Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission

Survey Committee Agenda – September 2019

September 18, 2019 – 6:00 p.m. 

1.  Chair’s Report: Len Norman

2.  Director’s Report: Dan Morrill

3.  Senior Preservation Planner’s Report: Stewart Gray

4.  Charlotte Modernist Survey

Modernist Additions to the Study List

5.  Beatties Ford Road Corridor Study

The HLC has approved a study of the Beatties Ford Road corridor to identify significant historic resources. Staff recommends that the Survey Committee consider a first phase of the survey to include Washington Heights, University Park, and the buildings that front on Beatties Ford Road between Brookshire Blvd and Interstate 85.

The survey of Washington Heights would include an inventory of all pre-1945 buildings. The survey would also include any post-1945 architecturally or historically significant buildings.

An historic report on the University Park neighborhood would be produced with a general analysis of the housing stock, and would identify architecturally and historically significant properties.

The survey would also inventory all pre-1945 buildings that front Beatties Ford Road, and any post-1945 architecturally or historically significant buildings. The survey would also identify any extant Green Book properties.

Brandon Lunsford, University Archivist and Digital Manager at Johnson C. Smith University, has agreed to perform the work for $5,000.

The work product would be a spreadsheet with the data for Washington Heights and the Beatties Ford Road properties, and a report containing the historical research and the descriptions of individually significant properties.

Map of Proposed Study Area

Map of Washington Heights Survey Area

Map of University Park Area

Map of Study Area Fronting Beatties Ford Road

Brandon Lunsford produced the Historic West End Digital Map

6.  Helper-Walley House, 603 North Main Street, Davidson, N.C.

Map of Property

Helper-Walley House

Revised Survey and Research Report

Below is the revised statement of significance:

Documentation of why and in what ways the property meets the criteria for designation set forth in N.C.G.S 160A-400.5.

a. Special significance in terms of its history, architecture and/or cultural importance:

1. The Helper-Walley House is one of only two remaining hall-and-parlor houses in the town of Davidson.

2. The Helper-Walley House is one of the best extant early examples in Mecklenburg County of the transitional nature of architecture. The original ca. 1896 hall-and-parlor form of the Helper-Walley House was retained while the Craftsman features were applied to the house during a remodel in the 1920s, making clear the two styles of architecture. The Helper-Walley House is an important example of the fact that architectural style is not static.

3. The Helper-Walley House is an important part of the North Main Street corridor of Davidson, which may be viewed as a timeline of Davidson’s architectural development from the antebellum period through the mid-twentieth century.

b. Integrity of design, setting, workmanship, materials, feeling and/or association: The architectural description in this report demonstrates that the property known as the Helper-Walley House meets this criterion.

7.  Old Business

8.  New Business