1950s
It was in the 1950s that Charlotte began to come into its own. A.G. Odell, Jr., was revolutionizing architecture with the International style, as evidenced by the Robert and Elizabeth Lassiter House, built in 1951, and Odell's associate Albert Cameron's Goldstein house. The times were also changing with the building of Independence Boulevard (completed in the early 1950s) and the growth of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
While the boulevard was controversial, few noticed when Bonnie Cone, a mathematics teacher at Central High School who transitioned to teaching engineering students at Charlotte College postwar, was placed in charge of a supposedly temporary extension of the University of North Carolina located in Charlotte in 1947. However, that small school would become Charlotte College within two years and a university by 1965, with the support of Bonnie Cone. Cone, along with W.A. Kennedy, ensured that the young school earned and kept its two-year college status, had its own campus, and received support from the state of North Carolina.
In addition to Bonnie Cone, other Charlotte women were gaining ground as teachers and even politicians. Martha Evans was the first woman to serve on the Charlotte city council, in 1954. She ran for mayor in 1959 and 1961 but was defeated, although she served as both state representative and state senator during the sixties. As the first winner of WBT radio station's honor of Woman of the Year in 1955, she had great influence over the decision made for future winners of the award. Indeed, when Bonnie Cone was nominated and won the following year, Martha Evans had been renominated by the American Legion Auxiliary.
Charlotte was a fast-growing city in the 1950s, as it remains today. By allowing women to earn positions of influence in the community--exhibited especially with Bonnie Cone's work at Charlotte College and Martha Evans' tenure as councilwoman--Charlotteans were willing to allow change in order to benefit their fair city, then and in the long run.