Public Radio for the Piedmont and High Country
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Historic marker honors site of first R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company factory

Winston-Salem officials unveiled a historic marker Tuesday where R.J. Reynolds started his namesake tobacco company. The event marked the 150th anniversary of the business.

R.J. Reynolds built what’s called “The Little Red Factory” on what was then “Depot Street” back in 1875. It served as the first home of the company. 

Among the speakers at the unveiling was Noah Reynolds. He serves on the Forsyth County Historic Resources Commission and is a direct descendant of the company founder.

“The land here where the first factory building stood was purchased by my great grandfather, R.J., from the adjacent Moravian community of Salem," he says. "And the modest, two-story building was strategically positioned in between the thriving tobacco market and a newly constructed railroad line.”

Phil Archer is the deputy director of Reynolda House Museum of American Art. He says the factory location is part of the origin story of the country.

“Tobacco was America's earliest enterprise, going all the way back to the Jamestown Colony," he says. "And this site marks a moment when it was propelled into the Industrial Age.” 

The marker is located on Chestnut Street near the Forsyth County Courthouse.

 

Paul Garber is a Winston-Salem native and an award-winning reporter who began his journalism career with an internship at The High Point Enterprise in 1993. He has previously worked at The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The News and Record of Greensboro and the Winston-Salem Journal, where he was the newspaper's first full-time multimedia reporter. He won the statewide Media and the Law award in 2000 and has also been recognized for his business, investigative and multimedia reporting. Paul earned a BA from Wake Forest University and has a Master's of Liberal Arts degree from Johns Hopkins University and a Master's of Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He lives in Lewisville.

Support quality journalism, like the story above,
with your gift right now.

Donate