Survey and Research Report

Bishop John C. Kilgo House

 

 

2100 The Plaza

Charlotte, North Carolina

28205

 

 

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission

2008

 

Click here to view the SHPO Letter

 

1. Name and location of the property.  The property known as the Bishop John C. Kilgo House is located 2100 The Plaza, in Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.

 

2. Name, address, and telephone number of the present owner of the properties.

The owners of the property are:

 

Donald R. and Kiley F. Rawlins

2100 The Plaza

Charlotte, North Carolina 28205

Telephone:  (704) 996-0188

 

3. Representative photographs of the property.  This report contains representative photographs of the property.

Photo Gallery

 

4. Maps depicting the location of the property.  This report contains maps which depict the location of the property.

 

 

5. Current deed book references to the properties. The most recent reference to Tax Parcel Number 095-03-505 is recorded in Mecklenburg County Deed Book 22913 at page 915.

 

6. A brief architectural description of the property.  This report contains brief architectural description of the property prepared by Richard L. Mattson and Frances P. Alexander.

 

7. A brief historical sketch of the property.  This report contains a brief historical sketch of the property prepared by Richard L. Mattson and Frances P. Alexander.

 

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

 

1. Special significance in terms of history, architecture, and cultural importance.  The Commission judges that the property known as the Bishop John C. Kilgo House does possess special significance in terms of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.  The Commission bases its judgment on the following considerations:  1)  the Kilgo House, erected in 1914, stands among the first and finest residences in the Chatham Estates suburb (now known as Plaza-Midwood) in Charlotte; 2) the house is associated with Bishop Kilgo, the original owner, a distinguished Methodist minister and bishop, and president of Trinity College, later Duke University; and 3) the designer of the house was Louis H. Asbury, one of Charlotte’s foremost architects in the early twentieth century

 

1. integrity of design, setting, workmanship, materials, feeling, and association.  The Commission contends that the architectural description by Richard L. Mattson and Frances P. Alexander included in this report demonstrates that the Bishop John C. Kilgo House meets this criterion.

 

9. Ad Valorem Tax Appraisal. The Commission is aware that designation would allow the owner to apply for an automatic deferral of 50% of the Ad Valorem taxes on all or any portion of the properties which become designated historic landmarks.  The current appraised value of the improvements to Tax Parcel Number 095-03-505 is—–.  The current appraised value of the land associated with Tax Parcel 095-03-505 is—–.  The total appraised value of Tax Parcel 095-03-505 is ——-.  The property is zoned —–.

 

Date of Preparation of this Report.: 10 January 2008

 

Prepared by:  Richard L. Mattson, Ph.D. and  Frances P. Alexander, M.A.

 

Mattson, Alexander and Associates

2228 Winter Street

Charlotte, North Carolina  28205

Telephone:  (704) 376-0985

Telephone:  (704) 358-9841

Statement of Significance

 

Constructed on The Plaza in 1915, the Bishop John C. Kilgo House stands among the first and finest residences in the Chatham Estates suburb (now known as Plaza-Midwood) in Charlotte.  In its setting along the landscaped boulevard, and sophisticated architecture, the Bishop Kilgo House exemplifies the houses erected for this subdivision’s earliest, elite residents. The house remains well-preserved—a handsome blend of Colonial Revival and Craftsman-style elements.  Bishop Kilgo, the original owner, was a distinguished Methodist minister and president of Trinity College, later Duke University.  The Kilgo House is primarily associated with his years as a bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South.   The designer of the house was Louis H. Asbury, one of Charlotte’s foremost architects in the early twentieth century.

 

Physical Description

 

The Bishop John C. Kilgo House is situated in the Plaza-Midwood neighborhood of Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.  The house faces west towards The Plaza, a landscaped, residential boulevard that runs through the heart of the neighborhood.  In addition to the house, there is modern one-story garage in the backyard.  The corner lot has modern landscaping and a new iron fence on the south side.  A gable-front garage and side-gable servant’s quarters that originally stood behind the house are no longer extant.  The expansive VanLandingham Estate, consisting of the 1914, Craftsman-style VanLandingham residence, and its landscaped grounds, stands south of the Kilgo House, across Belvedere Avenue.

 

In its form and elements of style, the Kilgo House combines Colonial Revival and Craftsman themes.  The balanced, hip-roofed, main block and the columned and bracketed entry porch, which originally included a roof balustrade, are popular Colonial Revival features.  The interior also expresses a classical formality, with classical mantels and a reception area and rear stairhall flanked by the principal rooms.  However, the house also reveals the Craftsman style in its conscious, straightforward simplicity and horizontality, with a low hip roof and deep, open eaves with exposed rafters.  The Tuscan columns on the front porch share this space with sturdy brick piers.

 

The two-story, frame, weatherboarded dwelling rests on a brick foundation, and has a cubic main block with a low hip roof pierced by tall, brick chimney stacks.  Hip-roofed, attic dormers with exposed rafters mark the front and side elevations.  The principal dormer in the front elevation has a rectangular vent flanked by casement windows.  The smaller, side dormers have rectangular vents.  A two-story, hip-roofed wing on the south elevation contains the original sleeping porch (now used for an office/sitting room) on the upper level, and sunroom and engaged porch on the lower level.  The original, hip-roofed sections of the house remain substantially intact. Unless otherwise noted, there are symmetrically arranged, eight-over-one windows on the second story and one-over-one windows on the first.  A bank of six-over-one windows allows natural light and cool breezes into the sleeping porch.  All the windows have simple, molded surrounds.  The roofs have deep eaves with exposed rafters.  The later, 1950s rear, gable-roofed addition has six-over-one windows on the second story.  Its roof has deep eaves and exposed rafters echo those on the main body of the house.

 

The balanced, three-bay façade (west elevation) has a center-bay entry porch with an original concrete floor, brick steps, and a frieze with heavy brackets, supported by both Tuscan columns and corbelled brick piers.  Probably in the 1950s, the porch’s original roof deck and balustrade were replaced by the present hip roof.   The original second-floor doorway that opened onto the roof deck has been converted to a window, which is flanked by original casement windows.  In recent years, the concrete porch floor has also been extended to create a deck across the façade, and now joins with the engaged porch on the south side of the house.  The original, wood porch railing on the south side remains, and connects to a new, matching railing along the front decks flanking the entry porch.  The front entrance has a glazed, oak door enframed by leaded-glass, paneled sidelights and three-part transom, and fluted pilasters capped by a simple entablature.

 

On the south elevation, French doors in the parlor open onto an engaged, hip-roofed side porch with Tuscan columns.  This subsidiary hip roof wraps around the southeast corner of the house to shield the sunroom windows.  The north elevation has a modern wooden deck and doorway, which opens into the rear kitchen wing.

 

The rear of the house includes an original full-height, hip-roofed wing.  When constructed, this wing included a one-story kitchen ell with an engaged corner porch.  During the 1950s, a gable-roofed, second-story was added above the kitchen and the small porch enclosed.  The original hip-roofed rear porch remains on the south side of this wing, as does the rear stairway, which ascends to an engaged second-story landing.  The 1950s addition contains an exterior brick chimney on the gable end and a hip-roofed side porch with square, wooden posts and railing.  A modern deck with a matching railing is attached to the south side of the rear porch.

 

The well-preserved interior retains the original plan and much of the original finish.   There are hardwood floors, plaster walls and ceilings, and unpainted oak woodwork, including two-panel doors, throughout.  Expect for the parlor, the original mantels are intact.  They display restrained, classically-inspired, post-and-lintel designs, with pilasters and paneled or plain friezes.  The doors and windows have simple, molded surrounds.  Baseboards and crown molding mark the principal rooms and halls.  The front door opens into the broad, front reception hall, where large, paneled, pocket doors lead into the parlor (south) and the living room (north).  Heavy crown moldings distinguish both the hall and the parlor.  The parlor includes French doors leading onto the side (south) porch, and a replacement brick mantel.  The rear stairhall features an open-string stairway with simple, square balusters and newels, and a striking, curvilinear opening on the second floor.  The rear kitchen has been modernized in recent years, though the original paneled door to the butler’s pantry (now the laundry/pantry) remains.  The bathrooms on the both first and second floors have been recently modernized, though the paneled doors appear to be original.

 

Upstairs, the four bedrooms are arranged around the center stairhall.  The southeast bedroom has the dwelling’s only painted mantel, and includes French doors leading onto the sleeping porch.  The major change on the second floor occurred during the 1950s, when the northeast bedroom (now the master bedroom) was expanded above the kitchen wing.

 

Louis H. Asbury, Architect

The Bishop Kilgo House was designed by Louis Humbert Asbury (1877-1975), one of the state’s first professionally trained architects and one of the region’s foremost building designers of the early twentieth century.  Built in 1914, the house dates from the height of Asbury’s practice in Charlotte, and clearly illustrates his role as one of the city’s premier architects earning commissions from a wealthy clientele.   While Asbury designed a host of fine houses in the Colonial Revival style, the Kilgo House is the only know example that blends both Colonial and Craftsman elements.  As Charlotte boomed as textile manufacturing center, Asbury was one of a coterie of architects that gained prominence designing buildings that were hallmarks of the prosperity.  Among the other architects widely recognized for their important work in and around Charlotte are:  Charles Christian Hook, William Peeps, Oliver Wheeler, James McMichael, and Martin Boyer (Asbury Papers 1906-1975; Bishir and Southern 2003:  504; Hanchett 1998:  159-160, 192-193, 305, 317; Charlotte-Mecklenburg Landmarks Commission, Files).

 

A Charlotte native, Louis H. Asbury graduated Trinity College (later Duke University) in Durham, North Carolina, in 1900.  He subsequently enrolled in a specialized, two-year architecture program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating in 1903.  He opened his firm in Charlotte in 1908, and became the first North Carolina member of the American Institute of Architects (Asbury Papers 1906-1975; Morrill 1978).

 

During the ensuing decades, Asbury earned hundreds of commissions in Charlotte and the surrounding counties.  His body of work encompassed a full range of buildings types—houses, commercial structures, hotels, banks, churches, and civic institutions—executed primarily in popular Colonial Revival and Gothic Revival themes.  During the early twentieth century, his principal clients were well-to-do homebuyers in the finest neighborhoods of Charlotte.  But Asbury also drew up plans for the city’s big churches and prominent retail stores and banks, as well as for local and state government.   His achievements in Charlotte included stately Georgian Revival and Colonial Revival dwellings in prestigious Myers Park., such as the 1913 Charles P. Moody House (Local Landmark 1981), a red-brick Georgian on Providence Road.  In downtown Charlotte, he designed the 1926 Mecklenburg County Courthouse (Local Landmark 1983; National Register 2001), which is a grand, stone, Beaux Arts edifice with a towering Corinthian portico (Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission, Files; Bishir and Southern 2003:  504, 511, 523; Asbury Papers 1906-1975).

 

Asbury’s commercial work in the center city included the 1929, Neoclassical, Mayfair Manor (renamed Dunhill Hotel) (Local Landmark 1989); and the 1930 Montaldo’s, a prestigious women’s clothing store that features a French Renaissance façade.  In 1926, Asbury teamed with Lockwood, Greene Engineers of Boston to design the First National Bank (Local Landmark pending), a twenty-story, classically detailed skyscraper on South Tryon Street.  However, his personal preference was the Gothic Revival, and Asbury’s local churches, including the 1915 Hawthorne Lane Methodist (Local Landmark 1983); the 1918 Old Mount Carmel Baptist (Local Landmark 1983); the 1920 Advent Christian Church (Local Landmark 1987); and the 1928 Myers Park Methodist, were all fashioned in the Gothic mode (Bishir and Southern 2003:  507-508, 509, 514-515; Asbury Papers 1906-1975).

 

Outside Charlotte, Asbury’s prominent projects included the 1907, Colonial Revival, Stonewall Jackson Training School complex (National Register 1984) near Concord, North Carolina; several of Concord’s finest Colonial Revival houses, including the 1912 J. Archibald Cannon House; the 1923, Gothic Revival, Lutheran Chapel Church in Gastonia; and the 1928 Bethel Bear Creek Church, an unusually large, Gothic Revival edifice in rural Stanly County (Bishir 1990:  Bishir and Southern 2003:  285, 493, 496-497; Asbury Papers).

 

Following several speculative real estate investments that failed during the Depression, Asbury declared bankruptcy in 1935.  He closed his Charlotte practice and briefly found employment as an architect for the Federal Housing Authority in Asheville and Greensboro, North Carolina.  In 1937, Asbury reopened his office, which by 1939, included his architect son, Louis Asbury Jr.  Asbury retired in 1956, after nearly a half century of architectural work in North Carolina, designing many of Charlotte’s landmark buildings of the early twentieth century (Asbury Papers; Bishir and Southern 2003:  504; Morrill 1978).

 

 

Historical Background

 

This spacious, two-story residence on The Plaza was completed in 1915 for Bishop John Carlisle Kilgo (1861-1922).  It was designed by the noteworthy Charlotte architect Louis H. Asbury.  The house was one of the first dwellings constructed in the newly platted Chatham Estates suburb near the Charlotte Country Club northeast of downtown Charlotte.  Consisting of approximately twenty blocks, this small suburb later became part of the Plaza-Midwood neighborhood, created in 1973 from ten separate subdivisions in this area. Chatham Estates was established by Paul Chatham, an Elkin, North Carolina, textile manufacturer who moved to Charlotte in 1907.  In 1910, Chatham joined forces with members of the newly formed country club to develop Chatham Estates as an upscale suburb.  The developers commissioned Charlotte-based landscape designer, Leigh Colyer, to lay out Chatham Estates incorporating a blend of straight and curvilinear avenues oriented to a grand, landscaped boulevard—The Plaza (Hanchett 1984:  “Plaza-Midwood”; Hanchett 1998:  164-165).

 

Benefiting from the adjacent country club and a well-drained, elevated site, the development began auspiciously, attracting a small group of well-off homebuyers.  Each built a large residence on a broad parcel facing The Plaza.  Bishop Kilgo purchased his lot across Belvedere Avenue from the VanLandingham Estate, which was finished 1914.  Ralph VanLandingham was a successful cotton broker, and his wife, Suzie, a civic leader.  The grand, Craftsman-style VanLandingham residence was designed by important local architects, Charles Christian Hook and Willard G. Rogers.  Leigh Colyer designed the estate’s lush gardens.  Nearby, in 1914, Union National Bank president H. M. Victor built a sizable dwelling (now gone) in the Colonial Revival style.  In 1915, cotton and grain merchant R. M. Miller, Jr., relocated his 1891 Queen Anne residence from the center city to 1600 The Plaza, where it was purchased by stockbroker John L. Scott.  A year later, businessman Joseph D. Woodside constructed a large, Colonial Revival house at 1801 The Plaza (Hanchett 1984:  “Plaza-Midwood”; Morrill and Boyte 1977, updated 1997; Bishir and Southern 2003:  522-523).

 

However, the appeal of Chatham Estates to elites was short-lived, spoiled mainly by its inconvenient location.  Although linked to downtown Charlotte by Central Avenue, in the era of streetcar travel, Chatham Estates was a time-consuming trolley ride from the center city, made even longer by the interference of the Seaboard Air Line Railroad line.  This busy rail line ran at grade across Central Avenue, causing frequent delays.  Moreover, the battery-powered trolley service to Chatham Estates was owned and operated separately from the main, electric trolley line run by Southern Public Utilities Company, requiring passengers to transfer between the two lines.  This created even more disruptions to the downtown commute.  Thus the city’s early northeast suburbs did not fully take shape until the era of the automobile in the 1920s, when well-to-do Charlotteans erected large Colonial Revival houses beside the country club, and middle-class homeowners favored bungalows and other Craftsman-style houses on smaller, subdivided lots along The Plaza and adjacent streets in Chatham Estates (Hanchett 1984:  “Plaza-Midwood”).

 

Bishop John C. Kilgo

Bishop John Carlisle Kilgo (1861-1922) was clearly one of the elites of Chatham Estates.  A noted Methodist Episcopal minister and educator, he began his professional career in South Carolina, his native state.  The son of a Methodist preacher, Kilgo was born in Laurens, South Carolina, and attended nearby Gaffney Seminary and Wofford College, in Spartanburg.  After a period as a Methodist minister in the South Carolina Conference, he taught philosophy and served as an administrator at Wofford College until 1894.  It during this time at Wofford that Kilgo developed his progressive views on academic freedom and coeducation that shape would the next phase of his professional life (Powell 1988:  359-361; Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission, Files).

 

Between 1894 and 1910, Kilgo served with distinction as president of Trinity College (later Duke University) in Durham, North Carolina.   During his tenure, Kilgo helped transform Trinity from a small, modestly funded college into one of the best known and most richly endowed institutions in the South.  The size of the student body doubled, the number of faculty tripled, and new buildings distinguished the growing campus.   He initiated the construction of the first women’s dormitory at Trinity, which led to the creation of a coordinate college for women, and actively encouraged freedom of speech among faculty and guests.  Upon President Kilgo’s invitation, African American leader Booker T. Washington gave his first speech at a white college in the South (Powell 1988:  360).

 

In 1910, Kilgo was appointed a bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and in 1915, he and his wife, Fannie Turner, and their five children departed Durham for their new home in Charlotte.  Bishop Kilgo selected Charlotte because it offered a more convenient location within the Methodist conference.  Moreover, Kilgo served on the board of the Southern Railway, which required regular trips to New York City, the company’s headquarters.  Charlotte’s location on the Southern Railway main line facilitated such journeys.  As a Methodist bishop, Kilgo gained a reputation for gifted oratorical skills, and was recognized as one of the great preachers of his day.  Kilgo was a member of the church’s Education Commission, and was instrumental in the founding of Atlanta’s Emory College, for which he served as a trustee and lecturer.  Kilgo United Methodist Church, located east of the Kilgo House on Belvedere Avenue in Plaza-Midwood, was founded in 1943 and named in his honor (Powell 1988:  360; Charlotte Observer 11 August 1922).

 

Bishop Kilgo died at age sixty-one on August 11, 1922.  His widow, Fannie, remained in the house until her death on February 22, 1948.  Heirs sold the house in 1951 to Frank and Genevieve Causley.  The residence exchanged hands numerous times between the 1950s and 2007, serving as a boarding house for several decades into the 1980s, and as cooperative housing in the late 1990s.  In 2007, Donald R. and Kiley F. Rawlins purchased the house and are the current residents (Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission, Files).

 

 

Architectural Context

 

Blending Colonial Revival and Craftsman features, the Bishop Kilgo House stands among the finest and earliest residences constructed in the original Chatham Estates subdivision on the east side of Charlotte.  Between 1914 and 1916, this suburb attracted a coterie of wealthy residents who owned large houses on The Plaza, the neighborhood’s grand boulevard.  Four of these houses remain, The VanLandingham House (National Register 1983), the Joseph D. Woodside House, Victoria (National Register 1973), and the Kilgo House.  Victoria is the current name of the turreted, Queen Anne house at 1600 The Plaza.  It was constructed in 1891 on North Tryon Street in downtown Charlotte.   The original owner, merchant R. M. Miller, Jr., relocated the house to Chatham Estates in 1915, where it was purchased by John L. Scott, a stockbroker.  Now surrounded by 1920s bungalows, reflecting the full-scale development of The Plaza after World War I, Victoria survives as one of the city’s fullest expressions of the Queen Anne style (Hanchett 1984:  “Plaza-Midwood”; Bishir and Southern 2003:  523).

 

The other three remaining houses were constructed on site, and represent national architectural trends of the 1910s.  The 1914 VanLandingham House is exemplary of the Craftsman style, the 1916 Woodside House illustrates the Colonial Revival, while the 1914 Bishop Kilgo residence displays both Colonial Revival and Craftsman elements.  By the 1910s, in burgeoning streetcar suburbs across the country, upper- and middle-class residents often favored Colonial Revival and Craftsman designs.  In Charlotte, homeowners commissioned architects and builders to erect houses reflecting these styles in the growing, fashionable neighborhoods that fringed the center city.  By the 1910s, Dilworth, Myers Park, Elizabeth, and Chatham Estates contained fine examples that remain substantially intact.  In the early twentieth century, the Colonial Revival’s comfortable patriotic associations and familiar classical themes appealed to homebuyers.  The rise of the Colonial also coincided with the housing reform movement of the Progressive Era.  Reformers, while promoting domestic welfare, encouraged simpler, more efficient dwellings that stood in contrast to preceding, ornate, picturesque styles.  The early Colonial Revival was inspired by a variety of architectural influences associated with the American colonial period, and later eras, including Federal elements.  The style was freely interpreted, and variations appeared in widely circulating magazines and books.  An especially popular version constructed in Charlotte and nationwide was a neatly composed, white-frame model with a straightforward, boxy form capped by a hip roof with dormers.  The façade was symmetrical and often featured a broad front porch with columns and pedimented entry bay.  Classical sidelights and transoms enframed the center entrance.  Ornamentation on this basic model varied according to the owner’s taste and budget.  By World War I, more historically correct, red-brick or frame, Georgian and Federal models gained widespread popularity.  In Charlotte, blocks of grand Georgian Revival houses distinguished the city’s finest neighborhoods between the 1920s and early 1950s, notably Myers Park and Eastover (Bishir 1990:  488-497, 516-518; Bishir and Southern 2003:  74, 518-522).

 

The Craftsman style emerged nationally in the early twentieth century, and culminated in the proliferation of bungalows in the late 1910s and especially the 1920s.  As with the Colonial Revival, Craftsman houses were often essentially simple, foursquare shapes, although jutting wings, bays, and gables could evoke an informality that was also emblematic of the style.  The Craftsman was distinguished by its use of natural-like materials (e.g., wood shingles, fieldstone, rough-faced brick), and the free and frank expression of structure.  It featured such elements as low-slung roofs with deep eaves that emphasized horizontality and a close relationship with the landscape, exposed rafters or decorative knee braces, large porches with sturdy, square or tapers posts, and abundant fenestration.  Interiors were marked by space-saving, open plans and built-in cabinetry (Bishir 1990:  498- 507; Bishir and Southern 2003:  73-74).

 

While Charlotte boasts houses that exemplify these styles, architects and builders frequently combined elements of both, as well as features from the other popular revival modes.  The availability of mass-produced millwork and the free exchange of design ideas in builders’ guides and magazines encouraged such mixing of motifs.  Thus, for example, in the Elizabeth suburb just south of Chatham Estates, upscale Clement Avenue boasts rambling frame residences that combine Craftsman-inspired wall shingles, granite block stonework, and wide eaves with exposed braces and rafters, with Colonial Revival porch posts and roof balustrades (Bishir and Southern 2003:  521-522).

 

Located just south of the Bishop Kilgo House, the grand, two-story, frame, VanLandingham House at 2010 The Plaza is an outstanding example of the Craftsman style.  Wealthy cotton broker, Ralph VanLandingham, commissioned noted local architects Charles Christian Hook and Willard G. Rogers to design the house. It remains intact, and epitomizes Craftsman architecture in its informal, wood-shingled exterior, rough stonework, and low, horizontal hip roof with wide eaves and exposed rafters.  Situated west across The Plaza, the hip-roofed Joseph D. Woodside House (1600 The Plaza) neatly represents the restrained, two-story, white-frame, cubic, Colonial Revival houses of the period.  The wraparound porch terminates in a porte-cochere on the south side.

 

The well-preserved Bishop Kilgo House exhibits key elements of both styles.  The balanced façade, center entry porch with brackets and Tuscan columns, and the formal interior plan with classical mantels are all Colonial Revival traits.  However, the dwelling’s deep eaves with exposed rafters, heavy brick porch piers, and banks of windows along the projecting sunroom and sleeping porch bays are Craftsman-style features.  The Kilgo House thus clearly illustrates the blending of such popular design elements, as accomplished by Louis H. Asbury, one Charlotte’s important architects of the early twentieth century.

References

 

Asbury, Louis H., Papers.  1906-1975. University of North Carolina, Charlotte (UNCC)

Manuscript Collection 145.  UNCC, Murray Atkins Library, Charlotte, N.C.

 

Bishir, Catherine W.  North Carolina Architecture.  Chapel Hill, N.C.:  University of North

Carolina Press, 1990.

 

—–, and Michael T. Southern.  A Guide to the Historic Architecture of Piedmont North Carolina.

Chapel Hill, N.C.:  University of North Carolina Press, 2003.

 

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission. Files.  Charlotte, N.C.

 

Charlotte Observer.  11 August 1922.

 

Hanchett, Thomas W.  “Charlotte and Its Neighborhoods:  The Growth of a New South City,

1850-1930.”  Charlotte, N.C., 1984.  (Typewritten.)

 

——.  “Charlotte:  Suburban Development in the Textile and Trade Center of the Carolinas.”  In

Early    Twentieth-Century Suburbs in North Carolina.  eds., Catherine W. Bishir and Lawrence S. Early.   Raleigh, N.C.:  Division of Archives and History, North Carolina Department of Cultural    Resources, 1985, 68-76.

 

—–.  Sorting Out the New South City:  Charlotte and Its Neighborhood.       Chapel Hill, N.C.:

University of North Carolina Press, 1998.

 

Mecklenburg County. Mecklenburg County Courthouse, Register of Deeds.

 

Miller’s Official Charlotte, North Carolina City Directory.  Asheville, N.C.:  E. H. Miller, 1929.

 

Morrill, Dan L., and Jack O. Boyte. “The VanLandingham Estate.  Survey and

Research Report.”   1977, updated 1997.  On file at the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission, Charlotte, N.C.,

 

Morrill, Dan L.  Interview with Louis H. Asbury, Jr.  24 August 1978.  Referenced in “Advent

Christian Church (Charlotte).  Survey and Research Report.” 1987.  On file at the            Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission, Charlotte, N.C.,

 

Powell, William S.  ed.  Dictionary of North Carolina Biography.  Chapel Hill, N.C.:  University

of North Carolina Press, 1988.

 

Sanborn Map Company.  Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.  1929, 1951.

JONES-GARIBALDI HOUSE

This report was written on February 5, 1986

1. Name and location of the property: The property known as the Jones-Garibaldi House is located at 228 East Park Avenue, Charlotte, North Carolina.

2. Name, address, and telephone number of the present owner of the property: The owner of the property is:

D. Charles and Associates, Inc.
1712 Cleveland Ave.
Charlotte, NC 20203

Telephone: (704) 332-4658

3. Representative photographs of the property: This report contains representative photographs of the property.

4. A map depicting the location of the property: This report contains a map which depicts the location of the property.

5. Current Deed Rook Reference to the property: The records of the Mecklenburg County Tax Office do not yet contain a current deed reference to the property. The Tax Parcel Number of the property is: 123-073-09.

6. A brief historical sketch of the property: This report contains a brief historical sketch of the property prepared by Dr. William H. Huffman.

7. A brief architectural description of the property: This report contains a brief architectural description of the property prepared by Frances M. Gay.

8. Documentation of why and in what ways the property meets the criteria for designation set forth in N.C.G.S. 160A-399.4:

 

a. Special significance in terms of its history, architecture, and/or cultural importance: The Commission judges that the property known as the Jones-Garibaldi House does possess special significance in terms of Charlotte-Mecklenburg. The Commission bases its judgment on the following considerations
1) the Jones-Garibaldi House (1894) is one of’ the oldest homes on East Park Avenue, the most prestigious residential district in the oldest portion of Dilworth, Charlotte’s first streetcar suburb,
2) C. Furber Jones (1866-1903), the initial owner, was a prominent business executive in New South Charlotte,
3) Joseph Garibaldi (1864-1939), the second owner, was a leading merchant and civic leader in New South Charlotte,
4) the house is one of the finer local examples of the Neo-Classical Revival style and was most probably designed by Charles Christian Hook, an architect of local and regional importance, and
5) the house is on a corner lot at the very edge of the residential section of Dilworth and, therefore, occupies a place of substantial importance in terms of the townscape of the neighborhood.

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

9. Ad Valorem Tax Appraisal: The Commission is aware that designation would allow the owner to apply for an automatic deferral of 50% of the Ad Valorem taxes on all or any portion of the property which becomes “historic property.” The current appraised value of the house is $37,240. The current appraised value of the land is $27,290. The total appraised value of the property is $64,580. The Property is zoned 06.

Date of Preparation of this Report: February 5, 1986

Prepared by: Dr. Dan L. Morrill
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission
1225 S. Caldwell St.
Charlotte, NC, 28203

Telephone: (704) 376-9115

 

 

Historical Overview

Dr. William H. Huffman

The setting and style of the Garibaldi house, located at 221 E. Park Avenue in the Dilworth section of Charlotte, reflect the early affluence of a New South city in the beginning years of a four-decade commercial boom that lasted from the late 1800’s to the end of the 1920’s. Built by insurance entrepreneur C. Furber Jones (1866-1903) in 1894, it was purchased by jeweler and local political leader Joseph Garibaldi ( 1864 -1939 ) ten years later. At the time of its contraction, it was one of the earliest homes in the city’s first streetcar suburb. Although the architect is presently unknown, the house was probably designed by Charlotte architect C. C. Hook, whose work includes some of the city’s most important architectural heritage.

Both Jones and Garibaldi were in many ways typical representatives (the one providing a service, the other a merchant) of the success that resulted from the combination of their own enterprising spirit and their good fortune at living in a boom town. Charlotte became the hub, through its good rail network, of the rapidly expanding New South industrialization of the Piedmont Carolinas, which lasted, almost without interruption, from the late 1880’s to the end of the 1920’s. Industrialization was based primarily on the construction of cotton mills and cotton oil processing plants throughout the Piedmont region, which stretches from Virginia into Georgia, and Charlotte served the region as the banking, trading, service and distribution center. Thus it grew, during this period, from one of a number of small towns its size in the state to be the largest city in the Carolinas by 1930 (1880 population: 7,094; by 1930: 82,675, a 1065% increase).¹

C. Furber Jones, the original owner of the house, was a South Carolina native who was educated at the old Charlotte Military Institute and graduated from the Citadel in Charleston, SC, following which he took business training at the Poughkeepsie Business College in New York. In 1894, he organized the Piedmont Fire insurance Company in Charlotte, and it was under his management that the Piedmont Fire Insurance Building was erected near the center of town in 1898. It was the city’s first office building, and was a clear indication of the prosperity of a rapidly growing city.² The same year he organized the Piedmont company, 1894, Jones contracted with E. D. Latta’s 4 C’s company to build a new house for his family in Dilworth.³ Three years before, in 1891, he had been married to Ida Clarkson, who was a sister of Heriot Clarkson, a prominent Charlotte attorney who became a state supreme court justice and a major landowner and developer in the Charlotte area.⁴

To design many of the early houses in Dilworth, the 4 C’s hired a skilled young architect, Charles Christian Hook (1869-1938).⁵ The son of German immigrants, Hook was born in Wheeling, W. VA, and educated at Washington University in St. Louis. He came to Charlotte in 1890, where he started out as a teacher of mechanical drawing in the old South school in the city. In 1893, he began his forty-five-year architectural career by designing houses in Dilworth for the 4 C’s, and eventually produced plans for some of the most important architectural landmarks in the city and the state of North Carolina. At various times Hook was in partnership with others in the city: Frank Sawyer,1902- 1907; Willard Rogers,1912- 1916; and with his son, W. W. Hook,1924-1938. Some of his important designs in Charlotte are the old Charlotte City Hall , the Charlotte Women’s Club, the J. B. Duke mansion, the Belk Department Store facade of 1927, and the William Henry Belk mansion. Outside the city, they include the west wing of the state capital in Raleigh, the Richmond County courthouse, Phillips Hall in Chapel Hill, the Science Hall at Davidson College, and the State Hospital in Morganton, NC.⁶ Although there is no direct evidence that C. C. Hook designed the Jones-Garibaldi house, the indirect evidence is persuasive: we know from contemporary newspaper stories that he had a number of commissions to do houses in Dilworth in 1894 and was a very popular architect; the appearance of the house is that of an early Hook design; there is no evidence that has come to light to contradict this conclusion.⁷

It appears that the Joneses probably moved into the house in December, 1894, where they raised their three children, Christopher, Clarkson and Caroline. Furber Jones’ mother also resided with the family. Unfortunately, tragedy struck in 1903, when Furber Jones died suddenly of pneumonia after a two-week illness. Among the prominent pallbearers were E. D. Latta and Walter Brem, another insurance man who built a house in Dilworth (1902, also designed by Hook).⁸ In May, 1904, jeweler Joseph Garibaldi bought the house from Mrs. Jones, and it remained in the Garibaldi family until 1971.⁹

Joseph (Joe) Garibaldi’s career was the classic fulfillment of the American dream. The son of Italian immigrants who left in the aftermath of the 1848 European revolutions, he was born in Mecklenburg County during the Civil War, in which his father served as a Confederate soldier. His grandfather was one of the early settlers of Belmont, NC to the west of Charlotte, which was once known as Garibaldi Station, and he was also a descendant of Giuseppi Garibaldi, the Italian patriot. After attending local schools, including that of Captain Barrier, at the age of twelve he was made an apprentice in the service of French jeweler P. Lasne, whose store was located on West Trade Street opposite the First Presbyterian Church. When he completed his apprenticeship four years later, he returned to school to finish his education, following which he worked for several different jewelry firms in Rock Hill, SC and Charlotte. After eight years of working for Farrier Jewelers in the location now occupied by the Garibaldi and Bruns Building just off the Square on Tryon Street, Joe Garibaldi and a co-worker, William L. Bruns ( 1872-1937) decided to open their own jewelry Store in 1896. During the day, both young men sold merchandise; but after the shop closed for the day, Garibaldi repaired watches and Bruns did all the engraving and jewelry repair so they could have the pieces ready for the next day.¹⁰

Their diligence and good timing in opening a business in the early years of a time of sustained, booming growth insured success. By 1903, the firm took in a friend, Harry Dixon ( 1872-1914), and thus it became Garibaldi, Bruns and Dixon until the latter’s untimely death in 1914, when it reverted to the previous name of Garibaldi and Bruns.¹¹ By 1904, Joe Garibaldi was sufficiently well established to marry and start a family. In May of that year, he bought the Jones house, and the following July he married Edna Dunklin of Charlotte.¹² Over the succeeding years, the jewelry firm did well, the Garibaldis raised four children, and Joe Garibaldi became a respected civic and political figure.

In 1907, as a leader of a progressive coalition of younger businessmen who wanted to see the city’s new growth and prosperity reflected in municipal services (their slogan was, “We want paved streets”), he was elected to the Board of Aldermen. Two years later, he was elected to the city’s newly formed Executive Board, and served in that post as Commissioner of Health; subsequently he also served as the city’s mayor pro term. After retiring from the jewelry business in 1934, twice he was elected to the state legislature, in 1934 and 1936. In addition to his political posts, Joe Garibaldi was on the board of directors of the Charlotte National Bank, St. Peter’s Hospital, and the Salvation Army, and belonged to several other civic and fraternal organizations. ¹³ His legacy was summarized in a local editorial:

 

His name has long and honorably been associated with the building of Charlotte. In business he achieved his success by the same marks of enthusiasm which dominated every act and attitude of his life. In both church and state, he was a factor of influence, widely esteemed, charitable of heart, magnetic of personality and wrong in the basic integrities. ¹⁴

The affluence which came as a result of the New South industrialization was soon reflected in changes in both the size and character of Charlotte. In 1890, entrepreneur Edward Dilworth Latta (1851-1925), a Princeton-educated South Carolina native, formed a land development company, the Charlotte Consolidated Construction Company (known locally as the 4 C’s), and purchased a 422-acre tract adjacent to the southeast edge of town. In order to entice potential homebuyers out to the city’s first suburb, named Dilworth, the 4 C’s: installed a new electric trolley system which ran from Independence Square, in the center of town, into and around the new development; created an attractive park (Latta Park) at the heart of the suburb, which included a pond for boating, an outdoor pavilion which hosted traveling shows, and strolling pathways; and included a broad range of houses, with the fine houses located on the main boulevards, and more modest middle-class dwellings located on the side streets. ¹⁵

Thus the Jones-Garibaldi house achieves importance because: it is representative of the city’s early suburban growth which was made possible by Charlotte’s favorable position in the Piedmont’s New South industrialization of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; its architectural style characteristically reflects the time, the place, and the probable early work of a noted architect, Charles Christen Hook; it has a strong associative history with two figures who embody well the spirit and activity of a town experiencing rapid economic and demographic expansion.

 

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NOTES

¹ Thomas W. Hanchett, “Charlotte Neighborhood Survey,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1983-81; William H. Huffman, “Charlotte, North Carolina: From Cotton to Commerce, 1850-1930,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1982; LeGette Blythe and Charles R. Brockman, Hornets’ Nest: The Story of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County (Charlotte: Public Library of Charlotte, 1961), p. 449.

² The Charlotte Observer, December 16, 1903, p. 1; Ibid., February 28, 1950. p. 3D.

^3.Mecklenburg County Deed Book 105, p.142,1 December 1894.

⁴ The Charlotte Observer. December 16, 1903, p.1.

⁵ Morrill, cited above.

⁶ The Charlotte Observer. September 18, 1938, p.1; information on file with author.

⁷ The Charlotte Observer. September 8, 1894, p.4; ibid., September 15, 1894, p.4.

⁸ Mecklenburg County Deed Book 105, p.142, 1 December 1894; The Charlotte Observer. December 16, 1903,p 1.

⁹ Mecklenburg County Deed Book 188, p. 490, 19 May 1904; ibid., 3326, p. 381, 20 August 1971.

¹⁰ The Charlotte Observer. December 29, 1939, p. 1; ibid., February 13,1916, n. p.; letter from Garibaldi and Bruns, dated 24 July 1964, in vertical file at public library.

¹¹ Ibid.

¹² Ibid.; Mecklenburg County Deed Book 188, p.490, 19 May 1904.

¹³ See note 10.

¹⁴The Charlotte Observer. December 20, 1939, p.6A.

¹⁵ Dan L. Morrill, “Edward Dilworth Latta and the Charlotte Consolidated Construction Company (1890-1925): Builders of a New South City”, The North Carolina Historical Review, 62 (July, 1985), 293-316.

 

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Selected Bibliography

Blythe, LeGette, and Charles R. Brockman, Hornets’ Nest: The Story of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County (Charlotte: Public Library of Charlotte, 1961)

The Charlotte Observer

Hanchett, Thomas W., “Charlotte Neighborhood Survey,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1983-84.

Huffman, William H., “Charlotte, North Carolina: from Cotton to Commerce, 1850-1930,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1982.

Morrill, Dan L., “Edward Dilworth Latta and the Charlotte Consolidated Construction Company (1890-1925): Builders of a New South City,” The North Carolina Historical Review. 62 (July, 1985), 293-316.

 

Architectural Description

Dr. Dan L. Morrill

The Jones-Garibaldi House, erected in 1894 and located on a corner lot at 228 East Park Avenue, is one of the oldest extant houses in Dilworth, the streetcar suburb that Edward Dilworth Latta’s Charlotte Consolidated Construction Company, locally known as the Four C’s, opened on May 20, 1891. The overall massing and architectural form of the house, especially its transition toward Colonial Revivalism, suggest that it was designed by Charles Christian Hook (1869-1938), the first architect who resided in Charlotte throughout his career. Hook, who definitely fashioned two other Colonial Revival mansions on East Park Avenue in Dilworth — the Gautier-Gilchrist House (1897) and the Villalonga-Alexander House (1901) — had a seminal impact upon the history of architecture in Charlotte. Attesting to this fact is an article which appeared in the Charlotte Daily Observer in September, 1894. Commenting upon Hook’s intentions regarding design, the newspaper stated that he planned to erect a: “genuine, ‘ye olden time’ house…after the style of the typical Southern home, with four large columns, two full stories high, surmounted by a classical pediment. Mr. Hook… will make the plans after the true classical style of architecture, which at one time predominated in the South and is being revived. The most striking feature of the house will be its simplicity of design and convenience of arrangement. The so-called ‘filigree’ ornamentation will not be a consideration, and only the true design will be carried out and thus give Charlotte another new style….”

Although the structure which this newspaper article describes (the J. Frank Wilkes House on East Morehead Street) no longer exists, Hook’s design for that edifice inaugurated a gradual abandonment in Charlotte of the elaborate ornamentation of such Victorian styles as Queen Anne, which, interestingly, Hook continued to use on occasion. The Mallonee-Jones House (1895) at 400 East Kingston Avenue and the Robert J. Walker House (1901) at 329 East Park Avenue, for example, are Queen Anne style residences in Dilworth that Hook designed. But the Jones-Garibaldi House exhibits the Colonial Revival features which were to become the dominant motifs employed by Hook during his distinguished career as an architect.

The most distinctive quality of the Jones-Garibaldi House, and the one which definitively separates it from Victorian styles, is its symmetrical massing. The house is a wooden clapboard, two and one-half story, slate hip-roofed, three-bay wide, two-bay deep main block with a west side two-story splayed bay-window, a projection on the east side resembling a porte-cochere, and a two-story ell on the left rear. Especially important in emphasizing the overall harmony or balance of the exterior of the house is an imposing wraparound porch, which, happily, remains intact. Twenty-three wooden columns are grouped in twos and threes. Most approximating the Roman Doric Order, a design noted for its simplicity, the columns support an entablature which exhibits such traditional classical elements as triglyphs, with vernacular diamond-shaped decorations in the metopes at the corners of the porch. The wraparound porch has a balustrade with attenuated spindles and heavy, unadorned newels. Further underscoring the Colonial Revivalism of the Jones-Garibaldi House are pilasters at the corners of the main block, modillions along the front and side cornices, and a centered shed dormer on the front, also with modillions.

The centered front entrance is reached by cement steps, probably not original, which rise to the wraparound porch. Again; the entrance, which is slightly out of line with the second story center window, is Colonial Revival in design. Pilasters, sidelights, and two entrance lamps of recent origin, flank a frame door with a single beveled-edged light. A transom light and dentiled cornice are overhead. Outside steps to the basement are reached through trap doors which are just beyond the left rear of the wraparound porch. The rear porch and sunroom of the house have been enclosed, and the rear entrance to the porch has been eliminated. A handicapped access ramp on the west side of the house leads to a side entrance.

The interior of the house is also Colonial Revival in style, making it much less ornate than one would find in a Victorian dwelling. A reception foyer leads into a large living room, from which a stairway with quarter-landings rises to the second floor. The principal first floor rooms, which radiate off a center hallway, have substantial base, crown and chair rail moldings; and the two large rooms to the right of the entrance foyer have fireplaces, mantels, and pocket doors, all of which exhibit the essential restraint which is characteristic of Colonial Revivalism. An especially striking interior feature is a massive yellow brick mantel with a segmental-arched fireplace in the men’s parlor or den. The original flooring material also survives, but the ceilings have been covered with a stucco-like substance. Unfortunately, a butler’s pantry and kitchen were sacrificed during a recent renovation of the house. The second floor plan is similar to that of the first floor. Again, rooms radiate from a center hallway. A stairway at the end of the hallway leads to the first floor. Colonial Revival features, including three mantels, remain on the second floor.

No outbuildings survive. There is a large ginkgo tree in the sideyard on the right. An original or early sidewalk and steps lead from the eastern side of the house to the rear of the dwelling. The front sidewalk is of more recent origin.

HAMILTON C. JONES HOUSE

This report was written on May 7, 1986

1. Name and location of the property: The property known as the Hamilton C. Jones House is located at 201 Cherokee Rd., Charlotte, North Carolina.

2. Name, address and telephone number of the present owner of the property:
The owner of the property is:
James A. Risser & Wife, Virginia G.
201 Cherokee Rd.
Charlotte, NC 28207

Telephone: (704) 375-3608

3. Representative photographs of the property: This report contains representative photographs of the property.

4. A map depicting the location of the property: This report contains a map which depicts the location of the property.

5. Current Deed Book Reference to the property: The most recent deed to this property is recorded in Mecklenburg County Deed Book 4231, page 532. The Tax Parcel Number of the property is: 155-074-01.

6. A brief historical sketch of the property: This report contains a brief historical sketch of the property prepared by Ms. Deborah Swanson.

7. A brief architectural description of the property: This report contains a brief architectural description of the property prepared by Mr. Thomas W. Hanchett

8. Documentation of why and in what ways the property meets the criteria for designation set forth in N.C.G.S. 160A-399.4:

 

a. Special significance in terms of its history, architecture, and/or cultural importance: The Commission judges that the property known as the Hamilton C. Jones House does possess special significance in terms of Charlotte-Mecklenburg. The Commission bases its judgment on the following considerations: 1) the initial owner of the house, Hamilton C. Jones III (1884-1957), was a prominent attorney, jurist, civic leader, and, from 1946 until 1952, member of the United States House of Representatives; 2) the Hamilton C. Jones House was designed by Martin Boyer, an important figure in the history of architecture in Charlotte-Mecklenburg; 3) the Hamilton C. Jones House is one of the finest local examples of the Tudor Revival style of architecture; and 4) the Hamilton C. Jones House occupies a pivotal position in terms of the townscape of Eastover, one of Charlotte’s premier suburbs, designed for the E. C. Griffith Company by Earle Sumner Draper.

b. Integrity of design, setting, workmanship, materials, feeling, and/or association: The Commission contends that the architectural description included in this report demonstrates that the property known as the Hamilton C. Jones House meets this criterion.

9. Ad Valorem Tax Appraisal: The Commission is aware that designation would allow the owner to apply for an automatic deferral of 50% of the Ad Valorem taxes on all or any portion of the property which becomes “historic property.” The current appraised value of the improvements is $245,560. The current appraised value of the 1.699 acres of land is $81,000. The total appraised value of the property is $326,560. The property is zoned R12.

Date of Preparation of this Report: May 7, 1986

Prepared by: Dr. Dan L. Morrill
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission
1225 S. Caldwell St.
Charlotte, NC, 28203

Telephone: (704) 376-9115

 

Historical Overview

From its beginning, the house at 201 Cherokee Road has been known as “The Stone House.” It was just a handy reference to the people who used the house as a landmark, but to many others who have been more intimately associated with the house, it is an affectionate term.

This house was among the earliest built in Eastover and has to be its finest example of the Tudor style, and one of Charlotte’s finest. There are only scattered examples of Tudor style architecture in the Eastover subdivision, as most of the early houses are red brick Georgian revival. The development of Eastover began in 1927 by the E. C. Griffith Company and was seen as being a competitor for the already established Myers Park.^l The land originally included in the subdivision came from two dairy farms. Two hundred and seventy-three acres were purchased from McD. Catkins and the remaining forty-three acres came from Miss Cora Vail.² The design of Eastover was done by E. S. Draper & Associates. Earle Sumner Draper started his career as John Nolen’s resident landscape architect in George Stephens’ development of Myers Park. Since then he had become a prominent planner in the Southeastern United States.³ Cherokee Road was planned as and still is the backbone of the Eastover neighborhood. Eastover was Charlotte’s first exclusive automobile suburb.⁴ All the previous ones had street car service available, including neighboring Myers Park, which at the time it was built was considered to be in the country. The development of Eastover did much to seal the fate of the growth patterns of the city. This suburb along with Myers Park “firmly established the southeast edge of Charlotte as the city’s prime residential area.”⁵ In 1929, the land at the corner of Cherokee Road and Fenton Place was purchased from the E. C. Griffith Company and deeded to Bessie Erwin Jones, the wife of Hamilton C. Jones, a prominent Charlotte lawyer and politician. This acquisition included three lots, two facing on Cherokee Road and the third with frontage on Fenton Place.⁶ A fourth adjoining lot with frontage on Cherokee Road was purchased the same year by the Jones’s from B. S. Blanton and wife, Rose M. Blanton.⁷

Hamilton C. Jones was born in Charlotte on September 28, 1884. He was one of six children born to Hamilton C. Jones, Jr. and Sophia Convere Myers Jones.⁸ His father, H. C. Jones, Jr., was noted for his gallant military service as an officer throughout the Civil War. He was wounded twice, captured by the Yankees and held prisoner for over a year. He moved to Charlotte in 1867 to practice law. In 1869 he was elected to fill an unexpired term as a state senator and was again elected in 1870. Grover Cleveland appointed him to be the United States District Attorney for the Western District in 1885.⁹ In the opinion of LeGette Blythe and Charles Brockmann: When the final quarter of the nineteenth century began, three of the most influential men in Charlotte were W. P. Bynum, Hamilton C. Jones, Sr. and Clement Dowd.”¹⁰ Sophia Myers was the daughter of Colonel William R. Myers, one of Charlotte’s leading entrepreneurs in the second half of the nineteenth century. One of his philanthropic deeds was the donation of eight acres of land to the fledgling Biddle Memorial Institute, later to become known as Johnson C. Smith University.¹¹ This established the institution at its present location. The land Colonel Myers gave to his son, John Springs Myers, later became the development of Myers Park.

Sophia’s father gave her a lot at 406 E. Trade Street,¹² the area then known as Stumptown. The house built on this lot is where Hamilton C. Jones was born and raised. He had fond memories of Stumptown and the many prominent families of Charlotte that lived there at the time. The YWCA now stands on this land. ¹³ Hamilton C. Jones graduated from the University of North Carolina and then earned a law degree from Columbia University in New York City. He returned to Charlotte in 1908 and established himself as an attorney at law. In 1913 he became a judge in the City Recorder’s Court and later was an assistant United States District Attorney in Charlotte. He was “influential in drafting and securing passage of the necessary legislation legalizing a special Juvenile Court” in Charlotte and became the first judge of this court , which was the first one to operate in the state. ¹⁴ Other legal and political activities Mr. Jones was involved in included being chairman of the Mecklenburg Democratic Executive Committee, president of the North Carolina Bar Association and the Mecklenburg Bar Association. He was a state senator for two terms and from 1946-1952 he represented the Tenth Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives.¹⁵

The social concerns this man had are obvious in his legal and political involvements, but did not stop there. He was continually reaching out to help others and giving of himself. He served as president of the Family Service Association, chairman of the Executive Committee of Thompson Orphanage president of the Charlotte Rotary Club a trustee of University of North Carolina, and vice chairman of the Charlotte Memorial Hospital Authority. As a member of the board of St. Peter’s Hospital in Charlotte, he, along with B. J. Blythe, put much effort into merging St. Peter’s into a new municipal hospital. Thus, Charlotte Memorial Hospital was formed.¹⁶ Hamilton C. Jones died August 10, 1957. Bessie Smedes Erwin was the wife of Hamilton Jones. She was the daughter of William Allen Erwin, the textile magnate who founded Erwin Mills in Durham. Mr. Erwin gave his hunting preserve to Duke University, where the new campus was built.¹⁷ Bessie was the granddaughter of Dr. Albert Smedes, the founder of St. Mary’s School for Women in Raleigh.¹⁸ Bessie Erwin Jones was also a very socially-conscious person. Her activities involved work with Good Samaritan Hospital, Thompson Orphanage and St. Peter’s Episcopal Church. She was a member of the Halifax Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. ¹⁹ Mrs. Jones passed away April 14, 1966. Construction of the house at 201 Cherokee Road, at the intersection of Fenton Place, was begun in 1929. The architect was Martin E. Boyer and the general contractor was Blythe-Isenhour, who had their offices at the Latta Arcade ^20.

Martin Boyer was “Charlotte’s premier revivalist architect.” He was the nephew of another prominent architect, James McMichael, who designed the First Baptist Church on North Tryon Street, which is now Spirit Square. Boyer made possible the saving and moving of the Charlotte Mint to its present Eastover site, where it is now the Mint Museum of Art.²² Stone was chosen as the building material of the Jones’ new residence apparently at the instigation of W. A. Erwin. He was fascinated with stone buildings and is said to have made possible the building of twelve stone churches, including the Episcopal Chapel of Hope in Chapel Hill. He told his daughter and son-in-law that if they would build their house with stone, he would give them the stone from a quarry he owned in Alamance County and participate in the cost of the house.²³ The chapel at Duke University was under construction at the time using granite from Erwin’s quarry Martin Boyer went up to look at it and didn’t like it, as he thought it to be a cold gray. He went to the quarry and asked for stone with more character, more life to it. He was shown some stone with more russet coloring in it, but still mostly gray. It seems that the closer to the surface the stone is, the more the iron in it has oxidized. Boyer took a sample back to W. O. Frank, a leading architect in the United States at the time, and the architect for Duke. As a result, the Chapel is the only building on the Duke campus of all gray stone. The rest are constructed of stones with some russet tones mixed in.²⁴ Until 1979 it was thought by V. Erwin Jones, the son of Hamilton and Bessie Jones, who grew up in The Stone House and returned there as an adult to live, that the stone came from his grandfather’s quarry. When this information was published in an article in The Charlotte Observer, he was contacted by the son of a stonecutter from Salisbury. This man had worked on the house with his father for two summers while he was in college.

Apparently, Boyer still had not been satisfied with the stone he saw in Erwin’s quarry. The russet colored granite used in The Stone House came from northern Wake County. The rock formation was said to have been in a field and shaped like a tear drop, forty feet wide and sixty feet long. It projected above the ground thirty to forty feet. They took all the stone above ground and a lot from below ground level. The granite is unusual not only because of its coloring, but because of the few veins and seams it contains.²⁵ The stone was chipped on the site at Cherokee Road to shape it. All the corners are squared, not rounded. Two masons from Scotland, both named Brown, but not related to each other, layed the stone. The son of one of the masons is said to operate Brown Brothers Stone Company in Greensboro. They manage A. A. Erwin’s quarry, which was left to Duke University upon Erwin’s death in 1932 to assure a continuing source of similar granite. Brown Brothers also does the stone work for Duke.²⁶ The construction of this house lasted from l929 to 1931. This was during the depression and it was said to have been the only building under construction in Charlotte during part of this period. Because of this, each subcontractor had his key people on the job, or the owners of the firms did the work themselves. The plumbing was done by P. C. Godfrey, Incorporated and Mr. Godfrey himself was the chief estimator and chief engineer. This might explain why the plumbing for the house has six cutoff zones. The same is true of the heating, which is steam vapor heat.²⁷ The original radiators are still in place, even though the source of fuel, and hence the boiler has changed over the years from coal to oil to gas.²⁸ All of the workers were the best around and since they had no other jobs they took their time and did their best work. Boyer himself spent one and a half years on the job.²⁹

This must account for all of the intricate details that are present in this house and are sure to be described more thoroughly in the architectural essay. A woodcutter from New York worked throughout the construction of the house. His work is evident from the roughly-hewn timbers used in the porte-cochere, the walkway leading from it to the house and the window trim to the intricately carved trim of the bay window on the southerly side of the building, away from Fenton Place. The woodwork of this bay window is representative of the totally asymmetrical nature of the entire house. There are two wooden columns, one on each outside corner of this bay window. Looking at them, one gets the feeling that a divider could have been placed at the middle of the window and a person placed on each side of it and told to carve what they pleased. This was not the case, as Erwin Jones was a witness. He remembers being an eager helper to the woodcutter as he carved this wood. Erwin, along with his friend Walter Lambeth, spent two summers on the job site. He would pack his lunch and walk to the new house from his family’s home on Hermitage Road,³⁰ which was in the Myers Park subdivision on the other side of Providence Road. The roofing material used on this house is Ludowici-Celadon clay tile, 3/4 inch thick. This is the tile used for the buildings on the new campus of Duke University. Boyer saw it when he was looking at the stone and liked it. It is made to look like slate with variations in colorant. The masonry work on each of the three chimneys is different. One of them is particularly unusual in that it is “twisted”. Brick is used sparingly in this house, and each place where it is seen has a design all to itself. There is a grapevine design in the stucco above the dining room window on the front of the house. Martin Boyer fashioned this himself with his fingers.³² The interior of this house is as unusual and intriguing as the exterior. According to Sherman Pardue, a Charlotte architect who is an admirer of Martin Boyer’s work, Boyer gave you something interesting to look at no matter where you looked. The theme that is repeated in this house is “a space behind an arch.”³³ The elliptical arch with an open space behind it is found throughout the house: in the public rooms, in bedrooms, and even in the basement. The entry hall is unusually large. The depth of the hall, with the curved staircase at the back of it, took space away from the library and what was originally the breakfast room. Bessie Jones is said to have complained about this when it was planned, but did accept it. The reason for it was that Boyer had never been permitted to do a stairway where you could see the entire thing from the first floor.³⁴

Another distinguishing feature about the staircase is that each of the wrought iron plates that support the railings has a different design. The layout of the hall and staircase allowed for the establishment of a Jones family tradition. Each Christmas season, the focal point of their holiday decorations was a twenty foot Christmas tree.³⁵ The walls on the first floor are stippled. This is a method of applying plaster to produce a somewhat patterned finish that is not smooth. After this was dry, stain was applied and then wiped off. Minwax was then applied as a finishing coat. The only care these walls required for years was an occasional washing. It was twenty-five years before these walls were painted, and then it was only done because a painter owed Hamilton Jones money for legal work and this was the way he was able to pay, so Mr. Jones let him do the work.³⁶ The fireplace in the living room, which is called cast stone work, is a copy of one that Boyer saw in Warwick Castle in England.³⁷ The symbols used on this fireplace, as well as those used on the fireplace in the dining room, on the plaster moldings, and other places throughout the house, interior and exterior, would necessitate the study of heraldry to be fully understood and enjoyed. The plaster molding in each of the four main floor public rooms was hand run and cast, in place. The molding in the library is different from that of the other three rooms. The millwork in the library is exquisite, with the same fine detailing being carried through in the bookcases and the fireplace. Warren Lumber Company was the millwork designer. They worked with Boyer on many houses, but he felt that this was their best work ever. The millwork in this house is unusual in that the wood used was tulip poplar, which has wide variations in color. This very feature is both the reason it was normally not used and the reason Boyer chose it for this house.³⁸ Forked-leaf white oak was used for the flooring, which is also not common. This wood is the only wood suitable for cooperage.³⁹

The third floor of the house consists mainly of a large room that was used as a playroom for the three children of Bessie and Hamilton that were raised in this house. The walls were of beaverboard, which is soft and has a rough finish, so the children’s artwork could be easily displayed. When it rained, the children of the neighborhood often gathered in this room. The finished floors provided a good area for roller skating, as well as for dancing.⁴⁰ The hardware in the house was all hand-wrought bronze, except for the doorknobs on the servants’ quarters, which were ceramic. The servants’ quarters consisted of two bedrooms and a bath located over the garage and accessible by a rear stairway.⁴¹ In the yard was a playhouse, also built of stone, that had the same clay tiles for the roof as were used for the main house. The playhouse has a miniature fireplace that was built into one of the two original stone walls. There was a circular stairway leading up to a loft. Many people in the neighborhood remember playing there as children. All of the wood members of this had rotted and the roof had caved in. The two stone walls, which remain as strong as ever, have been used as the base of a tool shed and workshop, with the area expanded and the roof higher than it was originally. ⁴²

The landscaping was originally done by Henry Harkey, Sr. This has all been changed over the years, though.⁴³ The property at 201 Cherokee Road remained in Bessie Erwin Jones’ name until 1962 when she sold it to her son, W. Erwin Jones. She reserved a life interest in the property.⁴⁴ She remained in the house until 1964, at which time she moved into an apartment. The house remained vacant for four months until Erwin Jones and his wife, Macy Ross Jones, moved into it.⁴⁵ Erwin was and still is a manufacturer is agent for commercial building products, with his own business, Erwin Jones and Company, Incorporated. Erwin and Macy raised a second generation of Jones children in The Stone House. He was the first president of the Eastover Homeowners Association. In September l979 the house was sold to James and Virginia Risser⁴⁶ who are the present owners. James Risser is the president of the United States Bottlers Machinery Company, which he also moved to Charlotte in 1979. The Rissers have four children who have all lived in the house.⁴⁷ Since they moved into the house, the Rissers have done much work on the building, most of it being maintenance, renovation and cosmetic work. Work done has included redoing all of the mechanical systems; washing the clay tile roofing and stonework; cleaning, repairing and repainting the one hundred and sixty-eight leaded exterior windows; and painting and wallpapering.⁴⁸

They have reconstructed the kitchen, which involved turning three rooms (a butlers pantry, kitchen and small breakfast room) into a large kitchen. This was planned with the age and feel of the house in mind. They have also restructured the servants’ quarters, changing it into one room with a small bath.⁴⁹ The few changes on the exterior are mostly at the back of the house. The wooden garage doors have been replaced with overhead doors. Next to the garage, the porte-cochere has been filled in with heavy wooden doors, the purpose being to enclose the backyard and make it more private. The circular drive through the yard has been removed and the area seeded in grass. The patio by the house has been lowered for better drainage away from the house, and it has been enlarged. A shallow concrete pond, two to four feet wide and about thirty feet long, and walkways have been added with plantings around them. Though the landscaping is changing, it is well-groomed and remains a quiet and tranquil setting. This home is one of the most prominent homes among many fine homes in the Eastover area. The time and thought that went into the planning and construction of this house is obvious. This building is not only solid, but is unique and beautiful. It is a home from a different era which could not be copied today.

 

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NOTES

¹ Thomas W. Hanchett, “Charlotte and Its Neighborhoods: The Growth of a New South City, 1850-1930,” (Unpublished manuscript in office of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission), p. 10.

² Ibid. , p 8.

³ “Myers Park, Charlotte, NC,” a brochure based on findings of the Charlotte Neighborhood Survey, conducted by Thomas W. Hanchett, 1981-1982.

⁴ Hanchett, p. 12.

⁵ Ibid., p. 13.

⁶ Deed Book 701, p. 581, 16 July 1929.

⁷ Deed Book 741, p. 182, 4 April 1929.

⁸ Samuel A. Ashe, Stephen B. Weeks, editors, Biographical History of North Carolina from Colonial Times to the Present, Vol. VII (Greensboro, NC: Charles L. VanNoppen, l908) p. 271.

⁹ Ibid., pp. 269-271.

¹⁰ Legette Blythe and Charles Raven Brockmann, Hornets’ Nest — The Story of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County (Charlotte: McNally of Charlotte, l96l), p. 188.

¹¹ William H. Huffman, “A Historical Sketch of the Carnegie Library, Johnson C. Smith University, Charlotte, N.C.”, January 1983, pp. 1-2.

¹² Information supplied by W. Erwin Jones.

¹³ The Charlotte Observer, February 28, 1950, p. 2.

 

¹⁴ The Charlotte Observer, August 11, 1957, p. 1.

¹⁵ Ibid.

¹⁶ Ibid.

¹⁷ Information supplied by W. Erwin Jones.

¹⁸ The Charlotte Observer, April 15, 1966, p. 18-A.

¹⁹ Ibid.

²⁰ Mecklenburg County Building Standards Department, Building Permit #9966, 15 April 1929.

²¹ “Myers Park, Charlotte, N.C.”, a brochure.

²² The Charlotte Observer, April 14, 1977, p. C 1.

²³ Information supplied by W. Erwin Jones.

²⁴ Ibid.

²⁵ Ibid.

²⁶ Ibid.

²⁷ Ibid.

²⁸ Information supplied by Virginia Risser.

²⁹ Information supplied by W. Erwin Jones.

³⁰ Ibid.

³¹ Ibid.

³² Ibid.

³³ Ibid.

³⁴ Ibid.

³⁵ Ibid.

³⁶ Ibid.

³⁷ Ibid.

³⁸ Ibid.

³⁹ Ibid.

⁴⁰ Ibid.

⁴¹ Information supplied by Virginia Risser.

⁴² Ibid.

⁴³ Information supplied by W. Erwin Jones.

⁴⁴ Deed Book 2374, p. 174, 30 October 1962.

⁴⁵ Information supplied by W. Erwin Jones.

⁴⁶ Deed Book 4231, p. 532, 13 September l979

⁴⁷ Information supplied by Virginia Risser.

⁴⁸ Ibid.

⁴⁹ lbid.

 

Architectural Description

The Hamilton C. Jones III House, built 1929-1931, is among the most impressive examples of the Tudor Revival style in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County. Prominently located on the corner of Cherokee Road and Fenton Place in the prestigious Eastover suburb, the large dwelling with its cut- stone exterior is the work of leading Charlotte residential architect Martin Boyer. Today, except for changes to the kitchen, bathrooms, utilities, and rear yard, the house remains in good original condition. In basic massing, the Jones House is a simple two-and-a-half story rectangular block with a one-and-a-half story rear service ell. Facades are treated asymmetrically, with bays, chimneys, gables and windows applied in playful abandon, giving the house the rambling rustic appearance characteristic of the Tudor Revival. The main exterior covering of the dwelling is random-coursed-ashlar russet-colored granite, which is said to have come from the same Alamance County quarry that produced the stone used at Duke University. Four-inch hollow terra cotta tile lies hidden behind the nine to twelve inch thick granite walls. Roofs are clay, tile made to resemble varicolored slate by the Loudice Celaden Company, who also did work for Duke.

Several gables feature plaster or half-timbering, and windows throughout the house are casement type, with small rectangular panes of glass. The front facade, facing west toward Cherokee Road, is the most complex. A gabled two-story entrance bay projects from the facade near the center. Its gable is plastered and features a scalloped bargeboard and pendant of dark stained wood. The tripartite gable window has a projecting wood lintel. Below the gable is a tripartite second-story window with a surround of smooth stone. At the first-story level, a smooth stone surround with two carved rosettes shelters the deeply inset front entry. Originally the entry had massive double doors of solid wood, but the current owners replaced them with a single door (salvaged from the remodeled kitchen area) surrounded by sidelights, in order to let natural light into the hall inside. Low stone walls curve outward on either side of the entrance bay, simultaneously sheltering terraces and guiding the visitor toward the door. To the right of the entrance bay, one faces the house, is a half-timbered gable and a massive projecting chimney. The gable features curved timbers, a pendant and scalloped bargeboards, and a two-part window. The chimney is asymmetrically double-sloped for rustic effect, and includes a deeply-inset window at the second-story level and a trench door at the first-story. Two round chimney-pots with elaborate brickwork surmount the stone chimney.

To the left of the entrance bay, Boyer designed a complexly-massed projecting bay. Its gable has a single window surrounded by plastering, which was worked by hand by Boyer himself in a grapevine motif. At the second-story level the bay is sheathed in red brick laid crazily in angles and curves. At the first-story level, a tall tripartite window lights the dining room inside. The north end facade of the Jones House is comparatively simple. It boasts a projecting second-story bay window with half-timbering and a standing-seam copper roof, and a tall exterior chimney of stone topped by another round chimney pot of rustically-laid brick. The south end facade of the dwelling is slightly more elaborate. In addition to the expected rectangular casement windows it has round-arched openings at the first-story for a sunporch. There is also a projecting first-story bay window with an ornate copper roof, and a tiny second-story balcony with a conical copper roof and a delicate wrought iron railing. The Jones House’s rear elevation includes a shed-roofed, wood shingle sided dormer, and another first-story projecting bay window with a copper roof. Running back from the main block of the house is the rear service ell, containing the three-car garage, the servants stair to the second-floor of the main house, and a small porte-cochere. A roofed-colonnade with heavy hand-hewn columns of dark stained wood extends along the south side of the wing, originally designed to shelter visitors as they walked from the port-cochere to the back door of the main house. The original garage doors have been replaced with modern units, but the garage still retains its numerous gables, and is topped by a small cupola.

Before turning to the interior of this residence, we shall look briefly at its setting. The Jones House sits on a slight rise near the center of its large lot. Its naturalistic landscaping on the Cherokee Rood and Fenton Place sides — consisting of random-spaced trees, lawns, and occasional spots of low ground-cover — is now near maturity and appears much as the dwelling’s original owners might have envisioned it. A flagstone walk curves with studied informality from Cherokee Road to the front door. The unknown designer of the dwelling’s landscaping took care to provide privacy for the residents. As noted above, low walls shelter front terraces, and other terraces extend along the south and east side of the house, carefully hidden from the street by tall bushes and by the house itself. At the south side of the house is a large private lawn not visible from the street, which was designed for parties and as a children’s play area. A small stone playhouse nearby has been enlarged and rebuilt as a workshop by the current owners. Originally the driveway from Fenton Place passed through the gated port-cochere and made a circle behind the house. The present owners have added parking close to Fenton Place, and are now replacing the circular drive with a swimming pool, whose curving asymmetrical design is chosen to be in keeping with the house.

The interior of the Jones House is not quite symmetrical in plan, but it is much more regular than the playful exterior suggests. Detailing continues the Tudor Revival rusticity that is found outside, with plaster walls, handsome tulip poplar four-panel door and woodwork, and floors of fork-leafed white oak. According to the present owners, the theme that Boyer built into the house is “a space behind an arch.” Thus, an elliptical arch with an opening behind it is found not only in the public rooms, but also in several bedrooms end even in the basement. One enters a large central entrance hall, which has a rustically handcrafted plaster cornice featuring flowers, oak leaves, and acorns. Through an arch to the right is the spacious living room. It continues the cornice and stippled plaster walls of the hall. A window seat inset under an arch dominates the south wall, and a large carved-stone fireplace with seven heraldic medallions and a Tudor-arched opening is the focus of the west wall. To the rear of the living room, through a pair of Hopes brand metal-framed trench doors, is the stone-floored sunporch. Its original exterior doors have been replaced recently with new units. Next to the sunporch, at the rear of the house behind the living room, is the library. It too features a window seat under an arch, a fireplace, and a plaster cornice.

The tulip-poplar bookcases have delicate Tudor-arched detailing. Returning to the central entrance hall, one can look left through an archway with sliding pocket doors into the dining room, which is somewhat smaller then the living room. The dining room has a bay window on its west wall and a smaller carved stone fireplace on its north wall. It continues the plaster cornice of the hall. To the rear of the dining room is the recently-remodeled kitchen. Several small pantries and food preparation areas were combined to create a single large L-shaped eat-in kitchen, with all new fixtures. A small service hall leads from the kitchen, past the back door, across the back of the house past closets and a bathroom to the library. Behind the kitchen is a servants’ pantry with service stairs to the basement and the second floor. Coming back to the entrance hall yet again, one can walk forward to the grand stair. Elliptically-shaped, it features a hand-wrought bronze balustrade with a variety of decorative panels, including one featuring the silhouette of a squirrel. At the top of the stairway is a smaller hall with its own window seat, five bedrooms open off the hall. Three have private baths, and the last two share a bathroom. Most of the baths retain their original ceramic tile wainscoting and some original fixtures, but the bathroom serving the northeast headroom still has all original fixtures including pedestal sink.

There is a small sleeping porch at the north end of this floor, and a larger sleeping porch off the master bedroom at the south end. The master bedroom has a small carved stone mantel with a Tudor arch. In addition to the main bedrooms, there are two other upstairs areas. Opening northeastward off the top of the grand stair is the hall to the former servants’ quarter, which is located over the garage. Originally containing two rooms and a bath, it has been completely gutted and rebuilt in recent years as a one-room office. Above the main bedrooms under the each of the main house is the Dance Room. It has an oak floors and the original rough particle-board walls. Underneath the house is a fully excavated laundry room and furnace room, but the rest of the dwelling has only a crawl-spa

JOHNSTON MILL

This report was written on 26 November 1993

1. Name and location of the property: The property known as the Johnston Mill is located in the 3300 block of North Davidson Street, Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.

2. Name, address, and telephone number of the present owner of the property:
The owner of the property is:
Johnston Mill Associates Limited Partnership
P.O. Box 471665
Charlotte, NC 28247

Telephone: (704) 342-4554

3. Representative photographs of the property: This report contains representative photographs of the property.

4. A map depicting the location of the property: This report contains maps which depict the location of the property.

5. Current Deed Book Reference to the property: The most recent deed to Tax Parcel Number 091-101-09 is listed in Mecklenburg County Deed Book 7138 on page 679.

6. A brief historic sketch of the property: This report contains a brief historical sketch of the property prepared by Dr. William H. Huffman.

7. A brief architectural description of the property: This report contains a brief architectural description of the property prepared by Dr. William H. Huffman.

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

 

a. Special significance in terms of its history, architecture and/or cultural importance: The Commission judges that the property known as the Johnston Mill does possess special significance for Charlotte and Mecklenburg County. The Commission bases its judgement on the following considerations: 1) Johnston Mill was built in 1916, and played a significant role in the history of textile manufacturing in the county and of the North Charlotte mill community. 2) its architecture is reflective of early twentieth-century mill buildings. 3) it is associated with Charles Worth Johnston, a leading textile figure in the Southern Piedmont Carolinas as well as in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.

b. Integrity of design, setting, workmanship, materials, feeling, and/or association: The Commission contends that the architectural description included in this report demonstrates that the Johnston Mill meets this criterion.

9. Ad Valorem Tax Appraisal: The Commission is aware that designation would allow the owner to apply for an automatic deferral of 50% of the Ad Valorem taxes on all or any portion of the property which becomes a designated “historic landmark.” The current appraised value of the tract is $669,260.00. The size of Tax Parcel 091-101-09 is 5.64 acres.

Date of Preparation of this Report: 26 November 1993

Prepared by: Dr. William H. Huffman
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission
500 North Tryon Street, Suite 200
P.O. Box 35434
Charlotte, NC 28235

Telephone: (704) 376-9115

 

 

Historical Overview

 

Dr. William H. Huffman

The Johnston Mill was one of the last mills built in Mecklenburg County, and was the last of the three mills in the North Charlotte community to close in recent times. Built originally in 1916 by textile magnate C. W. Johnston to meet the growing demand for cotton goods due to the war raging in Europe, the mill was further increased in size during the boom of the 1920’s. In addition to its importance as part of Mecklenburg County’s cotton mill history, it is also significant because of its association with Charles Worth Johnston (1861-1941), who played a prominent role in the history of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County’s business and civic life.

At first glance, the Johnston Mill seems a bit of a puzzle: it was built rather late for most Mecklenburg mills, was built on the land of an existing mill, and had no associated mill village. But an investigation into the circumstances surrounding its creation reveals the logic of the thought behind it. The story intertwines with the career of C. W. Johnston.

Born in Coddle Creek Township of Iredell County to Samuel and Mary Smith Johnston, he attended Davidson College for a time as a young man. His first job out of school was with the mercantile firm of the Stough Cornelius Company in Cornelius where he learned about business. In 1882, he married Jennie Stough, the sister of Richard J. Stough, whose family controlled the mercantile business and the Cornelius Mills. Johnston applied for and was hired to be the superintendent of the Cornelius Mills when that position became open. In 1891, he came to Charlotte at the request of J. S. Spencer, president of the Commercial National Bank, to become secretary of the Highland Park Manufacturing Company, and in 1906 Johnston took over as president of the firm.¹

The cotton mills in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County may best be seen as part of the New South industrialization that took place following Reconstruction. Locally, that movement was spearheaded by Daniel Augustus Tompkins (1852-1914), an indefatigable participant in, and advocate of, New South industrialization. Charlotte’s first cotton mill was the Charlotte Cotton Mills, which started up in 1881 under the direction of R. M. Oates, a cotton broker. A year later, D. A. Tompkins, a South Carolina native who was educated and trained in manufacturing in the North, came to the city as a representative of the Westinghouse Company. He quickly became aware of the potential for building cotton mills in the area, and so in 1884 he set up his own design, contracting and machine shop business, the D. A. Tompkins Co. Over a thirty-two year period, Tompkins built over one hundred cotton mills, fertilizer works, electric light plants and ginneries. He also changed the region’s cotton oil from a waste product into a major industry through the building of about two hundred processing plants and organizing one of his own, the Southern Cotton Oil Company.²

Tompkins’ efforts started to appear in rapid succession in Charlotte when his company built the Alpha, Ada and Victor mills in 1889, the city’s second, third and fourth mills.³ On June 15, 1891, at the first stockholder’s meeting of the new “Gingham Mill,” which was to be the city’s fifth, a board of directors was elected. At the meeting of January 11, 1882, a committee of D. A. Tompkins and two others suggested the name Highland Park Manufacturing Co., which was adopted. R. H. Jordan, who owned the drugstore at the southeast corner of Trade and Tryon Street at the center of town, was elected the company’s first president. He was followed by Vinton Liddell in 1893 and W. E. Holt in 1895.⁴

In 1891, the year Johnston joined the company, Highland Park began construction of its first mill, at Brevard and Sixteenth Streets in Charlotte, and in 1895 added a spinning mill at the same location. Originally called the “Gingham Mill,” after the 1895 addition the complex was called Highland Park; Mill #1. When the company bought Standard Mills of Rock Hill, SC, in 1898, it was renamed Highland Park Mill #2. The North Charlotte community was first created when it was chosen as the site for the mammoth Highland Park Mill #3, complete with an elaborate mill village and its own power plant, all constructed in 1903-1904.⁵ During the same period that Highland Park was building Mill #3, a smaller mill and associated houses were added to North Charlotte with the construction of the Mecklenburg Mill (after 1926, the Mercury Mill; acquired by Johnston, 1941). The latter was built on land purchased from Highland Park just to the north of Mill #3.⁶ With 20,000 spindles, 1000 looms and a work force of 800, Highland Park #3 was by far the largest mill in Mecklenburg County.

Other mills and their presidents built in or near Charlotte during the late nineteenth century and early twentieth included: The Atherton Mill (D. A. Tompkins’ own mill, 1892-3); Louise (H. S. Chadwick, 1897); Magnolia (A. C. Summerville, 1901); Chadwick (E. A. Smith, 1901); Elizabeth (R. M. Miller, 1901); Hoskins (H. S. Chadwick, 1904); and Savona Manufacturing (1908).⁷

Once well established in Charlotte with the Highland Park Company, C. W. Johnston began building his own textile empire. His first acquisition appears to have been the Anchor Mills in Huntersville (built 1897 as a small spinning plant, added weaving about 1902). By the time of his death in 1941 at the age of 79, Johnston headed thirteen mills in North and South Carolina. As a visible symbol of the position his textile chain occupied in the community, in 1924 he built a skyscraper, the Johnston Building, on South Tryon Street in Charlotte to house the corporate headquarters and other offices.⁸

When war broke out in Europe in 1914 and continued unabated in its ferocity for months which stretched into years, the European textile industry began to be severely affected. Because of the tremendous demand for uniforms and bandages and the shortage of materials, the textile plants in the neutral United States began to pick up more and more of the demand. The wary United States also started a program to expand its own armed forces, just in case. To meet this demand, the local mills began to work at capacity and around the clock, and a number of new mills were built.⁹ In an article in the Charlotte Observer in December, 1915, entitled “Amazing Activity Among the Mills,” the writer enthusiastically declared that: “There is greater activity in cotton mill construction circles just at present in and around Charlotte than there has been in a decade, according to the statements of the best informed mill architects and engineers of this section….It has been figured that it has been ordered and put under way more than $3,000,000 worth of work in and around Charlotte within the past few months. There is also well founded talk of the plans of Mr. Charles W. Johnston and his associates in the Anchor Mills at Huntersville, of building another mill or an addition to the present one at Huntersville.”¹⁰

Apparently Johnston decided to build another mill at North Charlotte rather than one in Huntersville. In 1913, he had already doubled the capacity of the Anchor Mills to bring it up to 10,000 spindles and 400 looms.¹¹ A likely factor in deciding to build in North Charlotte was the excellent rail connections. Spur lines already existed for the next-door Mecklenburg Mill, and no doubt Johnston wanted to get the mill up and running as quickly as possible. Apparently he leased about half of the Mecklenburg Mill property for the new site, and by mid-1916, the new Johnston Manufacturing Company mill had been completed with 12,000 spindles running at full capacity.¹² Since the surrounding area had already been built up with mill houses, stores and other amenities associated with Highland Park #3 and the Mecklenburg Mill, this accounts for the fact that no mill houses were built for the Johnston Mill.

To handle his various holdings, C. W. Johnston had formed at least three companies that bore his name: the Johnston Manufacturing Company; the Johnston Mills Company; and the Johnston Spinning Company (formerly Union Mills Company). ¹³ He had formed the Johnston Manufacturing Company in 1913 as a sole proprietorship (which accounts for a number of sources incorrectly citing that as the date of the mill), made it a partnership in 1914, and incorporated it in 1921. The three were merged into the Johnston Manufacturing Company in 1969.¹⁴

The Johnston Mill apparently prospered after the war, and participated in the boom times of the 1920’s. In 1926, additions were made to the mill that remain as part of the present complex: an addition was made to the picker room at the rear of the main mill; and a new waste house, opener room and cotton warehouse were added to the existing cotton warehouse.¹⁵ Sometime between 1929 and 1934, a two-story addition with a tower was added at the front of the mill for offices.¹⁶ In 1941, Johnston Manufacturing formally bought the property it sat on and that of the nearby Mercury Mill, primarily to acquire its mill houses.¹⁷

When C. W. Johnston stepped down as president in 1938, he was succeeded by his son, R. Horace Johnston, who led the Johnston interests until his own death in the early fifties. In 1951, the last president of the company, David R. Johnston (C. W. Johnston’s grandson), built the Johnston Memorial Y.M.C.A. in memory of his father, just northeast of Highland Park Mill No. 3. He also presided over the dissolution of Highland Park in June, 1969, when all textile manufacturing ceased at Highland Park #3.¹⁸ The Mercury Mill, which had operated through World War II, shut down in 1945 and was only used as a warehouse thereafter. ¹⁹ When the Johnston Manufacturing Co. plant also was closed and sold in 1975, there was a distinct passing from one time into another for the North Charlotte mill community. Indeed, in the 1950’s, ’60’s and ’70’s, Mecklenburg County, which at one time was second in textile production only to Gaston County in the state, saw the demise of its once dominant industry.²⁰

Chavis Textile Manufacturing of Gastonia bought the Johnston Mill in 1975 when it shut down, and the following year it was sold to Confederate Textile Machinery, Inc. of Greenville, SC.²¹ It was primarily used as warehouse space. In 1980, the plant was bought by Robert and Ava Stark, who also bought the old Mercury Mill, and ten year later, in 1990, both the former mill properties were purchased by the present owners.²² The present owners, with a one million dollar loan from the City of Charlotte, purchased both the Johnston and Mecklenburg Mills, and are converting the former to a low income apartment complex. Current plans are to convert the old Mecklenburg Mill into artists’ studios at a later date.²³

 

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NOTES

¹ Charlotte News, July 5, 1941, p. 1; Charlotte Observer, July 5,1941, p.1.

² William H. Huffman, “A Historical Sketch of the Charlotte Supply Company,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1983.

³ Dan L. Morrill, “A Survey of Cotton Mills in Charlotte, North Carolina,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1979.

⁴ Letter from Highland Park Manufacturing Company, undated (c. 1964) on file at Charlotte Mecklenburg Public Library.

⁵ William H. Huffman, “A Historical Sketch of the Highland Park Mill No. 3,” Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1984; National Register of Historic Places Nomination, 1988.

⁶ Morrill, note 3; Thomas W. Hanchett, “Charlotte and its Neighborhoods,” unpublished typescript, Charlotte Mecklenburg Historic Properties Commission, 1986.

⁷ Morrill, note 3.

⁸ See note 1; Edgar T. Thompson, Agricultural Mecklenburg and Industrial Charlotte (Charlotte: Chamber of Commerce, 1926), pp. 142-3.

⁹ Charlotte News, April 16, 1916, p.8: “Great Activity Among So. Mills: Many Running Day and Night – Best Season Since 1905.”

¹⁰ Charlotte Observer, December 30, 1915, p.6. l

¹¹ Ibid., January 16, 1913, p. 6.

¹² Ibid., July 8, 1916, p. 10.

¹³ Mecklenburg County, Record of Corporations, Book 19-C-486.

¹⁴ Ibid.; Charlotte City Directory, 1916; Mecklenburg County, Record of Partnerships, File No. 5; Thompson, note 8.

¹⁵ Records and plans of Biberstein, Bowles, on file in Special Collections, Atkins Library, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, NC.

¹⁶ Interview with Martin Luther (Luke) Brackett, last president of Johnston Mills by William H. Huffman, Charlotte, NC, 10 November 1993.

¹⁷ Ibid.; Mecklenburg County Deed Book 1065, p. 279, 24 November 1941.

¹⁸ Letter, note 4; Huffman, note 5.

¹⁹ Brackett interview, note 16.

²⁰ Charlotte News, March 3,1975, p. 1; Charlotte Observer, March 23, 1975, p. 19.

²¹ Mecklenburg County Deed Books 3318, p.366 and Book 3867, p. 640.

²² Ibid., Book 4327, p.816; 6348, p.612; and 7138, p.679.

²³ Charlotte Observer, July 18, 1993, Mecklenburg Neighbors Section, p. 1.

 

 

Architectural Description

 

Dr. William H. Huffman

The Johnston Mill is located in the North Charlotte community about 2.7 miles northeast of the Square, and in recent times carried the address of 3315 North Davidson Street. North Charlotte was a separate mill community created around the Highland Park Mill No. 3 and the Mecklenburg Mill (after 1926, the Mercury Mill), both finished in 1904 with mill villages, and was connected to Charlotte by rail lines for freight and a streetcar line for passengers. The original Johnston Mill was built in 1916 on the Mecklenburg Mill property, and had no village of its own.

The Johnston Mill complex is located on a 5.64-acre parcel of land that is bounded by the Norfolk Southern Railway tracks on the north, the Mecklenburg/Mercury Mill property on the east, North Davidson Street on the southeast, Norfolk Southern Railway tracks on the south, and East 36th Street on the southwest. The tract slopes gently downward from northeast to southwest.

The mill complex contains five buildings (number-keyed to attached map): 1) the main mill building; 2) new opener room; 3) the cotton warehouse, waste house and opener room complex; 4) the machine storage building; and 5) the Mecklenburg Mill house.

1) Main Mill Building (1916; additions 1926, c. 1930 and other dates unknown)
The 1916 original part of the mill is two stories with brick walls laid in a modified Flemish bond with alternating headers and stretchers every sixth row. The 1926 addition on the north end is brick laid in common bond one-to-six. Both have brick segmental-arch windows with brick sills on both stories. A low-gable wood roof is covered with built-up tar and gravel, and has a small overhang supported by exposed rafters with curved ends on the original mill, and brick parapet walls capped by corbeling and ceramic tile on the 1926 addition. A single tower was built on the east side of the original mill for access and bathrooms. The c.1930 addition on the south end of the mill next to Davidson Street is two stories with walls of brick laid in the same modified Flemish bond as the original mill. Built for office space, it has a two-story stair tower facing Davidson Street with brick pilasters and is capped by plain stone capitals. It is equipped with large window openings with flat metal lintels and concrete sills that formerly held industrial metal-sash windows, and has a roof with overhang and brackets that are similar to the original mill. This addition also added two towers on the north side opposite Davidson Street, one for stairs and the other for bathrooms and showers. Recent one-story additions on the south, east and west sides of the mill were removed to expose the original facades.

The interior of the original mill and the 1926 picker room addition on the north side have intact wood floors and wood post-and-beam construction with square posts. The wood beams on the first floor have been reinforced by the addition of steel I-beams flanking the wood beams. A partial basement work area was added to the original mill about the late 1930’s and has concrete floors and wood post-and-beam construction. The office addition on the south side also has wood floors, round steel posts and steel I-beam construction, and has concrete stairs with a plain metal handrail in the tower. The floors in the mill building are being covered with gypcrete for leveling and stability. All the main mill building is being adaptively rehabilitated for use as low-income apartments.

2) Opener room (late 1960’s)
The new opener room was built in the late 1960’s next to the Southern Railroad tracks, and was used to open the cotton bales so that the cotton could be fed into the mill through a suction device. It was constructed to hold new opening equipment acquired by the mill.¹ The building is one story, and is constructed of concrete block with some brick infill. It has a flat roof constructed of precast concrete beams, with parapet walls at the east and west ends capped with ceramic tile. It originally had two large doors at the east and west ends, which are being closed in for smaller doors. Four fifteen-light metal sash windows pierce the walls on the south side, and three of the same kind are on the north wall. The floor is concrete. This building is being unfitted as a day care center for the tenants of the project.

Cotton Warehouse, Waste House and Opener Room Complex (1916, 1926)
The original cotton warehouse was built in 1916 with the main mill, and was doubled in size in the 1926 addition. It is a raised one-story structure of wood post-and-beam construction resting on brick piers. It was constructed of clapboard siding, a low gable wood roof, and wood floors. Sometime later a basement was constructed by pouring concrete floors and putting brick infill between the piers.

Built in 1926, the opener room is a one-story building of brick laid in common bond one-to-six. It has wood floors, and a sloping wood flat roof with a stepped parapet wall on the south end that is capped with ceramic tile. Three twenty-light metal sash windows pierce the south wall, and four of the same kind of window are on the east side.

The waste house was also part of the 1926 addition. It is a two-story building of brick laid in common bond one-to-six, and had a flat wood roof, wood post-and-beam construction and wood floors. The original interior wood beams, flooring and roof collapsed from deterioration, and are being replaced. The parapet walls are capped with ceramic tile.

For the new project, the cotton warehouse is planned as a covered recreation area, the waste house as an indoor recreation area, and the opening room as a community center.

4) Machine Storage Building (1916)
The machine storage building was built in 1916 with the main mill. It is a one-story building with basement and brick walls laid in common bond one-to-seven. It has segmental-arch windows with brick sills, and a flat wood roof with side and front parapet walls capped with ceramic tile. The interior was constructed of wood floors and wood post-and-beam configuration. The wood posts in the basement level have been replaced with round steel columns. The original windows have been replaced with one-over-one double-hung sash. The roof has a skylight that faces to the north. On 36th Street, the original facade has been replaced by one of modern brick laid in common bond one-to-six. This building has been converted to twenty-one apartments.

5) Mecklenburg Mill House ( 1904)
The mill house was built as part of the mill village for the Mecklenburg Mill in 1903-1904. It is one story with twin front gables on a cross-gable roof and faces east toward the Mecklenburg Mill building. Judging from its size, proximity to the mill and quality of interior finish, it seems likely that the house was occupied by someone in a supervisory capacity at the mill. The house rests on a brick foundation laid in running bond and is covered throughout with plain weatherboarding. The replacement windows are two-over-two double-hung sash with simple, unadorned surrounds, and replacement four-panel wood doors are in the front and rear entrances, also with simple surrounds. A single-light fixed transom is just above the front door. A small louvered opening with the same simple surround pierces the wall just under the peaks of the gables in the front facade. The replacement one-story front porch spans most of the front elevation, with four square wood posts supporting a hip roof. A simple, wood balustrade with square balusters lines the sides, front and sides of the wood stairs leading to the wood-floored porch. A gable-roofed kitchen addition projects to the rear on the southwest side, which in turn has a shed roof addition attached to it at the center of the rear of the house. The house has a center hall plan, with two rooms, one in the front and one in the rear, on either side. Two interior chimneys permit fireplaces to be in the center of the north-south interior wall in all four rooms. All the original mantels, wood trim and floors are intact and restored. The kitchen has been modernized. The house has been carefully restored, and is being used as offices for the Johnston Mill Limited Partnership, the developers of the project.

Conclusion
The adaptive re-use of the Johnston Mill property will preserve important architectural features of the buildings described in this report. The major exterior and interior characteristics, including material, form and setting are being left sufficiently intact so as to maintain the historic integrity of the buildings while adapting them to a new use that will keep them in service for an indefinite time into the future.

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Notes

¹ Interview with Martin Luther (Luke) Brackett, last president of Johnston Mills, by William H. Huffman, 10 November 1993.

JOHNSTON BUILDING

This report was written on 27 May 1991.

1. Name and location of the property: The property known as the Johnston Building is located at 212 South Tryon Street in Charlotte, North Carolina.

2. Name, address and telephone number of the present owner of the property: The owner of the property is:
Two Hundred Twelve South Tryon Street Ltd. Partnership
212 S. Tryon Street
Charlotte, North Carolina 28281

Telephone: (704) 333-6643

3. Representative photographs of the property: This report contains representative photographs of the property.

4. A map depicting the location of the property: This report contains a map depicting the location of the property.

5. Current Deed Book Reference to the property: The most recent deed to this property is recorded in Mecklenburg County Deed Book 4407 on page 116. The tax parcel number of the property is 073-016-13.

6. A brief historical sketch of the property: This report contains a brief historical sketch of the property prepared by Mary Beth Gatza.

7. A brief architectural description of the property: This report contains a brief architectural description of the property prepared by Mary Beth Gatza.

8. Documentation of why and in what ways the property meets 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: The Commission judges that the property known as the Johnston Building does possess special significance in terms of Charlotte-Mecklenburg. The Commission bases its judgement on the following considerations: 1) The Johnston Building is one of a number of “tall office buildings,” or skyscrapers, that were built in North Carolina during the 1920’s. Although tall office buildings had been built in large urban areas such as New York City and Chicago for decades, virtually none were erected in North Carolina until the prosperous decade of the 1920’s. Therefore, the Johnston Building stands as physical evidence of an economic and historical trend. 2) At the time it opened, the Johnston Building was the tallest building in Charlotte.

b. Integrity of design, setting, workmanship, materials, feeling and/or association: The Commission contends that the physical description by Mary Beth Gatza which is included in this report demonstrates that the Johnston Building meets this criterion.

9. Ad Valorem Tax Appraisal: The Commission is aware that designation would allow the owner to apply for an automatic deferral of 50% of the Ad Valorem taxes on all or any portion of the property which becomes a designated “historic landmark.” The current total appraised value of the improvements is $15,176,470. The current total appraised value of the lot is $2,004,450. The current total value is $17,180,920. The property is zoned UMUD.

Date of Preparation of this Report: 27 May 1991.

Prepared by:Mary Beth Gatza
2228 East Seventh Street
Charlotte, North Carolina 28204

(704) 342-2268

 

 

Historical Overview  

Charles Worth Johnston (1861-1941) was born in 1861 in the Coddle Creek area of Cabarrus County. He relocated to Mecklenburg County when he became a student at Davidson College. After leaving Davidson, he was employed as a merchant with the Stough Cornelius Company, which also controlled the Cornelius Mills. When an opening in the mill arose, Johnston applied for and became the superintendent. He moved to Charlotte in 1892 and took the position of Secretary of the Highland Park Manufacturing Company, and by 1911, was president of the company. From then on, he would have an interest in numerous other cotton mills, including Anchor Mills in Huntersville. A newspaper article printed at the time of his death described him as a “Titan among textile industrialists,” and honored him with these words: “His career and achievements memorialize the old-fashioned virtues of thrift, frugality, self-reliance and industry, the honorableness of hard work, the virtue of business honor and integrity.”

In 1924, the year the Johnston Building was completed, Johnston was involved with at least five different companies. The city directory for that year listed his occupations as: president of Johnston Mills Company, M & F Bonded Warehouse Company, Highland Park Manufacturing Company, Johnston Manufacturing Company, and vice-president of Commercial National Bank.² The following year, his occupations were listed as: Johnston Mills Company, Eastern Manufacturing Company, Monroe Mills Company, Highland Park Manufacturing Company, president and treasurer of Johnston Manufacturing Company, vice-president of Commercial National Bank, and the Merchants and Farmers Warehouse Company.

Johnston Building under construction.  Photograph taken by E. D. Shaw.

C. W. Johnston married Miss Jennie Stough in 1882, undoubtedly having met her while living in North Mecklenburg. She bore three children before she died in 1921. There were two daughters, Rosa (1886-1958), who married R. W. Stokes, and Flora (1937), who married E. J. Braswell. The only son, R. Horace Johnston (1890-1949), was to succeed his father in business affairs. Five years after Jennie Stough’s death, Johnston remarried. Mrs. Jeannett Newcombe was a widow and came into the marriage with two children, Arthur R. and Elliott H. Newcombe. Johnston was again widowed when Jeannett died in 1930.⁴

R. Horace Johnston was born to Charles Worth and Jennie Stough Johnston in Cornelius in 1890. When he was about two years old, the family moved to Charlotte, where he would stay for the rest of his life. He was well-educated, having studied at Staunton Military Academy (in Staunton, Virginia), Davidson College, and the University of North Carolina. Upon completing his studies, he entered into business with his father, taking over Johnston Mills and Highland Park Manufacturing Company after his father’s death in 1941. Johnston married Miss Adelaide Orr and together they raised a son, David R. Johnston. In addition to their home in Myers Park, Johnston owned Whitehall Farm on York Road in the Steele Creek section of Mecklenburg County, where he bred and trained trotting horses. It was here that he died on October 22, 1949 of a heart attack. He had just returned from the dedication ceremony for the Charles Worth Johnston Memorial Gymnasium at Davidson College, which was named after his father. His son, David R. Johnston, was to carry on the family name and attain control of the family business after R. Horace Johnston’s death.

That the 1920’s were times of prosperity is seldom disputed, and lingering evidence of this can still be seen on the Charlotte streetscape. A publication by the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce, dating from 1927, shows that the dollar amount of investments in new buildings more than tripled between 1920 and 1926.⁶ Several landmark buildings were erected during the decade, including the Hotel Charlotte, the First National Bank, Mayfair Manor, the courthouse and the old City Hall. The Addison and Poplar apartments were also built during this era.

Anchor Mills Company purchased the lot in April 1923 from the Textile Office Building Company, which was a Gaston County corporation. The Textile Office Building Company had acquired the property in 1919, while the Trust Building was still standing on it.⁷ The Trust Building burned on December 1922, just four months before the lot was sold to Anchor Mills.⁸ The vacant lot was transferred for $100 and a building permit was obtained immediately. The dollar value of the proposed structure was reported to be $600,000.⁹ Hunkin-Conkey Construction Company was engaged as builder.¹⁰

The architect chosen to design the new building was William Lee Stoddart (1869-1940). Stoddart was an acclaimed designer of large urban hotels and although he practiced out of New York City, he was not unknown in Charlotte. He had designed the twelve story Hotel Charlotte, which was already under construction nearby at the junction of West Trade and South Poplar Streets. Construction began on the hotel in the summer of 1922, several months before the lot for the Johnston Building was purchased.¹¹ Johnston was an investor in the Citizens Hotel Company, which raised the capital and commissioned the hotel, and likely was familiar with the architect and the plans. His estate was still receiving dividends from the Citizen’s Hotel Company as late as 1945.¹²

The Johnston Building was the tallest skyscraper in Charlotte when it opened in 1924. Though the First National Bank, one block away at Trade and Tryon Streets, promptly superseded the Johnston Building in height and square footage, the Johnston Building was still regarded as being the epitome of style and elegance. The First National Bank building was completed in 1926, and had 160,000 square feet among its twenty stories.¹³

A contemporary newspaper article asserted that the Johnston Building, “Charlotte’s tallest and newest office building, is attracting favorable comment as it nears completion because of the beauty and attractiveness of its exterior.”¹⁴ It was, and still is, considered to be a fine building and a prestigious address.

Thomas Griffith was the rental agent in 1924, and was busy lining up tenants even before the building was completed. He revealed to the Charlotte News in January of 1924 that the building was “already largely booked as to tenants and will likely have a compliment of occupants when it is ready to open.”¹⁵ The offices housed cotton brokers, insurance agents, attorneys, realty companies and numerous independent businessmen. Some early tenants included the E. C. Griffith Company (developers of the Eastover neighborhood), architect C. C. Hook, and the Honorable Cameron Morrison.¹⁶

Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company was a major tenant in the Johnston Building for years. Though not an original lessee, they were occupying the entire fifteenth floor by 1926.¹⁷ The amount of space they rented increased over the years, and by 1947 they signed a lease for 42,369 square feet. They occupied the entire top three floors and had other offices scattered throughout the building. At that time, rental rates varied throughout the building, with the upper floors costing more than the lower floors. Southern Bell paid a rate of $1.84 per square foot for floors six through seventeen, but only $1.38 for the space they leased on the second floor.¹⁸

The Johnston building was held by Anchor Mills until the mid-1970’s. At that time, Mr. David R. Johnston’s health was declining, and the decision was made to sell the property.¹⁹ It was transferred in fee simple to the Johnston Building, Inc. in 1975. In doing so, Johnston Building, Inc. assumed the mortgage that Anchor Mills had taken with New York Life Insurance Company in 1974 for $2.1 million. In time, Johnston Building, Inc. became unable to make the payments and possession reverted to New York Life. New York Life sold the building in 1981 to Howard, Howard and Barnard, a California real estate company. Howard, Howard and Barnard transferred the title to a North Carolina Limited Partnership operating under the name of Johnston Building, Ltd. in March. In April of 1981, a construction deed of trust was taken out for 9.2 million dollars. Shortly thereafter, renovations on the building began.²⁰

 

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NOTES

¹ Charlotte Observer, 6 July 1941, sec. 3, p. 4.

² Charlotte City Directory, 1924.

³ Charlotte City Directory, 1925.

⁴ Charlotte Observer, 5 July 1941, sec. 1, p. 2.

⁵ Charlotte Observer, 23 October 1949, sec. l, p. 1.

⁶ Charlotte Chamber of Commerce, Charlotte, North Carolina (Charlotte: Observer Printing House, Inc., 1927), n. p.

⁷ Mecklenburg County Deed Book 497, p. 404.

⁸ Charlotte News, 13 January 1924, p. 2-A.

⁹ Mecklenburg County Deed Book 497, p. 404;Charlotte News, 30 December 1923, p. 11-A.

¹⁰ Charlotte News, 20 January 1924, p. A-10.

¹¹ Henry F. Withey and Elsie Rathburn Withey, Biographical Dictionary of American Architects (Deceased) (Los Angeles; Hennesset and Ingalls, Inc., 1970), p. 575; Edward S. Perzel, “National Register of Historic Places Inventory–Nomination Form, ” Charlotte, 1979, item 8 p. 3.

¹² Mecklenburg County Final Settlement Book 21, p. 167.

¹³ Charlotte Chamber, n. p.

¹⁴ Charlotte News, 13 January 1924, p. 2-A.

¹⁵ Charlotte News. 13 January 1924, p. 2-A.

^l6 Charlotte City Directory, 1925, pp. 1329-31; Charlotte City Directory, 1926, pp. 1086-87.

¹⁷ Charlotte City Directory, 1925, pp. 1329-31; 1926, pp. 1086-87.

¹⁸ Charlotte City Directory, 1945, pp. 132-33; Mecklenburg County Deed Book 1231, p. 93.

¹⁹ Interview with Mrs. David R. Johnston, Charlotte, North Carolina, 19 May 1991.

²⁰ Mecklenburg County Deed Book 3775, p. 937; Deed Book 3698, p. 409; Deed Book 4407, p. lO9; Deed Book 4407, p. 116; Deed Book 4420, p. 298; Charlotte Observer, 15 September 1977, p. 6-B.

 

Architectural Description  

At fifteen stories, the Johnston Building was the tallest skyscraper in Charlotte when it opened in 1924. Yet it wasn’t tall enough. The upper two floors were added in the late 1920’s, making the building rise seventeen stories above ground, plus one floor below street level. The internal structure of the building is a steel frame. The limestone facade and buff-colored brick walls are merely an exterior veneer–they are supported by the frame and carry no load of their own.

All seventeen stories of the facade are sheathed with limestone blocks. The same limestone is used for all the facade trim, with the exception of the bronze window and entry details. The first two stories are treated as one on the facade. There are three bays across at the street level, and each bay is marked by a two-story round-arched opening. The entry bay is crowned by a raised cartouche bearing a tree motif.

The entry is in the center and features a recessed double doorway. A circular motif with the initials J B (Johnston Building) in brass has been set into the recess between the sidewalk and the door. The plate glass doors (modern replacements) and windows are set in bronze trim. Florid bronze pilasters surround the door and windows and terminate in composite capitals. Above the door and windows, the bronze trim continues with a Renaissance-style entablature, another set of pilasters, and a crown molding. A fanlight above the door illuminates the vestibule beyond. A second set of doors inside the vestibule are set in brass, complete with a brass kickplate and triple bar handles. The radiator grates in both the front and rear vestibules are original and quite handsome. The grate was cast in a geometric pattern, with a floral border running around the edges.

The windows on the street level facade have the same arched openings. Tripartite plate glass windows (modern replacements) are found at both the first and second floor levels. Separating the two levels is a bronze frieze which is decorated with four recessed panels, each with a rosette surrounded by egg-and-dart molding. A thin, florid cornice tops the frieze. Above, the tripartite division of the lower windows is repeated in the round-arched opening. Precise arch stones form a neat transition between the openings and the flatter wall surfaces. The same transitional effect is achieved at the corners of the body of the building by shallow limestone quoins.

The body of the building received several different treatments, all in limestone. A shallow, florid stringcourse separates the second and third floors, and a deeper, denticular stringcourse runs above the third floor. Floors four through eleven are identical and feature six windows across, grouped by twos. Limestone quoins form a neat appearance at the corners of the building. The twelfth, thirteenth and fourteenth floors are likewise identical to each other. The six windows are slightly wider than on the lower floors, and are evenly spaced. They are separated by fluted pilasters with composite capitals. An architrave with a dentilled cornice completes this unit. The fifteenth floor was the top floor when the building was originally built. It has six evenly spaced windows, separated by raised panels and topped by a decorative cornice with bold urns at the corners. Above that, the final two floors, added later, are identical to the fifteenth, but are topped by a simpler architrave.

The side and rear exterior walls are all covered with an attractive buff-colored face brick, and the window openings trimmed with limestone. The south wall is seventeen bays deep, and the north wall has eighteen bays. On the south wall, patterning in the brick suggests divisions between every two bays from the fourth floor upwards. All windows throughout the building are modern replacements.

The first floor interior is one of the richest spaces in Charlotte surviving from the era. A central corridor with an arched, coffered ceiling runs the length of the building. The ceiling itself is divided into eight discreet units. Each unit has eight rectangular recesses in length and seven across the arch of the ceiling. Each individual coffer has egg-and-dart and bead-and-reel moldings and is separated from the others by round bead molding. Evidence remains that light fixtures once hung from the center of each of the eight sections of the ceiling.

Beneath the ceiling, light-colored marble columns correspond to the divisions between the coffered units. Each column is supported on a green marble base. The floor is paved with 12-inch square marble tiles and surrounded by a double border.

Perhaps the most outstanding feature of the Johnston Building is the massive carved marble stairway. The stair is located off of the central corridor, and is closer to the front (Tryon Street) entrance. It features bold turned balusters and a molded handrail. In place of a proper newel, the stair terminates with an oversized scroll resting on a square marble base. The marble stair, however, extends only from the basement level to the second floor. Above that, the stairwell is enclosed and unremarkable.

Four elevator cars serve the upper floors of the Johnston Building. The original “high speed” cars are no longer extant, but the elevator doors are original. Each door is solid brass and has four decorated panels. Brass and glass plates over each door read “this car up” and are original. The Johnston Building underwent extensive renovations in the early 1980’s, and the remainder of the interior has been altered.

Significance Statement

Tall office buildings were made possible subsequent to the development of three things: steel framing, fireproof construction, and the elevator. Prior to the advent of the mechanical elevator, five or six floors was considered to be the maximum height for an office building. While the technology allowed for higher structures, getting up to the top was a problem, as people were not apt to climb that many stairs. The first buildings to pierce the five or six story height limit were the Tribune Building (1873-75) and the Western Union Building (1873-75), both in New York City. They stood nine and ten stories, respectively.

The elevator was invented in 1852 and demonstrated at the New York World’s Fair a year later in 1853. Suddenly, it was possible to move people vertically with no trouble. The first tall office building constructed with an elevator in place was the Equitable Life Assurance Building (1868-70) in New York. Early elevators, however, ran on steam power and the machinery was cumbersome, and therefore prohibitive. It was not until W. van Siemen invented the electric elevator in 1880 that office buildings began to soar.

Architectural historians disagree as to which building deserves the designation of being the ‘first’ skyscraper. The Equitable was the first to be designed with an elevator, but at five stories it rose only 130 feet. The nine-story Tribune Building stood twice as high, and the Western Union Building was close behind at 230 feet. None should dispute, however, that the Home Insurance Building (1883-85, designed by William LeBaron Jenney) in Chicago fathered the skyscraper revolution. It stood only ten stories tall, but was the first of its kind to use true “skyscraper construction.” ¹ That is, the exterior masonry ‘skin’ was entirely supported by the interior steel frame.

Building with a steel frame was such a superior method that it quickly superseded load-bearing masonry construction. The last building to be built entirely of masonry was the Monadnock Building (1889-91) in Chicago, designed by Burnham and Root. In Charlotte, the first steel-frame skyscraper was the Independence Building, was erected in 1909 at the junction of Trade and Tryon Streets.

It was not until the 1920’s, however, that significant numbers of tall office buildings were built in North Carolina. Once the boom began, though, skyscrapers appeared on the cityscapes of Asheville, Greensboro and, especially, Winston-Salem in addition to Charlotte. As the decade began, there were only three tall buildings in North Carolina. The Independence Building in Charlotte was the first, erected in 1909 and rising twelve stories. The Wachovia Building in Winston-Salem was constructed in 1911, with an additional story added six years later. Also in Winston-Salem, the eight story O’Hanlon Building was built in 1915. Both buildings are still standing.

Four more skyscrapers were built in Winston-Salem during the 1920’s. The Hotel Robert E. Lee (twelve stories) went up in 1921, the Nissen Building (eighteen stories) was constructed in 1926, and the Carolina Hotel (eleven stories) was erected in 1928. Begun in 1927 and completed in 1929, the R. J. Reynolds Building was the tallest in the state. At twenty-two stories, it towered over the others.² In western in North Carolina, the thirteen story L. B. Jackson Building was built in Asheville in 1923. In Greensboro, the mammoth Jefferson Standard Building went up in 1923 and stood seventeen stories. It claimed the honor of being the tallest skyscraper in North Carolina until the R. J. Reynolds Building was completed in 1929.

In Charlotte, the Johnston Building was in good company when it opened in 1924. It stood among the Independence Building, the Hotel Charlotte and the Commercial National Bank, all of which stood twelve stories. When it was completed, the Johnston Building was the tallest on the Charlotte skyline, although the First National Bank was already under construction. The First National Bank was completed in 1925 and at twenty stories it superseded the Johnston Building as the tallest building in town.

In 1927, the Chamber of Commerce reported that there was about 500,000 square feet of floor space in “first class” office buildings in Charlotte. At 125,000 square feet, the Johnston Building accounted for one quarter of that space. Only the First National Bank Building had more, at 160,000 square feet. Other significant tall office buildings included in the tally were the Wilder Building (52,000 square feet), the Independence, Commercial National Bank, Professional, and Contractors buildings.³

The Johnston Building stands as physical evidence of historical and economic trends that marked the prosperous decade of the 1920’s. Although buildings in excess of fifteen stories high were built during the decade, the Johnston Building was the tallest structure on the Charlotte skyline when it was completed.

 

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Notes

¹ Henry-Russell Hitchcock, Architecture: Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. (Baltimore: Penguin, 1971), p. 338.

² Gwynne Stephens Taylor, From Frontier to Factory: An Architectural History of Forsyth County (Winston-Salem, 1981), p. 58, pp. 192-3.

³ Charlotte Chamber of Commerce, Charlotte, North Carolina (Charlotte: Observer Printing House, Inc., 1927), n.p.