Like the Back of the College Project, the history of the neighborhood is collaborative and community-based. As more people tell their stories, new information, data, photographs and memorabilia come to light. Students continue to transcribe residential data from Spartanburg city directories and US Census reports; former residents give interviews and often share their pictures and memorabilia; and historians continue to find relevant material in local archives. In this way, the Back of the College history grows, deepens and becomes more complicated over time – it becomes the living history of a community of interested people. 

 

Users here can learn about and add to the categories of historical knowledge we’ve established, from the neighborhood’s origins, to its apex in the 1950s, to its decline and demolition.