Hub City Writers Project's photostream  

In May 1995, a trio of writers in Spartanburg, S.C, began to talk in a downtown coffee shop about how they could help preserve a sense of place in their rapidly changing Southern city. What their community needed, they said, was a literary identity.

Modeling their organization after the Depression-era Federal Writers Project, they began to marshal the talents of writers across South Carolina to create a series of books characterized by a strong sense of place. They chose the name Hub City Writers Project because it both invoked Spartanburg's past as a 19th century railroad center and challenged them to make their hometown a center for literary arts.

From its beginning, Hub City's emphasis has been place-based literature that encourages readers to form a deeper connection with their home territory. With its first title, Hub City Anthology, the young press asked local authors to write about the experience of living in Spartanburg. That book sold out within six months and then was reprinted. Over the years, Hub City has published in a variety of genres, including fiction, personal essay, poetry, non-fiction, biography, humor, nature writing, children's literature, and historical.

Hub City was shepherded in its early days by Wofford College poet John Lane, journalists Betsy Teter and Gary Henderson, and photographer/graphic designer Mark Olencki; gradually the organization broadened its scope by publishing more than 100 South Carolina writers, creating a 14-member board of directors, and attracting the financial support of hundreds of South Carolina residents and businesses.

Among the nationally recognized authors who have contributed work to Hub City books are Josephine Humphreys, Bret Lott, Fred Chappell, Shelby Hearon, Dori Sanders, and Frye Gaillard. A 1998 title, New Southern Harmonies: Four Emerging Fiction Writers was named best book of short fiction in North America by Independent Publisher magazine.

The success of the press has led to national media attention, including articles in Southern Living, Utne Reader, and Orion Afield, and the spin-off of similar efforts in other parts of the country. Among other communities that used the Hub City model to create place-based literature are Beaufort, S.C.; Flagstaff, AR.; Fidalgo Island, WA; and Charlotte, NC.

In May 2002, seven years after the Hub City idea was hatched, the writers project received the Governor's Elizabeth O'Neill Verner Award for outstanding contribution to the arts in South Carolina. Today the Hub City Writers Project lives on, with a clear mission to foster a sense of community, advance the careers of local writers, and make Spartanburg a hub for the literary arts.