Soul City, North Carolina is a planned community first proposed in 1969 by Floyd McKissick, a civil rights leader and director of the Congress of Racial Equality. Funded by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, (HUD) as one of thirteen model city projects funded through the Urban Growth and New Community Development Act, it was located on 5000 acres (20 km²) in Warren County, near Manson. The city was to contain three villages housing 18,000 people by 1989. It was planned to be self-contained, so that residents could work, receive health care, get schooling, and worship in town. Soul City was the first new town organized by African-American businesses. Commonly misunderstood as Afro-centric in focus, McKissick actually envisioned Soul City as a community where all races could live in harmony.
In 1972, the city received a grant of $14 million from HUD on the hope that industry would move to the planned community. Yet by 1975, the city had few homes and only one industrial building, "Soul Tech 1".
The city failed to reach its initial ambitions. Lawsuits and investigations into the use of funds by the Soul City Company, the city's developers, resulted in foreclosure in 1979. In 1980, there were 35 housing units, a clinic, a tennis court, and a pool. About 150 people were employed in the city.
Since that time, the city has grown somewhat, but not to the size originally planned. The former Soul Tech building was purchased by the adjoining Warren County Correctional Institution for expansion, and a number of new homes have been constructed.
Representative Eva Clayton worked in Soul City before being elected to the United States Congress.