Welcome to Forest City, NC... a little slice of Dixiana. Quintessential Southern small town Americana, in other words. It's located a little more than an hour to the southeast of Asheville, en route to Charlotte or, if you're so inclined, the Greenville-Spartanburg metrosprawlitan area of Upstate South Carolina.
Forest City is located in Rutherford County, in the foothills as the mountains of Western North Carolina descend to the flatlands of the NC Piedmont, and it's one of a string of little towns clustered in the heart of the county. In addition to Forest City, you also have the towns of Ruth, Spindale, and the county seat of Rutherfordton right there in a clump. Each has its own -- however small -- downtown, their own residential areas, and because Rutherford County used to be an industrial powerhouse of textile mills, their own collection of hulking factory buildings.
Were all of these little towns part of the same town, they would make up a fairly substantial little place. Apart, each has their own charms, but they seem to fail to live up to their potential. It doesn't help that the textile industry in North Carolina has been annihilated. Rutherford County was marketing itself as a new retirement destination due to its pleasant landscape, unhurried pace, and a climate warmer than the already-established retirement destinations up in the mountains, like Asheville and Hendersonville. The effort was beginning to show some fruit just as the recession hit hard. As a result, Rutherford County has for the most part gone back to sleep.
My boyfriend and I found ourselves in Forest City because we were looking to kill some time while my mother was seeing a doctor down here. Why they won't send her to a doctor less than an hour away from her home I don't know. You would think that there's a shortage of them in Asheville and Hendersonville, or something. But at any rate, we took her down there and had some lunch, and set out to take a walk.
Here's what we saw.
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Forest City's Main Street.
Thanks to the collapse of the textile industry, Rutherford County has more than its share of grit. I have family down here, living in an old neighborhood built for the workers of a mill that's no longer in operation. Neighborhoods like that aren't at all uncommon in Rutherford County.
Downtown Forest City is a fairly practical place. People still shop there. All of the little towns of Rutherford County are glued together by suburban sprawl, and people shop there too, but Forest City is a somewhat utilitarian place. It has some nice restaurants, antique shops and art galleries, but also a healthy selection of appliance stores, furniture stores, clothing stores, and the like.
Meanwhile if you were wondering, Spindale and Ruth also have workaday downtowns, while Rutherfordton's is a little fancier -- as would fit its status as the county seat, after all.
Sadly, there's too much of this kind of thing in downtown Forest City.
There's one of those derelict textile mills. Not sure if anything is being done with it nowadays, but a nice park had been built on the way up to it.
An awful lot of flags. Forest City apparently goes all out for Presidents Day. however, it being Presidents Day, all the banks and government offices (like the library) were closed, and several stores were closed just because it was Monday. That meant that downtown was fairly dead, although several restaurants seemed pretty busy.
A little touch of art deco was nice to find. Unfortunately, the sidewalks were so narrow that it was hard to find a good vantage point to take a picture of it.
Rutherford County is part of something called the Thermal Belt, which is an area that stays considerably warmer than other nearby areas thanks to several unique geographical and meteorological characteristics. Just an hour away in Asheville-Hendersonville, nothing keeps its leaves in the winter. Down here, some of the pin oaks on Main Street are green all year round.
Forest City Town Hall. Not too shabby. I noticed as we drove in that the fire department, which used to be located here, and some town offices had relocated to shiny new digs on the road that leading into downtown.
Running down the center of Main Street are areas of parking and brick sidewalks that occasionally bulge out into little park-like squares. Some feature flower beds and monuments, and the biggest features this fountain.
I really like the name of this street.
Interestingly enough, Forest City was this town's second name. Originally it was called Burnt Chimney.
I highly doubt, however, that this was the actual burnt chimney that so inspired the original settlers. it's just another monument in the middle of Main Street.
Goodbye from Forest City. Try visiting on a Tuesday instead.
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