Rumored to be one of only two towns in the United States to have a
hyphen in its name, Winston-Salem was formed from the gradual meeting of the town of Winston and the
Moravian settlement of Salem. The original Salem community is left intact in the
Gettysburg-style faux community of
Old Salem, and in remnants of another settlement called
Bethabara. Winston-Salem's name was
rent asunder by
RJ Reynolds and the
cigarette industry, in the naming of the
Winston and
Salem varieties of cigarettes which make the town dubiously famous throughout the world.
The chief employers of the town are Wake Forest University, the bank Wachovia, and RJR. It's the fifth-largest city in North Carolina, trailing Charlotte, Raleigh, Durham, and Greensboro in population.
Winston-Salem has reinvigorated its downtown centers by sponsoring jazz and bluegrass concerts on Fourth Street, gallery hops, and by supporting events at its Benton Convention Center. Downtown's dotted with odd architecture like the Sawtooth Center and the late-1990s phallic Wachovia building, a cylindrical building topped with a dome.
Winston-Salem is the home of Maya Angelou.