Preservation Greensboro is now on the social networking site Facebook. Aside from notifications of special events and initiatives, the organization has initiated a program entitled "Gate City Architecture" that will spotlight architectural styles found throughout Greensboro. The tool will be a fun way to identify architectural styles in the landscape and provide a tool for armchair historians to impress their friends!
We hope you will join!
A recent project proposed by Edwards Development of Ohio for the Newman and Whitney site (image, right) adjecent to the College Hill Historic District envisions over 700 students housed in a complex of 10 buildings. Neighborhood residents are protesting the plans on grounds that the development will exacerbate parking issues and increase the neighborhood's population by 50%. Pro-development advocates encourage the project by quoting the adage “Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know.”
The “devil we don’t know” is envisioned as a myriad of industrial or institutional uses, ranging from a freight warehouse to a maintenance facility for the nearby UNCG campus. Residents of College Hill, it is reasoned, are better off with student housing than a noisy and nonresidential use that is incompatible with Greensboro’s oldest neighborhood.
However, several projects across the Gate City exemplify creative adaptive reuse projects in which existing historic buildings and settings were considered and enhanced with new development. Edwards’ plan to insert a new community inside an established neighborhood might get a “no” from residents. But residents are not opposed to supporting redevelopment of the site that considers the historic context of the neighborhood.
Greensboro is rich with context- and history-sensitive projects. For those who are not familiar with the city’s landscape, these include:
Wafco Mills Almost directly across the street from the proposed Edwards project in College Hill, the Wafco Mills project adaptively reused a dilapidated turn-of-the-twentieth century roller mill and nearby vacant land. Completed in 1984, the project involved the restoration of the original buildings and complimented them with new residential construction on surrounding vacant land. The combined project now stands as one of the most unique developments in the city and home to a mix of student, professional, and retired residents.
Southside Initiated in the late 1990s to remedy a neighborhood of high crime and substandard housing just to the south of center city Greensboro, the Southside project stands as a national model for inner city redevelopment. Southside maintained a number of historic homes, but utilized open land to provide for the construction of “live-work” units. These units allow for a mix of uses in the fashion of traditional “over-the-store” residential/commercial buildings once common cities and towns. Single family homes were blended into the development plan. Today, Southside residents include a variety of incomes and professions within the context of historic houses and new construction.
Revolution Mill Once the center of Greensboro’s textile industry, the sprawling Revolution Mill stood largely abandoned by the turn-of-the-twenty-first-century. Featuring 600,000 square feet of exposed brick walls, large industrial windows, and expansive inner courtyards, the complex is in the midst of a comprehensive restoration project that will result in a mixed-use community including residential, commercial, recreational, office, and event space. The innovative project includes the preservation of existing historic buildings that will be enhanced by landscaping, streamside improvement, and a greenway. Upon completion, the Revolution Mill initiative will likely represent a nine-figure investment in the Gate City.
Historic preservation and neighborhood conservation in Greensboro is not an “either – or” option. For the past 25 years, residents have been careful to plan “win-win” initiatives that build the city’s tax-base, preserve community culture and history, and develop a strong sense of place. Wafco Mills, Southside, and the Revolution Mill project are regionally admired role models for inner city redevelopment. Why not continue a winning formula for future redevelopment? Developers would likely see the neighborhoods no turn into a yes.
The dates and the locations are different, but the scenarios are strikingly similar.
In both cases, large wood-frame homes constructed in the earliest years of the twentieth century occupy prominent corner lots at the edge of each city’s premiere streetcar suburb. In both cases, houses are located across the street from each city’s respective First Presbyterian Church (both designed by Hobart Upjohn), with both congregations seeking to expand their campus at the expense of historic neighborhoods. In both cases, neighborhood activists run head-to-head with congregation leadership in dealing with the deteriorated structures that require major restoration. In both cases: controversy.
The Ecker House in High Point and the Holleman House in Greensboro share a number of similarities. However, the outcome of these stories is likely to result in dramatically different legacies.
In November 1989 (20 years this month), a fire roared through the second and third floors of the 1908 Ferdinand Ecker House (image, right), the flagship residence of High Point’s then three-year-old Johnson Street Historic District. Efforts to create the district were a hard-won victory for High Point’s fledgling preservation community, and loss of the Ecker house would have represented a stunning defeat to the neighborhood of primarily simple bungalows and Colonial Revival homes. Battle lines were quickly drawn.
Leaders of High Point’s First Presbyterian Church made an early offer to purchase the burned house in order to tear it down and expand parking opportunities. The neighborhood balked at efforts to destroy the house with the president of the homeowners association countering in the newspaper that his group’s “main objective is to see the house does not come down”.
The conflict brewed for six months as water seepage and vandalism worsened damage to the home. City officials condemned the house, the High Point Enterprise opined that the house should be destroyed, and the preservation commission grudgingly approved a Certificate of Appropriateness to let the house go after a six month delay.
In May 1990, the story took a turn. I was a 23-year old graduate from college when I made an offer to buy the Ecker House to save it from the bulldozer. By the fall of the year, the restoration process was well underway to repair the fire-damaged attic and wrap-around porch, upgrade the bathrooms and kitchen, refinish floors and woodwork, and give the house a new historically appropriate paint scheme of teal and grey. In 1993, I sold the house to Kittenger Furniture of Buffalo New York for use as their corporate residence for furniture market. With the tax value of the house tripled, the home led renewed interest in neighborhood revitalization efforts.
Beyond the preservation of the Johnson Street’s flagship house, the project resulted in broader community-wide implications. The Ecker House directly inspired the preservation of the Elihu Mendenhall House on Skeet Club Road north of the city. The residence stands as one of the best examples of Greek Revival architecture in Guilford County. Later momentum led to the restoration of Chestnut Hill, a mid-nineteenth century Quaker home with history as a stagecoach stop, a post office, and a general store in the Florence community.
Buoyed by the Ecker House success story, preservationists rallied support to preserve High Point’s classic 1906 Southern Railroad Passenger Depot (image, right). The momentum gained in historic preservation led to the preservation of the nearby J. H. Adams House (now an inn) and the Briles House (now home to the High Point Junior League). The preservation easements that assure the conservation of the Ecker House into the future were repeated in an easement to preserve the Cottam-Wall House in Emerywood, the only known example of Welch Revival architecture in North Carolina.
Although the preservation of High Point’s Ecker House inspired a network of preservation projects throughout the city in the 1990s, the near-certain destruction of the Holleman House in Greensboro’s Fisher Park will have its own legacy.
As a witness to (and participant in) the positive High Point preservation story, it is difficult for me to watch an alternative storyline unfold in Greensboro. I can look back on my involvement in the efforts to save the Holleman House (image, right) with confidence that every tool available to the community was made available, from offers of funding to partnerships, and from behind-the-scenes discussions to public forums.
Putting aside the historically antagonistic relationship between neighborhood and church, the hard-feelings caused by inflated restoration estimates, the impact of the national recession on the church, and the community’s willingness to engage in a shared plan for the future of the site…the destruction of the Holleman House will resonate throughout the community for some time.
The question that the community must answer is where do we go from here?
For those who know the name, Lustron says it all. And in Greensboro, it’s for sale.
One of Greensboro’s three Lustron Homes is going on the market. Located at 2103 Dellwood Drive, the modest Dove-Gray home with pale-colored trim remains well-preserved. “Nearly everything is still there as it was built” says home owner Karen Moorefield, “even the built-in cabinets.”
The house was built around 1948. Greensboro once contained four Lustron homes, but the city’s fourth Lustron on Myers Lane was destroyed in 2000. The Gate City remains a center of Lustron Homes statewide with three surviving structures, all with the same floor plan. North Carolina sports nearly 40 of the houses.
The Lustron phenomenon began with the close of World War II when returning veteran’s required thousands of new homes for their growing families. The Lustron Corporation was set up to provide quick, efficient, and mass-manufactured homes for an affordable price. Local Lustron dealers would sell homebuyers the model of their choice, and transport components of home from Columbus, Ohio for on-site assembly. From start to finish, the construction project was often completed within two weeks.
The Dellwood residence is an example of the Westchester model of Lustron products. The 1,093 foot-, two bedroom house features steel frame construction sheathed with porcelain finished steel panels for the roof, exterior walls and interior walls. Lustron bragged that the durable nature of the porcelain finish made it “rat-proof, decay-proof, termite and rodent-proof.”
Interior appointments included built-in bookcases, china cabinet and drawer space, bedroom vanity, and closets, much constructed of porcelain-coated steel. Soap, water and a damp cloth were all that was needed to clean and maintain the house, inside and out.
The present economy might make the modest Lustron Home more popular that ever. Resurgence in the Small House Movement and repudiation of sprawling McMansions might bode well for this home that has been eyed by developers for replacement with a much larger stick-built for decades. Through the tenacity of its owner, it has survived, but Moorefield is ready to let a new steward carry the torch.
“It’s a great house,” she says “and I would love to see someone own it who appreciates it.”
For those who would like to inquire about buying the Lustron Home, contact Karen Moorefield by email or telephone 336-312-5146.
City Council reversed the Zoning Commission’s approval to rezone property near the corner of North Elm and Cornwallis Drive to allow for condos, but questions linger over the future of the Commencement House, an historic property of modern design and historic significance.
The rezoning request for the property would have cleared the way for two residential structures, each containing 12 units to be constructed on the site that adjoins single family residences to the west and north, a church to the east and a bank to the south. The project would have resulted in the demolition (or at least dismantling) of the Commencement House.
Several residents from surrounding neighborhoods fought off earlier plans to redevelop the site for commercial or medical use. Some saw redevelopment of the property for residential multi-family use as a compromise to more intense development; others felt the importance of the Commencement House was too high for it to fall as a casualty of higher density.
Developer John Stratton placed a number of conditions on the site that sought to win neighborhood support, including architecture that was seen as complimentary to the neighborhood, landscape buffering, and a 45-foot height limit for structures.
However, opposition to the development focused on the fate of the Commencement House. With numerous examples of infill development around Greensboro that preserved history, including the Rankin King Farm, Wafco Mills, Southside, and the Gardens at the Anthony House – why could this project not follow suit?
A protest petition filed by two adjoining property owners required council to approve the project with six votes. Council voted 3-4 in opposition to the rezoning and the request was denied. However, some last minute wrangling and vote redistribution could leave the door open for another vote on the matter in the future, and under a newly elected city council set to meet for the first time on December 1.
In the meantime, the Commencement House remains vacant and no plans are in place to preserve the site. Whether the issue is returned to council for a second vote - and whether it wins approval at that time - or not, the historic house is deteriorating and the cost to restore it are rising.
Historic preservation can be about saving an old house from deterioration. It can also involve the conservation of architectural features that are authentic and contribute to a sense of history and place. Increasingly, however, historic preservation is about site use and zoning. When a residential property is allowed to take on higher density, the likelihood that the structure will find its way into the city landfill is dramatically increased.
As the future of the Commencement House is decided through political cogs, a facet of Greensboro’s unique and irreplaceable history finds itself on the line.
Update 11/19/09: PreservationNation, the national blog on preservation issues, reviews this issue here.
The two-story brick duplex once located at 208 Blandwood Avenue, and considered by some to be an impediment to construction of the new Guilford County Jail, has been removed off county land. It now sits on property owned by the Zenke family, where it will remain and be restored.
Movers dodged rainy weather over the past week to lift the heavy structure off its original foundation where it had stood for approximately 90 years. The house was gingerly hauled across the county-Zenke property line late last week. The mid-block move was made simpler by a lack of overhead wires and cables. It now awaits final placement facing Washington Street directly across from Blandwood Mansion.
The project was coordinated by the Zenke family and the Preservation Greensboro Development Fund. Public and private finances were pooled to make the project happen. The effort should result in a more pedestrian-friendly environment along West Washington Street, and contribute to public initiaves to rejuvenate the downtown Morehead Neighborhood that is centered on Governor John Motley Morehead’s Blandwood Mansion.
I vote for a small restaurant to occupy the duplex. No restaurants exist west of Greene and south of Market!
North Carolina history has just become more affordable.
The Model Farm, an important Reconstruction-era historic site located at 2045 Brentwood Street in High Point, has been placed on the market by its California-based owner. Its price has been adjusted down to $99,000 from the earlier $177,500 asking price.
The 3,300 square foot farmhouse was built in 1866 by the Baltimore Association of Friends to Advise and Assist Friends in the Southern States as a demonstration project. The Friends sought to improve production and prosperity among the state’s war-torn farmers by informing them of advances in agricultural practice and procedure. The site had wide-ranging influence across the region and became a center of modern agricultural standards for most of the late nineteenth century. Governor Jonathan Worth stated that the Model Farm was the only green spot in North Carolina in the years after the war. Today, the Farm remains one of North Carolina’s most important Reconstruction-era historic sites.
William A. Sampson of Maine operated the 240-acre farm beginning in 1866. Sampson was well-versed in modern agricultural practices and set about demonstrating the use of clover crops for soil fertilization, the sale of seed and the cultivation of grass pastureland. Other initiatives included a barn with running water, “rat-proof” corn cribs, milled bone for fertilization, iron axles on wagons, thoroughbred cattle and registered sheep and hogs. After twenty-five years of service, the Baltimore Association considered its mission complete and sold the property for private use in 1891.
Though the outbuildings and barn have been lost, the imposing farmhouse remains. It stands two and a half stories tall, with a steeply sloping triple-A roofline and a wide front porch, a large three-sided window bay on the west elevation and arched windows lighting the attic. Interior appointments are simple; however, the plaster walls and ceilings and running water were novel in the South in the years after the Civil War.
The neighborhood in which the Model Farm stands was once the Springfield community, a agrarian village of Quakers clustered around Springfield Friends Meeting House. In the past 50 years, Springfield grew from a farming community into a commercial and industrial neighborhood of High Point. Although the house is now convenient to interstate highways, its once bucolic setting has been lost to parking lots and satellite dishes.
Ideas for the site range widely, from a continued residential use to adaptation to a small inn, garden center, or antique shop. The house and its land were recognized as a Guilford County landmark property in 2001, a designation that reduces property taxes in exchange for regulation of the historic character of the property. The house may be eligible for the National Register of Historic Places – a move that could tap into state and federal tax credits.
Interested parties should contact Mike Stout, Regional Director of the Preservation North Carolina Northwest Office. 336-788-0765.
Three preservation organizations are teaming up to encourage a thoughtful and positive dialog to shape the future of one of Greensboro's most historic neighborhoods.
Locally-based Preservation Greensboro has linked with Philadelphia-based Partners for Sacred Places and the Washington DC-based National Trust for Historic Places to hold a community design workshop to explore the future of Fisher Park. At the heart of the discussion is how the southern frontier of the historic neighborhood that borders downtown can grow and flourish as the state's most urbane locale without sacrificing its culture and institutions. The city blocks that constitute the study area are home to major religious congregations, a network of city- and statewide nonprofits, the Guilford County School system administration building, the city's oldest public park, a sprawling Victorian-era cemetery, and a soon-to-be-constructed downtown greenway...all within the context of one of North Carolina's premiere streetcar suburbs. How can these institutions grow and thrive in a way that benefits all?
The workshop is open to the public. It will be held on November 6th, 1-4:30pm in Broome Hall on the ground floor of Holy Trinity Church at 607 North Greene Street. The event is free.
The open-ended workshop will be facilitated by Luther K. Snow, the nationally-known creator of the Asset Mapping technique. Participants will focus on the strengths and assets of Fisher Park and its institutions, including the gifts and contributions of congregations and social ministries, the talents and contributions of residents, service and business development opportunities, the inventory of religious structures and historic assets, and much more. Attendees will use Asset Mapping techniques to develop creative project ideas that will lead to positive actions. Anyone with an interest and a love for Fisher Park is invited to attend.
Those who plan to attend may RSVP to Judi Kastner at Preservation Greensboro at 272-5003 ext 3, or by email jkastner@blandwood.org.
The workshop is funded in part through a grant by the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Terence L. Mills Memorial Endowed Preservation Fund for North and South Carolina, Preservation Greensboro, and Partners for Sacred Places.
It was the grandest office building erected in High Point in its first 120 years of existence.
It was designed by one of the Triad’s most prominent architects.
It was financed by one of High Point’s most prominent leaders.
It was built by the city’s most prominent general contractor.
Now, it is on the path to be recognized as an official Guilford County landmark property.
The Commercial National Bank (today known as the Radio Building) is the premier office building constructed in the city during the first half of the twentieth century, and the first major office building in High Point after the 1907 North Carolina Savings Bank and Trust building on North Main Street. Located at 164 South Main Street, the form of the building alludes to three components of a classical column—including a stone base with an arched entry, a shaft of six-story pilasters and an elaborate capital-like top—typical of the Neoclassical style popular for office towers of the period. Renaissance details include fasciae over the windows on the first floor supported by brackets, an elaborate keystone over the front entry arch and an impressive entablature at the top floor.
The building was designed by Charles C. Hartmann of Greensboro and constructed in 1922–24 by R.K. Stewart of High Point. Hartmann had a hand in designing some of Guilford County’s most distinctive buildings, including Dudley and Grimsley high schools in Greensboro, the Jefferson Standard Life Insurance Building in Greensboro, and the Sheraton Hotel in High Point.
The building was built as the home of Commercial National Bank. Its president, J. Elwood Cox, a former gubernatorial candidate and industrialist, heralded the bank headquarters as “the finest in North Carolina.” The opening day crowd numbered 2,500, and all were given souvenirs—desk knives for men and notebooks for women.
Commercial National Bank fell victim to a panic during the Great Depression. After 1936 the building was home to Greensboro-based Security National Bank. Security National merged with American Commercial Bank of Charlotte in 1960, forming North Carolina National Bank (NCNB). The banking area of the building was remodeled in 1963 by High Point-based architect William Freeman to reflect the power and success of the new bank. NCNB remained in the building until 1992, when it moved to a new location at the corner of N. Main St. and Church Avenue and later took the name Bank of America.
The building has long been the home of WMFR radio, indicated by the broadcasting tower atop the building. Until the early 1980s, the roof sported the station's call letters emblazoned in red. The presence of the radio station has provided the building its latest name.
The structure received a favorable recommendation by the Guilford County Historic Preservation Commission for landmark designation on Tuesday night. The application will be considered by High Point City Council for final approval.
Landmark designation is a voluntary process in Guilford County. In exchange for the requirement of a Certificate of Appropriateness for any changes and alterations to the historic building, owners receive a 50% property tax deferral. Several downtown High Point buildings are recognized as landmark properties, including the Old Guilford County Courthouse, Market Square, and portions of the old YMCA.
Our friends at the National Trust for Historic Preservation report progress on passage of a bill that would make beneficial changes to the federal rehabilitation tax credit and provide a greater incentive for the reuse of historic and older buildings.
The federal rehabilitation tax credit is the nation's largest federal incentive promoting urban and rural revitalization through private investment in reusing historic buildings. The credit encourages reinvestment in downtowns, generates jobs, and is instrumental in preserving the historic places that give cities, towns and rural areas their unique character. Several recent projects in Greensboro have received credits, including Foundation Place (image, right), Natty Greene's, and Revolution Mill.
While the credit has generated over $50 billion in renovation and revitalization dollars since it was enacted in 1976, it could do more. On October 1st, Representatives Allyson Schwartz and Pat Tiberi and Senators Olympia Snowe and Blanche Lincoln introduced bills (in the House and the Senate) that would provide several amendments to the existing federal rehabilitation tax credit to further its mission by encouraging substantial energy savings in historic buildings while spurring greater investment in commercial projects -- particularly with smaller businesses located in older neighborhoods where there is a critical need for revitalization.
You can help in garnering support for this important package of amendments. Contact your Members of Congress today and ask them to be a cosponsor of the Community Restoration and Revitalization Act (H.R. 3715, S. 1743). Tell them these important changes will realize a greater potential for revitalizing communities in their district and across the country.
If your Members of Congress are already co-sponsors (find out here), please thank them for their support of historic preservation.
Learn more about the existing federal rehabilitation tax credit and the proposed amendments.
