Bentonville, the largest Civil War battle in North Carolina, was the only place Rebel troops stopped General Sherman’s march up from Atlanta. It also was the last major battle fought during the Civil War, as over 80,000 troops engaged over 6,000 acres of farm land in eastern Johnston County.

Re-enacters frequently recreate some parts of the battle, but once every five years history buffs go all out. The weekend of March 19-21, about 30,000 spectators are expected to see 3,500 re-enactors bring the complete three-day battle back to life on the 140th anniversary of the fight. Features include educational and military lectures, Sunday morning church service, and historic battle scenarios. The visitor center and Harper House, both with historic exhibits, military and civilian camp sites, will be open to the public.

The big show will be Saturday at 3 p.m. when re-enactors stage “The Last Grand Charge of the Army of Tennessee,” described by witnesses as some of the most desperate fighting to take place during the entire Civil War.

Sunday at 1:30 p.m., the re-enactors present “The Fight for the Morris Farm.” In 1865, Confederate Lt. Gen. William J. Hardee launched a series of assaults on the Morris Farm position in a last-ditch attempt to break the thin Federal line. The re-enactment takes place on the same day of the actual fighting on the Reddick Morris farm 140 years ago.

Lectures and educational programs range from what women wore in the 1860s to children’s games of the period and “Religion and the Civil War.”

Tickets are required for viewing battles; other events free. For details, call (910) 594-0789. Or visit www.bentonvillerenactment.com. -- Allan Maurer



ASHEVILLE

Manufacturing Jobs Still Growing Out West

Swiss industry leader Jacob Holm Industries was lured to Asheville last summer with the help of incentives from the city and county, AdvantageWest, and the One North Carolina fund. The company began constructing what will be the world’s largest non-wovens plant. The $60 million facility is just west of Asheville.

Less than a month later in neighboring Haywood County, Consolidated Metco, a manufacturer of plastic commercial truck interior components with operations in Bryson City and Sylva, leased a vacant building in the Beaverdam Industrial Park just off I-40.

Then, Yancey County officials — who had acquired the vacant Outboard Marine Corp. facility in order to attract a top-notch tenant — said that Birmingham, Ala.-based Altec Industries would lease the building and create 300 jobs.

Altec, the world’s leading manufacturer of aerial lifts, mounted cranes and specialty products for the electric utility, telecommunications and construction industries, was the first company in Western North Carolina to receive a state Job Development Investment Grant (JDIG). That could provide up to $1.9 million in benefits to the company over a decade if Altec meets stated employment and investment goals.

Gordon Myers, who chairs AdvantageWest and is a past chair of NCCBI, said that a good workforce and innovative incentives have played a major role in the recent resurgence in new manufacturing jobs.

“For many manufacturers, the combination of the right workforce, a central East Coast location and low operational startup costs are still key requirements for success,” Myers said. “Those are the kinds of businesses we look for, and fortunately, those businesses are also increasingly looking for us.”

Even as the region’s economy diversifies, with several high tech and biotech-related announcements coming on the heels of the new manufacturing jobs, workers and community leaders alike appreciate the resurgence in manufacturing.

“Manufacturing is our heritage in Western North Carolina, but it’s also going to play a big part in our future,” Myers said. — Mark Owen


CHARLOTTE

Regal Retailers Drawn to Queen City's Wealth

Looking to keep out the winter chill? Consider a signature Burberry trenchcoat available at Charlotte’s SouthPark mall. Price tag: $1,085. If you’re looking to de-stress, a morning at a Queen City day spa will run $415. And if luxury is what you are seeking, consider trading in the old ride for a Maserati at Charlotte’s newest car dealership, where models start out over $200,000.

Charlotte has emerged as one of the nation’s wealthiest municipalities in terms of household income, and retailers are chasing those available dollars.

Thirty-year-old SouthPark mall has become a designer haven during its $100 million redux. Upper-end retailers from Louis Vuitton and Kate Spade to gourmet kitchen store Sur La Table — with its $379 blenders — have entered the market with locations there. Nordstrom opened a South Park store a year ago and Neiman Marcus plans to follow next year. Saks Fifth Avenue has eyes on the city but has yet to confirm a location.

The latest of many uptown luxury condo towers will have a taste of Fifth Avenue. A redone 31-year-old office building will have a penthouse priced at $1.5 million and a uniformed doorman.

“Certainly we are seeing more affluent people in the Charlotte market than we have ever seen before,” says Tony Crumbley, vice president of research for the Charlotte Chamber.

The number of households with an income greater than $150,000 now tops 13,200, compared to Raleigh, with 7,000 such households.

At $45,738, Wake County still has the highest median household income, with Union County in second and Meck- lenburg third at $44,000. But Union County is a bedroom community to Charlotte, and most people with higher incomes in Union County work just over the county line in Mecklenburg.

Charlotte’s growing status as the nation’s second-largest banking center is driving the upscale shopping trend, says Crumbley. “The banks have brought a tremendous number of top jobs. At the same time the city has become more of a corporate headquarters city, with eight Fortune 500 companies now headquartered here. Only five other cities in the nation count more top headquarters.”

Perhaps the best barometer of a city’s disposable income is its pro sports teams. People who buy NFL and NBA season tickets are not as sensitive to the ups and downs of the economy.

 — Laura Williams-Tracy




CAROLINA BEACH

Little Beach Shakes Sand from its Shoes

Carolina Beach always has had to compete for the beach traffic with Wrightsville Beach and Myrtle Beach. But now the community of 5,000 about 15 miles from Wilmington is hoping to escape the shadow of those larger markets with a $100 million planned community that mixes residential, commercial and public spaces.

The Arcadius development will take three years to complete. Designed by Centrepoint Architecture, Raleigh, it will include 140 luxury condos selling for $370,000 to $1.5 million with construction expected to start in September. Architect Jonathan Wolk of Centrepoint says the project eventually will include 270 residential units, with 170 already reserved.

“We created it on a friendly scale,” says Wolk. “Streets will be lined with trees. There will be street lamps, refreshing pools, bicycle paths and plentiful parking. The buildings will be set back to allow for sidewalks. All residences will face the ocean or the marina.”

A SeaWalk will allow elevated off-street access to shops, the boardwalk, and the beachfront. The project includes a parking deck that will be used by the town, a skyway walkover, and places for visitors to park boats.

The project also will include 60,000 square feet of retail shops and restaurants.

Hughes, Pitman and Gutman estimates the project will have a $18.5 million economic impact on Carolina Beach during the three-year construction period and $68.9 million over ten years post construction. —Allan Maurer



TRIAD

New Model Booting Thomas Built Sales

State and local officials came up with $14.5 million in incentives last year to keep Thomas Built Buses and 200 jobs in High Point, money it invested in a $40 million plant to build its next-generation school bus. The plant opened last June and now the new models are rolling off the assembly line.

The Saf-T-Liner C2 bus is hailed as a revolutionary new product and should be a hot-seller. Thomas Built Buses already enjoys a 39 percent market share, up from 33 percent when the company was bought by Freightliner LLC in 1998. In other words, Thomas Built sells nearly four in 10 school buses bought in North America today, and Sat-T-Liner C2 sales should swell that number.

President and CEO John O’Leary credits the increase to “membership in the Freightliner Group and the outstanding support of local government.” Freightliner, the largest heavy-duty truck manufacturer in North America, is owned by DaimlerChrysler.

Thomas expects to strengthen its industry dominance even further with the boost from its Saf-T-Liner C2, a sleek new school bus design in both appearance and operation.  In 2001 Thomas and Freightliner introduced plans for the revolutionary school bus model in 2001. R&D followed before the company unveiled plans for a $40 million plant to manufacture the C2 buses.

The state, High Point, Archdale, and Guilford and Randolph Counties offered $14.5 million in incentives to keep the facility in High Point. The manufacturing plant employing 178 workers opened in June last year and the first C2 was delivered three months later.

High Point’s oldest business started in 1916 when Canadian-born Perley A. Thomas, a car designer, opened the Thomas Car Works in High Point to renovate and manufacture streetcars. When the popularity of streetcars waned, Thomas switched to school buses in 1936. Streetcars carrying the Perley A. Thomas Car Works brand still carry passengers in New Orleans.  Today Thomas’s corporate headquarters and plants occupy more than a million square feet.  With 1,600 full-time employees, the company is among the largest employers in Guilford and Randolph counties.

The company’s future plans, O’Leary says, are to “ramp up the Saf-T-Liner C2 plant, modernize our other operations in High Point, and further strengthen our market leadership position.”
 —Jerry Blackwelder



COLUMBUS COUNTY

Telecenter Brings the World to Another Small Community

Tabor City is planning how to use a Business & Technology Telecenter, thanks to a $30,000 grant from the e-NC Authority.

The authority has created eight of the telecenters across the state since 2001. They provide entrepreneurs, small businesses, local governments and community organizations with up-to-date technology resources and services such as high speed Internet access and training programs. The centers also provide public access to the Internet and opportunities for telecommuting and e-work.

Oppie Jordan, e-NC chair, says, “Columbus County is poised for growth and the telecenter would provide the technology infrastructure and business services necessary for that growth.”

County and city officials say they’ll use the money to access possible uses for the center, such as to train staff for a proposed correctional facility. It could also provide services to retirees living in nearby beach communities.

The legislature appropriated $2 million in 2004 for e-NC and the Rural Economic Development Center to use for technology purposes that include establishment of Business & Technology Centers.


GASTON

Big Deals Stir in Areas Last to Feel City's Growth

Eastern Gaston County is the latest area ringing Mecklenburg to feel the heat of the metro center’s growth. In Belmont, for example, one 350-home development would swell town tax revenues 50 percent  In Mount Holly, a Charlotte developer, Carolina Income Management Group, is planning a $350 million, 750-acre community called Dutchmans Creek with 1,500 homes, a golf course, retirement center and commercial area.

South of Belmont on Lake Wylie, a gated waterfront community called Reflection Pointe will include 350 homes on 360 acres. The town and developers are jointly extending water and sewer lines, and Belmont intends to annex the neighborhood. Its estimated final build out value of $300 million is half of the current tax roll value of the entire town, says Billy Joye, mayor of Belmont for 25 of the last 30 years.

But area leaders say residential development isn’t all that’s happening here. A Wal-Mart Supercenter, with a one-of-a-kind Gothic design to mirror nearby Belmont Abbey College, is under development and could bring as many as 300 jobs.

Meanwhile a partnership between Belmont Abbey College and local businesses Pharr Yarns, Parkdale Mills and R.L. Stowe Mills, may result in the development of more than 2 million square feet of office, retail and residential projects. The partnership owns 1,100 acres near the college and is considering how to develop the property along I-85.

“The good thing about being the last to be discovered is that we’ve gotten to see the bad things that happened in other areas and have worked to prevent them here,” says Mayor Billy Joye.

Those projects are all near several new public investments that are sure to boost the local economy. Belmont recently opened a $3 million police station inside a renovated textile plant. The new Gaston County Visitors Center off I-85 in Belmont opened in December and offers a showcase of what the community has to offer.

And next year, the U.S. National Whitewater Center will open along I-85 at the Catawba River and county line, bringing thousands of visitors to see Olympic-caliber kayaking competitions.              Laura Williams-Tracy



HICKORY

Good News, Inbound and Out, Over Return of Airline Service

Commercial air service returns to Hickory Regional Airport in May when Atlantic Southeast Airlines, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Delta, begins three daily flights to Atlanta. Officials say the return of jet service will create about a dozen airport jobs.

The airlines left Hickory Regional Airport three years ago when U.S. Airways stopped commuter service to Charlotte. The return of air service is good for local business and boosts tourism, since many passengers would be bound for destinations like Boone and Blowing Rock.

“Delta’s announcement represents a great opportunity for regions of North Carolina that have been without commercial air service for some time,” said Bill Williams, director of aviation at the N.C. Department of Transportation. “Good, steady airline service is a great tool for showcasing and developing North Carolina’s communities.”

“Delta Connection customers tell us they want to go where business takes them,” says Fred Buttrell, president and CEO of Delta Connection.

While it’s known as the “furniture capital of the world,” Hickory also has a large fiber optic cable industry and several foreign-owned auto supply facilities and specialty plastics companies.



CAPITOL

Oh, That's Why You Have That License Plate

After he bangs down the gavel ending a week of lawmaking on Thursday afternoons, House Speaker Jim Black gets in his car and drives to Matthews to see customers of his optometrist office just east of Charlotte. He sees patients through Monday and drives back to Raleigh late Monday afternoon.

The license plate on Black’s car has just a single number — 3 — because he’s the state’s third-ranking constitutional officer, after the governor and lieutenant governor. Sometimes his customers spot the license plate in the parking lot and ask about it, as he described at a recent NCCBI event.

“Used to when they asked about it, I would go into this long explanation about the General Assembly, which they didn’t care about because to most of them I wasn’t the honorable anything, I was just this guy they get their glasses from.”

Worse, the patients were listening to him talk when he wanted them to talk — about their vision. Black needed something to say about the license plate that would let him quickly change the subject. “So now I just say I’m a big Dale Earnhardt fan.”



ASHEVILLE

Pristine Mountain Wetland Saved with Sandymush Deal

Not far outside the city is a boggy swath of land that’s more valuable than it appears. The 2,600-acre Sandymush tract isn’t eye-appealing but it does function as an important wetland.

Progress Energy, which owned Sandymush for 30 years, has sold the land in Buncombe and Madison counties to the state to preserve it. The price was $10.2 million. The state’s Ecosystem Enhancement Program contributed more than $9 million. The rest came from the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy via a donation by philanthropists Fred and Alice Stanback.

The N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources created the Ecosystem Enhancement Program in 2003 to fund the restoration and permanent preservation of wetlands and streams. The program combines an existing initiative with ongoing efforts by the N.C. Department of Transportation.

The Department of Transportation’s participation is funded through state and federal monies allocated to offset the loss of wetlands caused by highway construction projects.

“Through the Sandymush preservation project, we will preserve one of the precious natural resources that make Western North Carolina so special,” says Gordon Myers of Asheville, a DOT board member.


OUT & ABOUT

See 100 Films at Wilmington's Cucalorus Festival

The Cucalorus Film Festival, one of the Southeast Tourism Society’s top events, will screen about 100 movies by independent filmmakers in downtown Wilmington March 30 through April 3.

Among the films, a feature written and directed by Jim Taylor, co-writer of “Sideways,” which garnered multiple Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations this year. Called “The Lost Cause,” it’s about a Confederate soldier who causes hilarious family turmoil through his commitment to his cause.

N.C. filmmakers Cynthia Hill and Curtis Gaston delve into the world of modern tobacco farming with their documentary, “Tobacco Money Feeds My Family,” which weaves a tale of hardship and perseverance in the rural southeastern part of the state.

 “Der Neute Tag,” the latest feature from German director Volker Schlondorff, who also directed the Oscar-winning “The Tin Drum” in 1979, follows a Catholic priest who struggles to survive in a Nazi concentration camp. The film is based on a true story.

The festival also includes lighter fare at both feature and short film length, including many under five minutes and a number of Wilmington-produced efforts. They include Terry Linehan’s documentary “The Goody Goody,” the narrative short “Snap Shot” by UNC-Wilmington professor Andrew Lund, and Matt Malloy’s very personal take on Cucalorus itself in “il Maestro D’el Festivale.”

The festival looks for work that “explores the artform of the moving image in new ways,” says Dan Brawley, director. Movie Maker magazine called it “one of the best kept secrets on the indie fest circuit.” Cucalorus, in case you’re wondering, is a term for a film set with dappled moving lights. For more information call 910-343-5995 or go to www.cucalorus.org.

If you’re looking for something offbeat, try the Comedy Pet Theatre March 19 at the Clayton Center, a unique variety show starring cats, dogs and birds rescued from animal shelters. Gregory Popovich, a former member of a Russian circus, trained the rescued animals to ride bicycles and perform amusing routines. It costs $8 for children, $12 for adults. Call 919-553-1737 or visit www.theclaytoncenter.org for more information.— Allan Maurer