HISTORY OF JOHN ALLEN CARTER

 

     John Allen Carter served as the exalted and revered principal of Atkins High School when Atkins first opened its doors until his death twenty-seven years later.  He was conceived as the most innovative, unique and uncommonly thorough principal by every student that came to fear, love, and respect him.

     He was the first principal, who had previously been a professor at Winston-Salem Teacher’s College and a principal at Columbian Heights High School. He continued as principal until 1959. The school curriculum included both an academic track for those students intending to go on to college, and a vocational track for those intending to start work immediately

     Cameron Avenue helps illustrate the history of the transition of East Winston from groups of white neighborhoods and black neighborhoods into a solidly African American area of the city.

     The 800 and 900 blocks are known today as Reynoldstown. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. bought the “old Cameron lands” in 1917 and built several substantial bungalows in the area in between 1919 and 1921. The area was known as “Cameron Park: and the houses were rented to white employees in a rent to own program. A similar area for black employees was developed nearby on Dunleith Avenue, but was destroyed by Urban Renewal. Reynolds died shortly after the program started, and it was years before the company actually allowed employees to buy the houses. The neighborhood was solidly white when Atkins High School opened in 1931.

     Principal John Carter moved into a new house just north of the Cameron Park development, and the entire neighborhood switched from white tenants to black tenants in a year. Beginning in 1938, the Reynolds Company sold the houses to private owners. Since this was now an established black neighborhood the buyers were African Americans, though some lived in the houses and many others bought them for rental income.

     John A. Carter bought this house on 1100 Rich Avenue in 1931 and was the first African American to move to Rich Avenue. He was an instructor at Winston-Salem Teachers College, which is now Winston-Salem State University. He was also the principal at Columbian Heights High School and Atkins High School.