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1929 - Greek Community

Since around 1900, the Karnazes brothers have sold fruit at Charlotte's downtown crossroads, called the Square. Families from foreign countries continue to come to America, or immigrate. Now the city's Greek community is large enough to buy its own church building on South Boulevard. By 1954 the building will be too small, and the Greek Orthodox church will move to East Boulevard.

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1930 - Air Mail

April 1, 1930 - Mail arrives in Charlotte by airplane for the first time. Eastern Air Travel, which will become Eastern Airlines, makes the delivery as 30,000 people turn out to greet the plane. 

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1917 - Training Soldiers

Mayor Frank McNinch and other officials convince the federal government to build a military training facility west of downtown Charlotte. Camp Greene is named for General Nathanael Greene, who defended Mecklenburg from British attack during the Revolutionary War. Living and working in 1,000 tents and barracks, some 60,000 soldiers will pass through Charlotte. Some will train as pilots, others will learn to repair airplanes.Camp Greene

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1928 - The Fifth Mecklenburg County Courthouse

The Fifth Courthouse was located at 700 East Trade Street next to the new City Hall. . . . It was designed by noted architect Louis H. Asbury, a Charlotte native who also built the Myers Park United Methodist Church. . . . The Courthouse is an imposing, three-story, rectangular limestone building, topped with a recessed structure that served as the county's jail until the 1960's. from Courthouses of Mecklenburg County, 1766-2007 (Mecklenburg County, 2007)

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1932 - Music Easing Sorrow

Even though the country is in the midst of a terrible economic downturn, the performing arts survive. The Charlotte Symphony Orchestra is founded. It will be followed in 1948 by the city's opera company. These and other cultural organizations will entertain and enrich the lives of Charlotteans for years to come.

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1917 - Russian Revolution

March 12, 1917 - It is a time of great upheaval in world politics. The Russian Revolution begins when Czar Nicholas II is forced to resign, or abdicate. A new political party will be in power by autumn: the Bolsheviks, who will come to be known as Communists. They will change Russia into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. In years to come, the U.S.S.R. and the United States will become enemies.

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1919 - Trolley Strike

 August 25, 1919 - Five men are killed and several more are wounded by police protecting Charlotte's streetcar barns against trolley workers who have walked off the job in a labor dispute, called a strike. Two weeks earlier streetcar operators demanded higher wages and group representation by a union. When the Southern Public Utilities Company hired replacement workers, called strikebreakers, violence began. The trolley strike is the worst violence in Charlotte's labor history. 

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1932 - Keeping the Mills Open

Millions are out of work during these Depression years. But the president of the Chadwick-Hoskins Mill, Ben Gossett, has an idea. He asks President Herbert Hoover for help. The Red Cross will get 50,000 bales of cotton that are sitting in shut-down factories. Mill workers will weave cloth and sew it into clothing for the needy. This is a way to provide jobs and goods for people who have lost everything.

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1917 - U. S. Declares War

April 6, 1917 - Germany continues to sink non-military, or civilian ships, some American. The U.S. can no longer stay out of the war. Over the next two years, more than one million U.S. troops will go to fight the war in Europe, and help its friends, or allies. The disputes of colonial times are long past, and the Americans join with Britain and France to become allies fighting against Germany.

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1933 - Lakewood Closes

Charlotte's Lakewood Park closes. For years, countless people have ridden the streetcars to this westside park. But after a storm washes away the dam across the lake, there is no money to make repairs.Casino at Lakewood Park

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