The 500 block of East Nash Street is justly remembered as the 20th century epicenter of Wilson’s African-American-owned businesses. However, in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Black entrepreneurs and tradespeople also operated across the tracks. As Wilson’s downtown experiences a resurgence, let’s rediscover and celebrate these pioneering men and women.

Check in each Sunday for the latest in the Historic Black Business Series!

The fantastic Wilson Arts Center now occupies the footprint of New Briggs Hotel. Paragon Shaving Parlor opened in a storefront space of the hotel at what was then 213 East Nash Street. The barbershop was located in the area of the “short,” far-left section of the arts center’s facade.

After apprenticing with barber John A. Gaston, Walter S. Hines joined with Noah J. Tate and Jacob Astor Tabron to open Paragon Shaving Parlor in a storefront at the New Briggs Hotel circa 1903. (Not 1912, as my little sign says.) In 1906, Tate, Hines, Tabron sold the shop’s furnishings to another barber, Richard Renfrow, suggesting a complete upgrade of Paragon’s interior.

Tabron soon left the partnership to start a barbershop with his brothers. Hines and Tate continued the business, which was described this way in the 1912 Wilson, North Carolina, Industrial & Commercial Directory: “The Paragon Shaving Parlor is located at 213 East Nash street in Briggs Hotel Block, and it can truthfully be said that it is the most popular Tonsorial parlor in the city of Wilson. It is owned and managed by N.J. Tate and W.S. Hines, both of whom are skilled barbers of long experience. Their genial manner and high class work have won for them the liberal share of the best patronage of the city. Their shop is fully equipped with all the latest appurtenances, and a short visit to this establishment will after passing through their hands, convince you of what the modern, up-to-date barber shops can do to put a man in good humor with himself and the rest of mankind. The shop is equipped with five chairs, each in charge of a professional barber. Go there for your next shave.”

By 1916, the business was known as Tate & Hines.

Hill’s Wilson, N.C., city directory (1916).

About 1920, Tate and Hines parted company, and Walter S. Hines assumed sole ownership of the barbershop. He briefly reverted to the Paragon Shaving Parlor name, but soon settled on Walter S. Hines Barbershop. His shop and that of his brother, the William Hines Barbershop, were friendly competitors for white custom until the 1970s.

Wilson Chamber of Commerce’s Facts About Wilson, North Carolina, published in 1934, featured a full-page for New Briggs with a photo of the hotel’s street-facing exterior. At lower left, Hines Barbershop is identifiable by its barber pole.

A close-up reveals two African-American men standing in front of the shop’s large window.

Walter S. Hines Barber Shop, early 1940s. Left to right: David H. Coley, Joe Knolly Zachary, Edgar H. Diggs, Roderick Taylor, and Sidney Boatwright.

Contrary to the passage below, which was lifted from the nomination form the Central Business-Tobacco Warehouse Historic District, Hines himself did not move the barbershop from the Briggs Hotel in 1955. Walter Hines died in 1941, and his family continued running the business for nearly 40 more years.

Barbers and bootblacks who worked for Walter S. Hines included Hiram A. Faulk, Walter Mainer, Roderick Taylor, David Barnes, Herman N. Grissom, Floyd Pender, Hubert Mitchner, Lonnie Barnes, Charles C. Chick, Edgar H. Diggs, Mancie Gaston, Elmer Gordon, Golden Robinson, James Smalls, Alonzo Barnes, David H. Coley, Sidney Boatwright, and Joe Knolly Zachary.