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Preservationists plan to survey at least 30 North Carolina counties, including several in the Piedmont, to create a census of the area’s textile heritage assets.

They plan to use the information in their ongoing efforts to establish a 700-plus-mile Southern Textile Heritage Corridor stretching along Interstate 85 from Richmond, Va., to Montgomery, Ala.

The census would list mill villages and renovated mills, plus textile-related museums, exhibits, churches, eating establishments, music events, sports venues, festivals and landmarks.

The survey will identify visitor-ready and potential sites.

“We need to be able to say what we have and what is unique about it and what its story is,” said Lynn Rumley, director of the Textile Heritage Center in Cooleemee. “(It’s) a way to let the public know what ... venues and attractions exist.”

In 2007, Rumley and other textile history enthusiasts established a nonprofit made up of members from Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia with the goal of creating a textile corridor along I-85.

The group wants to preserve old mills and textile memories; spur the development of historic sites, scenic byways and museums; and attract tourists to communities devastated by plant closings and job losses.

Such national heritage corridors allow residents, businesses, nonprofits, private groups and local governments to join together to preserve their history, culture and natural resources with the help of the National Park Service.

The corridors, which must be approved by Congress, can receive federal funds and guidance from the park service, but are not federally owned or controlled. That’s left to local groups.

Those pushing the textile heritage corridor won’t seek federal designation for several years, but they are laying the groundwork for such an effort.

Rumley said North Carolina already has visitor-ready textile sites and attractions in 17 communities, including four in Alamance County and one in Rockingham County. No organized sites currently exist in Guilford.

Those involved with textile-related events say they welcome efforts to establish a corridor in the state.

“We would hope that it would certainly increase tourism,” said Marianne Aiken, associate director of the Charlie Poole Music Festival, an event which honors the former banjo great and textile worker from Eden. “That’s one of our objectives with the festival, to have something to draw visitors to this area.”

Others say they have seen an increase in attendance to area textile attractions in recent years.

“With proper support, the interest is there,” said Jerrie Nall, director of the Textile Heritage Museum at Glencoe, a restored mill village north of Burlington. “As people learn more and more about what is taking place, then the excitement increases.”

But Rumley says the textile corridor effort isn’t just about attracting tourists.

“(We’re) working to save cotton mills from being destroyed and working to save the stories of the people in the mills,” she said. “We are looking to build a more permanent apparatus that can preserve the South’s textile heritage.”

Rumley said her group hopes to complete the survey this year, but must secure funding first.

She said she has no idea how many possible attractions exist.

“That’s why we have got to do the survey,” she said. “We still have no comprehensive list of what remains.”

Contact Donald W. Patterson at 373-7027 or don.patterson@news-record.com.