"This community, back in the day, was a community to be very proud of. It has very great roots. I just want the younger people out here, who are still here, to understand that."
-Jaqueline Lyles, Looking Past The Pipes
about Terra Cotta
The African-American residents of this company town named their community, Terra Cotta, after the Pomona Terra Cotta Company, which operated in Greensboro from the 1880s until the mid 1970s. The Pomona Terra Cotta Company employed both black and white workers, who worked side-by-side to fabricate pipes and bricks made from the local Terra Cotta clay to build the growing South. Terra Cotta was home to hundreds of African-American workers and their families who lived, worked, worshipped, learned and played together. Though the factory is history, the robust legacy of the community and the strong sense of a family lives on. Our project seeks to take these stories out of attics and archives and into the public view.
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