What’s in a name? For Asheville, signs point to history of racism
So I have lived in the Asheville NC area since 1984. It is a Southern "progressive" artsy Bohemian city. I always read about the history of Asheville was that because it was in the Mountains there were no large plantations, therefore very few slaves. The neighboring county, Madison County, voted against sucession.
This article puts truth to the lie of "very few slaves." Every town, every major road, etc was named after slave owners!.
"Vance, Patton, Woodfin, Henderson, Weaver, Chunn, Baird — their names are familiar to anyone living in Asheville and Buncombe County today. All were wealthy and influential civic leaders honored by having their names bestowed on statues, monuments, streets, schools, parks, neighborhoods and local communities.
They were also major slaveholders or slave traders and white supremacists who amassed their wealth and influence in part through the exploitation of human beings they treated as property. Of all the slaveholders in Buncombe County, no one enslaved more African Americans than Nicholas W. Woodfin, James W. Patton and James McConnell Smith, according to census records and slave deeds."
So, I am OK with MLK Blvd. etc.
