'Marian Inabinett'

Many people know that the railroad tracks once were on street level through downtown High Point, and in the 1930s, the massive project of “lowering the tracks” created the cut and brought the tracks down 35 feet. Nicknamed by some the “F.D.R. Canal” because of its New Deal funding, the below-grade tracks eliminated the railroad crossings in the downtown, but cost three men their lives. Once city government received approval from the Public Works Administration in 1937, the project got underway, drastically changing the landscape of High Point’s downtown. 

The eroding embankment of the railway corridor along a segment of Washington Street has been a dangerous problem for many years. Recently, the City of High Point hired a Kernersville construction company to realign the street path and install guardrails and sidewalks, and the North Carolina Railroad Company has agreed to stabilize the embankment. Many people will know that the tracks once were on street level, and in the 1930s, the massive project of “lowering the tracks” created the cut dividing north and south High Point. Costing nearly $1.5 million and taking over 10 years to complete, eliminating the railroad crossings changed the landscape of downtown, cost three men their lives, and made an impact on the development of the city.

The North Carolina African American Heritage Commission invited the High Point Museum to add a historic marker to their North Carolina Civil Rights Trail in 2022, one of a number of sites in the state where challenges to racial segregation took place. The marker in High Point commemorates the actions leading to the desegregation of Blair Park Golf Course in 1956. Often these local protests are left out of the larger narrative of the civil rights story in our state, and the Trail highlights many inspiring “everyday” people who made a difference. The golf game played by three doctors at Blair Park in December 1954 was the first step of many to move High Point toward racial integration and is an important event in High Point’s history.