Piedmont Historic Homes

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Two National Register houses and six antebellum homes are among 14 remarkable 19th-century houses sold in the Piedmont Triad this year. The homes are well scattered round the Piedmont’s small towns and rural areas — two each in Alamance, Guilford, Montgomery, Stokes and Surry counties; one each in Caswell, Forsyth, Moore and Rockingham (and, curiously, none in Greensboro or Winston-Salem). Details on each house are below; click on the address links for more information.

1939 N.C. Highway 57, Milton, Caswell County
Woodside, the Caleb Hazard Richmond House, 1838
National Register of Historic Places
Blog post — Woodside: An 1838 Mansion in Caswell County on the National Register, $595,000

• Sold for $395,000 on May 4, 2023 (originally $595,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 5 1/2 bathrooms, 4,400 square feet, 5 acres
• Price/square foot: $90

In the 1990s, Woodside was restored as a bed and breakfast and restaurant, which operated as recently as three years ago. The house is about two miles southeast of Milton.

News & Record, April 18, 1995: “Woodside is filled with beautifully executed woodwork attributed to Thomas Day, Milton’s free black craftsman. A fine example of the workmanship is the mahogany staircase railing which ends in a nautilus-shaped swirl.”

National Register nomination: “Woodside, the home of Caleb Hazard Richmond in northeastern Caswell County, is a splendid … example of Greek Revival residential architecture produced during the county’s ‘Boom Era’ in the middle decades of the 19th century.”

A roadside plaque is devoted to Caleb’s son-in-law, Confederate General Dodson Ramseur, who barely ever lived there after his 1863 wedding, owing to his extremely up-and-down military career, which ended with his death as a prisoner of his friend and West Point classmate George Armstrong Custer.

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204 E. Railroad Avenue, Gibsonville, Guilford County
The Francis Marion Smith House, 1898
National Register of Historic Places
Blog post — National Register Property For Sale: Gibsonville’s ‘Most Stylish and Impressive’ Turn-of-the Century Home, $425,000

• Sold for $350,000 on February 28, 2023 (originally $475,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 3,536 square feet, 1.12 acres (per county)
• Price/square foot: $99

The house remained in the Smith-Whitsett family until 1976. NRHP nomination: “the most stylish and impressive residence in Gibsonville surviving from the 1890-1910 period that witnessed the town’s major growth. The two-and-a-half-story frame house combines elements of the Colonial Revival and Queen Anne styles, including an elaborate program of classical trim and turned ornament.

“It is one of three notable late nineteenth and early twentieth residences associated with the Whitsett Institute, a boarding secondary school and junior college in the Whitsett community near Gibsonville. The three houses (one of which has already been listed in the National Register) are among the finest houses combining Colonial Revival and Queen Anne style elements in eastern Guilford County.”

• Sold for $85,000 on October 30, 2023 (listed at $110,000)
• bedrooms, bathrooms, 2,694 square feet, 0.66 acre
• Price/square foot: $32
• Neighborhood: Summerfield Historic District (NRHP)

Preservation North Carolina: “The Alexander Strong Martin House is an early, modestly rendered example of the Greek Revival style featuring solid brick construction and finely crafted details such as a corbelled brick cornice; decorative curved exposed rafters; a 60-inch wide, double-leaf glazed front door set within deep coffered panels; an elaborate transom above the main entrance door; and well-executed, mitered window surrounds. … The interior of this 8-room house is equally modest yet finely crafted with a variety of styles perhaps reflecting its use over the years as a single-family home, home office, fabric shop, and apartments.”

The house was built by Valentine Allen on property bought from the estate of Charles Bruce, one of the earliest settlers in the area, originally called Bruce’s Crossroad. Alexander Strong Martin (1787-1864) bought the house and 448 acres in 1838. He owned it for 11 years.

Alexander Strong Martin was the son of one of the most prominent figures of North Carolina’s Revolutionary Era, Alexander Martin (1740-1807). From the 1770s into the 19th Century, the elder Martin served as speaker of the N.C. Senate, governor (elected four times), U.S. senator and many other public positions. He never married but acknowledged Alexander Strong as his son. The child’s mother was Elizabeth Lewis Strong (b. 1753). Her husband, Thomas Strong, had disappeared during the Revolutionary War.

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• Sold for $475,000 on September 28, 2023 (listed at $489,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 3,180 square feet, 1.47 acres
• Price/square foot: $149

Architectural Inventory of Alamance County: “This house is a two-story, Italianate I-house with a ‘Triple-A’ roof line. Relatively unaltered, the house is three-bay wide, single-pile with a one-story rear-ell. … The long rear ell may have been an earlier c. 1850 Italianate dwelling, remodeled and joined to the later Italianate house.”

The Architectural Inventory states that “the house was owned by the Quackenbush family from before the Civil War up until the 1990s.” Ownership can be traced online back to David Vance Quackenbush (1886-1962) and Lelia Ruth Dark Quackenbush (1888-1986). David was the proprietor of Graham Lumber Company.

The home’s original address was 1205 S. Main Street in Graham. “In October 1996 it was moved 3 1/2 miles to its current location, just off N.C. 54 north of the village of Swepsonville,” the Architectural Inventory says.

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716 S. Main Street, Reidsville, Rockingham County
The Wray-Rainey-Webster House, 1850 (maybe)
Blog post — New Listing: The 1850 Wray-Rainey-Webster House in Reidsville, $350,000

• Sold for $334,000 on March 30, 2023 (listed at $350,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 3,494 square feet, 0.23 acre
• Price/square foot: $96
• Neighborhood: Reidsville Historic District (NRHP), Old Post Road Historic District (local)

The county dates the house to 1850; the district’s National Register nomination puts it at circa 1860. District NRHP nomination: “Believed to be one of the oldest houses surviving in the district, this two-story frame residence has changed hands more than most of the pivotal houses, and its original location was some one hundred yards to the south on the present site of the Hugh Reid Scott [House]. …

“The first recorded owner was John Rainey, a farmer, who was followed by Colonel John R. Webster (1845-1909), publisher of Webster’s Dollar Weekly, and later by Hugh Reid Scott, as well as several others.

“These changing ownerships have resulted in alterations to the house, although the exterior of the front section remains relatively intact in its late 19th century appearance. This two-story single-pile section is topped by a low hipped roof of standing seam tin with deep bracketed eaves and a paneled frieze, relating it to more elaborate Italianate houses in the district.”

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• Sold for $120,000 on April 10, 2023 (listed at $130,000)
• 3 bedrooms (per county), 2 1/2 bathrooms, 2,540 square feet, 1.49 acres
• Price/square foot: $47
• Neighborhood: Carthage Historic District (NR)

The listing says the owners who sold the property in 1853, the Glascocks, “were first cousins of (President) George Washington, and it is said that a young George Washington would come from Virginia to visit his cousins the Glascock’s.”

The historic district’s National Register nomination references the Glascock family but doesn’t mention George Washington. It does mention that the “frame house [combines] three periods of construction and architectural styles” and notes an Italianate door with tabernacle panes, contemporary with the late 19th century porch, and several mid 19th century Greek Revival mantels.

Dr. John Shaw bought the house in 1853. “Dr. Shaw was physician and prominent town and county citizen — Register of Deeds, county commissioner, two terms in state house of representatives, trustee of Carthage Academy.”

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1291 Conrad Road, Lewisville, Forsyth County
Hilltops, the Conrad Family Farm, 1858

• Sold for $865,000 on December 29, 2023
• 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2,856 square feet, 13.17 acres
• Price/square foot: $303

The house and much of the Conrad property remained in the Conrad family until 2022. The house was built by either John Joseph Conrad (1805-1871) or his son Augustine Eugene Conrad (1828-1917). A.E. owned it when he died. He had served as chairman of the county Board of Commissioners for may years. “Mr. Conrad was one of the most prominent and widely known men in that section of the state,” The Charlotte Observer noted in reporting his death.

His estate sold it to one of his four surviving children, William Joseph Conrad (1856-1941). A.E. had six children by two wives over a period of 41 years. Dr. William J. Conrad was memorialized as the “dean of N.C. dentists” by the Winston-Salem Journal. He was a graduate of the Kernersville Institute, Emory & Henry and the Pennsylvania Dental College, class of 1876. He practiced until 1934, retiring at age 78.

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3007 Riverside Drive, Mount Airy, Surry County
The Sparger House, 1864

• Sold for $460,000 on June 7, 2023 (originally $479,000)
• 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 2,486 square feet, 6.1 acres
• Price/square foot: $185

The property includes a pond and creek, a three-stall horse barn with tack room and spring house, and a detached garage with a full bath and an office. It’s located north of Mount Airy on N.C. Highway 104 near the Salem community and the White Sulphur Springs community, a 19th century resort. It’s also near the site of the Smith & Sparger Tobacco Factory.

An 1862 deed shows a property being bought by William Simpson Sparger (1833-1915). The description of the property is vague, but it appears at least to be in the same general area. The deed indicates it was adjacent to another property owned by either William or another member of the Sparger family. William was a farmer, according to census records, and apparently had many friends. A report on his death in The Charlotte Observer noted “an immense crowd” of relatives and friends: “Mr. Sparger was the last of the old Sparger generation in the state, and his friends were numbered by the score. He was 82 years of age and highly esteemed by everybody.”

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214 N. Main Street, Troy, Montgomery County
The Wade-Arscott House, 1871
Blog post — The Wade-Arscott House: A Much-Admired Judge’s 1871 Queen Anne in Troy, $369,000

• Sold for $365,000 on March 1, 2023 (listed at $369,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 3,474 square feet, 0.24 acre
• Price/square foot: $105
• Neighborhood: One of five structures in the tiny Troy Residential Historic District (NR)

Before its 2023 sale, it was a well-reviewed B&B. District NR nomination: “A notable example of Queen Anne architecture in Troy is the two-and-a-half-story Wade-Arscott House, a rambling frame residence that is enlivened by widely spaced windows, a one-story wraparound porch supported by square posts and enclosed by plain balustrades, a cylindrical, weatherboarded and shingled tower capped by a helmet roof at the southwest corner of the structure, and a peaked gable dormer incorporating a recessed balcony.”

Christopher Columbus Wade (1837-1915) served as judge of probate and, for 21 years, county clerk of court. In 1904 he was elected state House; he declined to seek re-election, “preferring the quiet of his home and attention to his farming and business interests,” The Asheboro Courier related in a wonderfully laudatory obituary. The newspaper called him “an able, wise, prudent member, always carefully guarding the public good. Few members have served in the general assembly in our memory who ranked higher.”

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2450 Glencoe Street, Glencoe Mill Village, Alamance County, 1885

• Sold for $315,000 on August 10, 2023 (originally $250,000)
• 2 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 1,744 square feet (per county), 0.24 acre
• Price/square foot: $181
• Built in 1885
• Neighborhood: Glencoe Mill Village Historic District (local and NR)

District NR nomination: “The Glencoe Historic District is located on the east bank of Haw River about three miles north of Burlington in Alamance County. It is a typical but remarkably well-preserved example of nineteenth century industrial villages that once flourished in North Carolina’s Piedmont region. …

“The predominant house type was originally a four room, two-story structure typical of North Carolina rural housing of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. … A later modification of the mill housing is the kitchen, attached at the back of the east wing of most houses, forming an L. These rooms had, by 1910, largely replaced the detached kitchens, of which only a handful remain.”

1090 Dalton Place Drive, Dalton, Stokes County
The Matthew Dalton Phillips House, 1888

• Sold for $400,000 on September 5, 2023 (listed at $400,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 3,024 square feet, 4.81 acres
• Price/square foot: $132

The property may have been in the Philips family since the house was built. The original owners may have been Dr. Matthew Dalton Phillips (1851-1925) and Margaret Melissa Dalton Phillips (1862-1947). Matthew was a native of Stokes County and graduate of Wake Forest College, class of 1871. He studied medicine at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia and New York University. Returning to Stokes County, “he practiced scientific medicine for forty years,” according to an entertaining entry on the WFU website. He was still practicing when he died of pneumonia at age 74. “The family believes he caught a chill from crossing a stream in wintry weather while making his regular rounds.”

Listing: “A 36 by 20 foot two story structure which used to be the Dalton Store is also on the property. This building is standing but is in disrepair and is not safe to enter.” The house has a Pinnacle mailing address. It’s about 2 1/2 miles southeast of the town.

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• Sold for $580,000 on August 14, 2023 (originally $659,900, later as low as $575,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2,918 square feet (per county), 1 acre
• Price/square foot: $199

In addition to the Neoclassical house, the property includes a barn and a “pub,” originally the free-standing kitchen. The listing says it’s a wedding and event venue, but its website appears to be offline (info here). The house has a Mount Airy mailing address, although it’s near the Asbury community in Stokes County, 12 miles northeast of Mount Airy.

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• Sold for $615,000 on September 14, 2023 (listed at $675,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 4,581 square feet, 0.77 acre
• Price/square foot: $134
• Neighborhood: Mount Airy Historic District (NR)

The listing says the house was “the first in Mount Airy to be built with Granite which was sourced directly from the site.” James A. Hadley House was a tobacco industrialist, real estate developer and mayor of Mount Airy. Historic district NR nomination: “The Queen Anne style was popular at the turn of the century, and outstanding examples of the nationally popular style are located throughout the district. The finest of these is the James A. Hadley House at 400 West Pine Street.”

James’s wife, Swannanoa Brower Hadley, continued to live in the house after he died at age 63. She outlived him by a prodigious 57 years, never remarrying and living to the age of 109. She also outlived three of their five children. Swannanoa attended Guilford College and graduated from Salem College in 1890. She donated the land for Northern Surry Hospital in the 1950s.

The house was sold in 1975, two years after her death, by their two surviving daughters, Sallie Hadley Yokley and Lucy Hadley Cash, both widows themselves by then who lived to age 91 and 101, respectively.

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109 E. Haywood Lane, Mount Gilead, Montgomery County
The Harris-Caffey House, 1898

• Sold for $440,000 on November 16, 2023 (listed at $439,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 4,034 square feet, 0.54 acre
• Price/square foot: $109

The property includes a gazebo and a fountain, both in the front yard; a two-car garage; and a small storage building. The house is the only residence among 10 structures listed among the “cultural resources” in the town’s comprehensive plan (p. 12). State Historic Preservation Office: “2-story side gable frame Queen Anne house w/twin front gables & hip roof front porch”

From Mount Gilead Pride: Masten Leak Harris (1858-1912) was connected for many years with the Mount Gilead Store Company [also here].  The Mount Gilead Southerner called him “a man of Christian character. … He was an earnest advocate of better schools, better churches, and better citizenship. In his death, the town and community is deprived of one of its best and most useful citizens.”

In 1920, the house was sold to James Francis Caffey (1887-1960), mill manager and later superintendent for Mount Gilead Cotton Oil Company. When he died, his casket was placed in the front parlor of the house “for an old-fashioned, Southern-style wake. Many mourners, both black and white, visited the home to pay their respects to ‘Mr. Jim.'”