Piedmont Historic Homes

The founder of the world’s biggest textile company. A German-born carpenter and home builder. A flea-circus impresario. A house sold with a restored 1939 Cadillac. And a house with a garage containing an outcrop of granite too big to allow a car into it. That’s who and what you’ll find when you look into the most interesting historic home sold in February. One of the houses may have had more super-rich owners than any other in Greensboro, perhaps the Piedmont.

710 Country Club Drive, Greensboro
The J. Spencer Love House I
Blog post — $7.5 million and It’s Yours: The 1937 J. Spencer Love House in Irving Park

• Sold for $4.5 million on February 27, 2024 (originally $7.495 million)
• 6 bedrooms, 7 full bathrooms, 3 half-bathrooms, 11,201 square feet, 3.3 acres
• Price/square foot: $402
• Built in 1937
• Listed August 5, 2021
• Last sale: $2.49 million, February 1997
• Neighborhood: Irving Park Historic District (NR)
• Note: This house may have had more super-rich owners than any other in Greensboro, perhaps the Piedmont.
• The buyers: The buyer is an LLC registered to Roy Carroll, CEO of the Carroll Companies, a Greensboro-based developer of hotels, apartments, mammoth self-storage facilities and other blessings upon the land, and Craig Carlock, Carroll’s chief operating officer and former CEO of The Fresh Market. What are they going to do with an 11,000 square-foot house in Greensboro’s most exclusive neighborhood?
• Listing: “In the late 1990’s the house underwent a total renovation by the present owners. Original features to the house include the Grand Foyer, Formal Living & Dining Rooms, Sunroom, Library, Kitchen, Butler Pantry’s, Morning Room, Six Bedrooms, inclusive of a magnificent primary suite with his & hers dressing rooms, baths.
  • “Lower level with Sauna, hot tub, bedroom, bath, exercise room & mechanical room. Pool House with two kitchens, two living areas & three bedrooms. The Cottage with open kitchen & living area, massive fireplace, two bedrooms, two baths, Carriage House with kitchen, bedroom & bath.
  • “Gazebo, Tennis Court & open air breeze back grounds overlooking beautifully maintained gardens. Picturesque park like grounds face Greensboro Country Club golf course.”
  • District NRHP nomination: “This was the residence of J. Spencer Love, president of Burlington Mills, and his family. The Love House is a palatial Georgian Revival mansion inspired by eighteenth century Virginia houses. It features Flemish bond brickwork, a steep hipped roof with segmental-arched dormers and a modillioned cornice, a five-bay facade with a swan’s neck pedimented entrance, a string course between floors, and brick corner quoins. Large one and two-story wings project from either side of the main block. An expansive landscaped lawn fronts the house and is bordered by a molded brick wall.”
  • James Spencer Love (1896-1962) was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father, James Lee Love, was a professor of mathematics at Harvard and, more importantly, a native a Gastonia, where his father and brother owned a small mill called the Gastonia Cotton Manufacturing Company. After graduating from Harvard, J. Spencer went to Gastonia and in 1919 bought the company. In 1922 he moved it to Burlington and gave it a new name. “Shortly afterwards, he decided to gamble on a new product, rayon. Throughout his business career, Love continued to be bold, expanding frequently and seeking new products even in the hard times of the 1930s.” (Dictionary of North Carolina Biography) That kind of initiative turned his small mill into the largest textile company in the world, Burlington Industries.
  • Benjamin and Anne Cone bought the house in 1941 from Love’s ex-wife, Elizabeth Love Appleget. Cone (1899-1982) was a son of Ceasar and Jeannette Cone. He served as chairman of Cone Mills, 1957-71; mayor of Greensboro, 1949-51 (Greensboro mayors traditionally served only one term until the 1970s); and chairman of Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital, 1956-65. He and his wife, Anne Coleman Wortham Cone (1915-1999), were major benefactors to the Weatherspoon Art Museum. They owned the house until 1977, when they sold it to Richard Love, a son of J. Spencer Love, and his wife, Bonnie B. Love. They sold the house in 1982.
  • in 1997, the house was bought by the current owner, Bonnie McElveen Hunter, founder and CEO of Greensboro’s Pace Communications, president of the American Red Cross and former ambassador to Finland, and her husband, Bynum Merritt Hunter (1925-2018).

6800 Germanton Road, Germanton, Forsyth County
The Stedman-Rainey-Savage House

• Sold for $485,000 on February 23, 2024 (listed at $495,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 3,845 square feet, 1.7 acres
• Price/square foot: $126
• Built circa 1855
• Listed December 21, 2023
• Last sale: $362,000 on June 11, 2021
• Note: County records date the house to 1900, which other evidence renders unlikely.
  • The house is attributed to architect John Dietrich Tavis (1814-1889) of Salem, who designed two other very similar houses still standing in Germanton. “John Dietrich Tavis, a mid-nineteenth century house carpenter and member of the Moravian community in Salem, is among the few builders of his time and place to whom specific buildings outside of Winston-Salem have been attributed. A native of Hanover, Germany, he maintained his identity as a ‘German architect’ traditionally associated with several antebellum Greek Revival houses in the Germanton area.” (North Carolina Architects & Builders)
  • “The two-story, double-pile, Greek Revival dwelling features flush-sheathed pedimented gable ends, large twelve-over-twelve sash windows, two-panel interior doors, and post-and-lintel mantelpieces. The original double-tier, single-bay portico was replaced with the existing full-height porch in the 1940s, but the original door surrounds with Tavis’s asymmetrical sidelights and multi-light transoms exist at both the upper and lower floors. The house was most likely built for William and Olivia Gibson Stedman … between their marriage in 1848 and William’s death in 1857.” (North Carolina Architects & Builders)
  • Listing: “Stokes and Forsyth County line runs through the property.” Property records are held by Forsyth County, and the listing says it’s in the Forsyth County school attendance area.
  • The listing emphasizes the historic nature of the home, but it has vinyl siding and replacement windows.

525 Jersey Avenue, Winston-Salem
The Lasley-Hobbs House

• Sold for $475,000 on February 21, 2024 (originally $490,000)
• 3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 1,892 square feet, 0.16 acre
• Price/square foot: $251
• Built in 1920
• Listed September 23, 2023
• Last sale: $195,000, March 29. 2023
• Neighborhood: West End Historic District (local and NR)
• Note: Caveat emptor — quickie flip job.
• District NR nomination: “The Lasley House is a straightforward Colonial Revival house with a hint of the Craftsman style. It is a two-story weatherboarded frame dwelling with a gable roof, overhanging eaves with large block brackets, paired six-over-one sash windows, and a front porch with Tuscan columns, a plain balustrade, and a pedimented entrance bay which repeats the block brackets of the main roof.”
  • Emma J, Lasley (1865-1943) bought the property in 1921, around the time her husband died (James Wesley Lasley, 1864-1921). In 1924 she was listed at this address, along with her children Glenn, John Archie, James W., Matthew, Hollie, Nannie, Robah, and Wesley Lasley. The house was owned by the Lasley family until 1947.
  • In 1983 the house was bought by Jim Albert Hobbs (1939-2020) and Barbara Virgo Hobbs (dates unknown). Their son sold the house in 2023. Jim was head of the lighting design program at NC School of the Arts. Barbara received a doctorate in social science research from UNCG and worked as a writer/editor, grant writer, research associate and project evaluator.
  • Jim’s greatest renown may have come as “Jim Alberti,” proprietor of the Alberti Flea Circus, which he operated from the 1980s until around 2018. He performed at state fairs and other events around the United States and Canada, including the National Folk Festival, Festival for the Eno and MerleFest.
  • From the Alberti website (archived by the Wayback Machine):”Part magician, part storyteller, part comedian, and all entertainer, Jim Alberti is a third-generation flea circus impresario. After a long career in theater, Alberti began itching to revive the flea circus that was once performed by his great uncle and later by his grandfather. He envisioned bringing it to a new generation that had never had the opportunity to experience a flea circus.”
  • For more abut the circus and the fleas, click here or here.
  • A former student is reviving Jim’s show. Please join Piedmont Historic Homes in providing financial support through a GoFundMe page.

210 Patterson Avenue, Mount Airy, Surry County
The Roland and Virginia Carpenter House

• Sold for $129,000 on February 15, 2024 (originally $199,000)
• 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 1,416 square feet, 0.23 acre
• Price/square foot: $91
• Built in 1947
• Listed August 6, 2022
• Last sale: $29,000, May 2013
• Neighborhood: Mount Airy Historic District (NR)
• Listing: “Home will convey fully furnished minus the kitchen table and chairs.”
  • Currently a short term rental.
  • There’s an attached garage, but, oddly, it was built around an outcrop of granite, which doesn’t allow room for a car.
• District NR nomination: “One-story Modernist house of stuccoed concrete block construction with a parapet shed roof. The parapet jetties slightly over the walls below and has a ceramic tile coping.
  • “The main façade is five bays with a central entrance and flanking one-over-one windows (short and wide windows on each side of the entrance and taller and narrower windows at the outer bays). The bay immediately to the right of the entrance projects with a rectangular footprint and has a window on each side.
  • “A set-back wing with a garage-like shed attached to the house by infill extends from the west side. Other features include replacement windows, novelty vinyl siding on the wing, and modern entry awnings.”
  • The house was built for James Roland Carpenter (1908-1975) and Vera Virginia Collins Carpenter (1915-2007), who owned the property from 1948 to 2007. Roland was the manager of Granite City Cleaners and later produce manager at Moseley Super Market. The house was sold after Virginia’s death at age 91.
  • “The site has granite outcrops, one of which is inside the ‘garage’ which would have rendered the space too small to park a car … The 1948 Sanborn map identifies the building as a garage, though that may have been an educated guess on the part of the mapper. The garage was shown with an open-air covered connection to the house. Carpenter also had a backyard grill created by mounting a grill between two granite boulders.”

618 N. Main Street, Mount Airy, Surry County
The William Edward Merritt House
Heart & Soul Bed & Breakfast

• Sold for $849,900 on February 1, 2024 (originally $850,000, later $750,000)
• 6 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, 5,024 square feet (per county), 0.66 acre
• Price/square foot: $169
• Built in 1901
• Listed July 8, 2021
• Last sale: $152,000, April 2014
• Neighborhood: Mount Airy Historic District
• Note: The listing gives the square footage as 4,779.
  • The listing previously said there were 7 bedrooms and 7 1/2 bathrooms.
  • Listing: “The house is selling completely furnished except for personal belongings.” That includes a restored 1939 Cadillac Series 75 limousine (click for photo).
  • The property includes a detached two-car garage with an apartment above.
  • District NRHP nomination: “Large, impressive two-story brick late Victorian style house with granite trim, dominated by a two-and-one-half story polygonal projecting bay and one-story wrap-around porch with spindle frieze.
  • “The virtually unaltered house also features decorative, tall, corbelled and recessed panel interior chimneys, one-over-one windows with granite lintels and sills, granite string course extending around the house above the second story windows, decorative sawn brackets supporting wide overhanging eaves and Colonial Revival interior features.
  • “Built in 1901 by contractor J.A. Tesh for W.E. Merritt, who owned a hardware store and brickyard, and was the founder of the Renfro Textile Company and one of the founders of the Mount Airy Furniture Company.”
  • William Edward “Ed” Merritt (1867-1946) was born in Chatham, Virginia. His wife, Caroline Octavia “Carrie” Kochtitzky Merritt (1868-1960), was a native of Oakland, Missouri. After they came to Mount Airy, Ed’s parents and five of his six siblings also moved to the town.
  • From the Mount Airy News: “As is often the case, this new blood energized and benefited the community, as they established or led several major businesses: Merritt Hardware, Renfro Hosiery, Mount Airy Furniture Company, Merritt Machine Shop, Piedmont Manufacturing Company, and Floyd Pike Electrical, the North Carolina Granite Corp., and others. Several family members have served as town commissioners, the city engineer, the Surry County Draft Board, the county Board of Commissioners, and in the US Navy and Army.”