“Firestone Cotton Mills, Gastonia, N.C.” in North Carolina Postcard Collection (P052), North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives, Wilson Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

The Digital Innovation Lab is partnering with the Gaston County Museum of Art & History and the Gaston County Public Library to help develop a public history center and digital archive for the Loray Mill Redevelopment Project in Gastonia, N.C. The mill was once the largest textile mill in the South, and was the site of Gastonia’s bloody 1929 labor strike. Firestone took over the mill in the 1930s, where the company manufactured tire cord until 1993.

Efforts to redevelop the 600,000-square-foot, 110-year-old building began in April 2013 and are expected to be completed this summer. The redeveloped space will be mixed-use, with commercial and event space as well as residential space.

The developers have set aside prominent space for the creation of a history center. The DIL is already hard at work creating a DH Press project that maps the residents of the 1920 Mill Village. Learn more about what the DIL is doing.