The North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources has announced that one district and five individual properties across the state have been added to the National Register of Historic Places.
“The addition of these North Carolina listings to the National Register of Historic Places continues to expand our telling of the diverse story of our state’s history, and to acknowledge the important contributions of all North Carolinians,” said Secretary Susi Hamilton, N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
The listing of a property in the National Register places no obligation or restriction on a private owner using private resources to maintain or alter the property. Over the years, various federal and state incentives have been introduced to assist private preservation initiatives, including tax credits for the rehabilitation of National Register properties. As of Jan. 1, 2019, over 3,790 historic rehabilitation projects with an estimated private investment of over $2.833 billion have been completed.
In Central North Carolina
Cleveland School, Cleveland, Rowan County, listed 01/28/2019
Cleveland School is locally significant for its association with African American education in Rowan County from 1930 until 1968 when the school closed due to desegregation. It was one of five schools in the county financed and constructed with the assistance of the Rosenwald Fund, which provided seed money for construction of the primary building, a four-teacher brick school erected in 1930. The property includes a 1942 auditorium and 1956-57 playground equipment. Cleveland School served African American students in grades one through 12 in the Cleveland community and the northwest portion of Rowan County. The nomination for Cleveland School was funded by an Underrepresented Community Grant to the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office from the National Park Service.
College Heights Historic District, Durham, Durham County, listed 01/10/2019
The College Heights Historic District is an historically African American neighborhood in southwest Durham that developed during the racially segregated early 20th century. The neighborhood is distinguished by its proximity to African American educational institutions, including North Carolina Central University, and became one of the most popular neighborhoods for teachers, professors and other school employees. The development of College Heights can also be attributed to the growth and success of locally owned, African American companies like North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company, Mechanics and Farmers Bank, and others, with many of their upper-level employees residing in the neighborhood. The district is also significant for its collection of residential buildings in styles and forms that illustrate national trends during the period of significance, which begins in 1925 when the first homes were constructed and ends c.1966, by which time the neighborhood had been largely built out. The district exhibits Colonial Revival, Craftsman, Minimal Traditional, Period Cottage, Ranch, Contemporary, and Moderne-style homes on gridded and curvilinear streets, following residential development trends of the period.
Madison-Derr Iron Furnace, Location Restricted, Lincoln County, listed 01/10/2019
The Madison-Derr Iron Furnace, established in 1809 and rebuilt in 1855, is set on Leepers Creek in the Big Ore Bank iron deposit of eastern Lincoln County. The site includes a well-preserved stone furnace, stone walls and footings associated with the furnace complex, an earthen sluiceway, remains of dams, a stone quarry, a charcoal stockpile area, slag deposits, and an old road bed. The furnace is a monumental, prismoidal stone structure and is one of the few extant furnace structures related to the iron industry that operated in the Piedmont of North Carolina from c. 1775 to c. 1875. Madison-Derr Furnace is also significant for its distinctive furnace design featuring triangular openings. Historical archaeology of the furnace site as a whole has the potential to answer questions about the design of the furnace and the layout of the associated water-management system, to investigate how labor was organized and the nature of social relations at the ironworks, to identify fluctuations in the intensity of production at Madison-Derr over time, to assess the extent to which the ironworks affected the local environment, and to provide details about the daily lives of workers, including those enslaved, with regard to their foodways, pastimes, dress and health.
In Western North Carolina
Asheville School (Additional Documentation), Asheville, Buncombe County, listed 12/13/2018
The Asheville School was originally listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1996. The additional documentation extends the Period of Significance through 1968, as the school continued to reflect its significance in the areas of architecture, landscape architecture and education beyond 1946 (as identified in 1996). The expansion of the Period of Significance allows Memorial Hall, a 1947 building designed by Asheville architect Anthony Lord, to become a contributing resource, further illustrating the school’s commitment to hiring architects and landscape designers of local and national prominence to expand the campus. This document also serves to correct an omission in the original nomination by including the 1937 coal burner shed as a contributing building, and accounts for any changes to the campus made since the original nomination.
Stamey Company Store, Fallston, Cleveland County, listed 01/10/2019
The Stamey Company Store was built in 1927 at the heart of the crossroads community of Fallston in Cleveland County. The building is locally significant as an excellent and remarkably intact building representative of commercial architecture in the 1920s. The two-story building features a restrained classical exterior with decorative brickwork and a traditional storefront on the exterior and such decorative interior elements as a wood-frame storefront display, grand central stairway, and ornamental metal ceiling tiles. Stamey Company Store’s impressive size, decorative brickwork, and finely finished interior distinguished it from competitors and brought an urban commercial aesthetic to the small community of Fallston.
West Fork Pigeon River Pratt Truss Bridge, Bethel vicinity, Haywood County, listed 01/10/2019
Erected in 1891 at the Forks of Pigeon in Southern Haywood County, the West Fork Pigeon River Pratt Truss Bridge is significant as one of only two Pratt through-truss bridges remaining in the county, and the only one that is constructed of wrought iron. The New York-based engineering firm of Dean & Westbrook installed the bridge using patented pre-fabricated components designed by the Pennsylvania-based Phoenix Bridge Company. Though relocated in 1925 when the state replaced the structure with a more modern steel truss bridge, the West Fork Pigeon River Pratt Truss Bridge remained in use for vehicular traffic until it was decommissioned by the North Carolina Department of Transportation in 2013. At that time, a new bridge was constructed to the south of the historic structure, which was then refurbished and converted to pedestrian use.
In Eastern North Carolina
Bethlehem Baptist Church, Bethlehem vicinity, Hertford County, listed 01/10/2019
The Bethlehem Baptist Church sits prominently at an angle on the southwest corner of the intersection of North Carolina Highway 561 East and State Road 1427 in rural Hertford County, approximately six miles east of the town of Ahoskie. Agricultural fields face all three opposing corners, placing more emphasis on the church’s stature in the open landscape. The picturesque church building is an intact example of a 1902 rural eastern North Carolina church. It is a three-bay, gable-front, frame church with central entrance flanked by two gothic-arched windows. The ends of the eaves have a slight flare. The wood siding is beadboard installed in a herringbone pattern which is repeated on the exterior and interior of the building. The church is five bays deep delineated by pointed arch windows. Clear ripple glass rather than stained glass is contained within the wood frames. The roofline is surmounted by a three-tier steeple. The Bethlehem Baptist Church located in rural Hertford County, North Carolina is listed in the National Register of Historic Places under Criterion C for architecture as a fine example of vernacular religious architecture in eastern North Carolina, showing a creative and architecturally intact example of the Gothic Revival style.
About the National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the nation’s official list of buildings, structures, objects, sites, and districts worthy of preservation for their significance in American history, architecture, archaeology, and culture. The National Register was established by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 to ensure that as a matter of public policy, properties significant in national, state and local history are considered in the planning of federal undertakings, and to encourage historic preservation initiatives by state and local governments and the private sector. The Act authorized the establishment of a State Historic Preservation Office in each state and territory to help administer federal historic preservation programs.
In North Carolina, the State Historic Preservation Office is an agency of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources. Dr. Kevin Cherry, the Department’s Deputy Secretary of Archives, History, and Parks, is North Carolina’s State Historic Preservation Officer. The North Carolina National Register Advisory Committee, a board of professionals and citizens with expertise in history, architectural history, and archaeology, meets three times a year to advise Dr. Cherry on the eligibility of properties for the National Register and the adequacy of nominations.
The National Register nominations for the recently listed properties may be read in their entirety by clicking on the National Register page of the State Historic Preservation Office website. For more information on the National Register, including the criteria for listing, see this page.
About the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources
The N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources (NCDNCR) is the state agency with a vision to be the leader in using the state’s natural and cultural resources to build the social, cultural, educational and economic future of North Carolina. NCDNCR’s mission is to improve the quality of life in our state by creating opportunities to experience excellence in the arts, history, libraries and nature in North Carolina by stimulating learning, inspiring creativity, preserving the state’s history, conserving the state’s natural heritage, encouraging recreation and cultural tourism, and promoting economic development.
NCDNCR includes 27 historic sites, seven history museums, two art museums, two science museums, three aquariums and Jennette’s Pier, 39 state parks and recreation areas, the N.C. Zoo, the nation’s first state-supported Symphony Orchestra, the State Library, the State Archives, the N.C. Arts Council, State Preservation Office and the Office of State Archaeology, along with the Division of Land and Water Stewardship. For more information, please visit www.ncdcr.gov.