1920 19th Amendment to U.S. Constitution, giving women the right to vote in elections.

1920 U.S. 25 is first road in the county paved.

1920 American Legion Post is chartered

1920 Berea Baptist Church forms near Flat Rock and Crab Creek. Bethel Wesleyan Church organized in 1926 in Tracy Grove community.

1920s Roaring ‘20s.

1920s Summer camps opening in county.

1920s Library opens in Bat Cave

1921 R.G. Anders named school superintendent. Serves until 1953. School consolidation and school building program begins. One-room schools close.

1922 Agudas Israel Congregation forms and Jewish synagogue built.

1922 Bonclarken Assembly Grounds open in Flat Rock by Presbyterians.

1923 Moland-Drsydale Brick Co. forms in Etowah. In 1943, the company moves to Brickton area outside of Fletcher.

1923 Southern Bell Co. opens operation in Hendersonville. There are 987 telephones.

1924 Laurel Park Estates chartered as N.C. Corporation

1924 Henderson County Curb Market opens, giving farmers an outlet to sell their crops

1924 Ellison Adger Smyth buys the Balfour property and opens Balfour Mills. Mill town begins. Later sold to Kimberly-Clark Corp.

1925 New jail is started. Jail completed in 1927.

1926 East Flat Rock incorporates as town. Town is a municipality until 1950, when residents vote to dissolve the incorporation.

1926 Immaculata Catholic School opens.

1926 Fletcher Hospital School of Nursing opens by Seventh-day Adventist Church.

1926 Hendersonville High School built

1926 Feb. 28-May 20 World Heavyweight Boxing Champion Jack Dempsey trains in Laurel Park. This was the biggest commercial promotion in the county’s history. An estimated 200 sports writers visit county.

1927 Blue Ridge Power and Light Co. sells to Duke Power Co. Lake Summit built in Tuxedo when dam is built on Green River.

1927 Paved road to Bat Cave (U.S. 64 East)

1927 Hendersonville Times merges with Hendersonville News, becoming Hendersonville Times-News.

1928 Hendersonville City Hall built in current location.

1928 Kanuga Conferences opens as an Episcopal center and camp

1929 Skyland Hotel opens

1930 First gas line completed (butane-air gas)

1930 Nov. 20 Three banks in Hendersonville and Bank of Fletcher close on same day, along with most of the nation’s banks. Within a short time, State Trust opens (later known as Northwestern Bank). This was the beginning of the Great Depression.

1930s Great Depression: Salvation Army main agency serving needs of people suffering from lack of jobs and the economic crisis.

1930s Formation of West Hendersonville Baptist (1931), Dana Baptist (1936), Mountain View Missionary Baptist on Duncan Hill Road (1937)

1933 New Deal comes to Henderson County.

1933 Laurel Park incorporates as a town.

1933-34 Hendersonville Country Club Golf Course opens

1933 Edwards Park opens in Hendersonville as a center for activities of Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. The park is named for Mayor Albert V. Edwards.

1936 Blue Ridge Apple Growers Association forms.

1936 Boyd Park opens in Hendersonville

1937 A three-member board of Public Welfare forms. This is the forerunner of the Department of Social Services

1938 Henderson County holds centennial celebration. Gov. Clyde R. Hoey is main speaker.

1939 There were 2,690 farms in the county. An estimated 42 percent of the population lived on farms.

1939 Diamond Brand Canvas Co. opens in Naples

1940 Vagabond Players led by Robroy Farquhar come to Henderson County. The first plays were held at the Old Mill Playhouse.

1941-45 World War II. An estimated 4,400 men and women from Henderson County served in the military during the war. It is estimated that approximately 118 men from Henderson County died in battle.

1941 Asheville-Hendersonville Airport opens in Hoopers Creek-Fletcher area

1940s Commercial apple packing houses open

1940s More churches form: Naples Baptist, 1942; First Church of Christ Scientist, 1946; Mountain View Baptist (Tuxedo) 1947; First Congregational, 1947; First Church of the Nazarene, 1947; Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration (Bat Cave), 1948.

1942 Spinning Wheel Rugs, owner F.M. Michaelian, opens plant at corner of King and Main streets.

1942 March 2 Heaviest snowfall on record, 22 inches recorded from morning to midnight.

1942 Lennox Park given to city of Hendersonville

1942 City begins bus system

1942 First migrant labor camp opens in Henderson County to help harvest crops.

1944 Demands of wartime stimulate agricultural economy, agricultural production valued at $2 million.

1945 Elks Camp for Boys opens in Green River community at state line. Camp Blue Star opens, 1948, and Camp Glen Arden opens 1951.

1945 Hendersonville hires first full-time fire chief, Ed E. Edney

1946 Radio station WHKP is on the airwaves

1946 Balfour Mills is sold and is now known as Berkeley Mills. In 1963, the Kimberly-Clark Corp. buys the mill.

1946 Veterans of Foreign Wars Post formed

1947 Monroe Redden of Henderson County elected to U.S. House of Representatives.

1946 Poet, Lincoln biographer and folk musician Carl Sandburg moves from Illinois to Flat Rock. He purchases the former Rock Hill estate of Confederate leader C.G. Memminger.

1946 First parking meters installed in Hendersonville

1947 N.C. Apple Blossom Festival is held. The date for the festival is later changed to Labor Day and known as the N.C. Apple Festival

1948 Cranston Print Works opens outside of Fletcher and Belding-Corticelli plant opens in 1950 in Laurel Park

1948 Valley Clinic and Hospital opens in Bat Cave by Dr. George Bond

1948 Lake Summit Playhouse opens by Vagabond Players. By 1952, it is known as the Vagabond School of Drama, moves to Flat Rock and becomes the Flat Rock Playhouse. It was designated the State Theater of North Carolina in 1961.

1949 N.C. Mountain Horticultural Crops Research Station opens in Fletcher

Late 1940s to early 1950s marks the arrival of the first televisions in the county.

1950 Ruth of Carolina opens. This was a home-grown industry started by Ruth Combs and Daisy Sample

1950 Phone service switches from switchboard to dial

1950-70 Boom of apple industry in Henderson County

1950s Henderson and Transylvania counties form a joint Health Department. In 1959 the Henderson County Health Department forms.

1951 Korean War begins. Approximately 1,000 men served in the military from Henderson County. At least eight county residents died in battle.

1951 A union school established for all black students. The last two “colored” districts in the county close. Black students from Polk and Transylvania counties are transported by bus to the new school on Ninth Avenue West.

1952 Bookmobile begins traveling the county roads from the library in Hendersonville. In 1957 the name of the library was changed to the Henderson County Public Library.

1953 Pardee Hospital is dedicated

1954 N.C. Apple Growers Association forms. Edneyville apple grower William Dalton is the first president.

1954 General Electric announces plans to open a plant in East Flat Rock. This plant becomes the county’s largest employer. Groundbreaking is in 1955.

1954 Natural gas replaces butane-air gas

1954 Mountain Sanitarium and Hospital buys a fire truck. This leads to the formation of the Fletcher Volunteer Fire Department. Other volunteer fire departments form: Valley Hill, 1956-58; Blue Ridge, 1958; Green River, 1958.

1950s Greenville, S.C., watershed displaces families in the Mountain Page community

1956 DuPont begins buying land in Transylvania and Henderson counties. The first DuPont plant opens in 1958 at Cedar Mountain.

1957 Henderson County Rescue Squad organizes

1959 Buncombe County annexes 30 acres in Henderson County for an airport. This becomes the Asheville Regional Airport. Buncombe County transfers the old airport land to Henderson County for an industrial park.