In 1942, Millard Harry Faison registered for the World War II draft in Wilson County. Per his registration card, Faison was born 11 September 1897 in Duplin County, N.C.; lived at 210 Pettigrew Street; his contact was H.J. Faison, Faison, N.C.; and he worked under a contractor’s contract at Marine Barracks, New River, Onslow County, N.C.

The transition from commercial to residential on the south side of the street. 526 is the Hotel Orange, a boarding house run by Mattie B. Coleman.

Mid-block, two multi-story buildings dominated — the Whitley Hotel and the Odd Fellows lodge hall. The Odd Fellows building featured commercial space at street-level and the Globe Theatre above.

In March 1950, the publisher of the Wilson Daily Times, shocked by what he had witnessed on the two short blocks of Wilson’s Pettigrew Street, penned a series of articles exposing living conditions for the city’s poorest. Though Herbert D. Brauff had plenty to say about the standards of the block’s residents, he aimed a surprising salvo straight at the source of the blight — landlords. City manager Talmage Green, who guided Brauff on his tour, viewed public housing as an answer to the problem and this series arguably launched public discourse that would lead to Wilson’s construction in the 1950s and 1960s of housing projects in both African-American neighborhoods.

In the eastern third of the block, the south side of the street was almost entirely residential. Ideal Pharmacy and First Baptist Church dominated the north side.

Detail of the Sanborn map showing several tenant houses on the west end of Smith Street, the tightly packed commercial buildings on Nash, Verser’s home at 504, and the sole freestanding two-story house on the north side of Nash at 529. Notice, behind 509, a garage (marked A) and toilets (marked WC). There were also garages behind 511 (with nearby gasoline tank) and 513-515. Several of the businesses were owned by native whites or Lebanese immigrants, and there was even a Chinese laundry.

Unity Peace Mission, a non-denominational church headed by W.E. Willoughby, was active in Wilson in the 1940s. Wilson Daily Times, 12 January 1943.

(Also on the agenda, a request by East Nash Street businessmen for parking on both sides of the street and a report that a “large number of colored school children are passing under freight car and trains on their way to school.” They were headed, of course, to Sallie Barbour or Vick Elementary or Darden High Schools from Black neighborhoods west of the tracks, like Daniel Hill and New Grabneck.)

Divided by East Nash Street, Pettigrew Street is two blocks long. By the 1920s, the two halves were starkly segregated, with African-Americans at the north end and whites at the south. (The exception on the south end was the Oak City Pressing Club, a laundry service.)

Only one house, at 210, stands. Originally a two-room duplex, the house is vacant despite a recent renovation (in which one of the front doors was removed.)

As a supplement to this post, here is an excerpt of the 1930 Sanborn fire insurance map of Wilson detailing town’s Black business district. Though the northeast side of the 500 block of East Nash Street was almost completely commercial, the southwest side was largely residential. Segregation was in full effect at the time, but several white merchants operated businesses catering to African-American clientele, and one, Jesse Verser, lived on the block (around the corner from his Stantonsburg Street grocery.)

Within days, Wilson’s board of town commissioners began to explore an ordinance addressing “the repair or elimination of unfit housing and dangerous building conditions.” Stakeholders weighed in — the city’s postmaster, the Colored Ministers Alliance — and the board requested the public at large to weigh in.