the town of Cherryville.