Piedmont Historic Homes

February is typically a rather slow month for new listings, and this one is no exception. And yet four outstanding 19th-century homes have popped up in the first two weeks of the month, scattered from one end of the Triad to the other among the region’s smaller communities. It’s a rare profusion of significant properties.

One is on the National Register. One is built into a hillside so snugly rocks form part of the interior walls. One has fallen on hard times (the other three are in great condition). One went under contract just three days after listing. All are well documented, which isn’t surprising, given their prominence.

Click on the address links for more information.

290 E. Maple Avenue, Mocksville, Davie County
National Register of Historic Places

• $695,000
• 5 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 2,640 square feet, 12.75 acres
• Price/square foot: $263
• Built in 1828 (per county)
• To be listed February 22, 2025
• Last sale: $323,500, June 2006
• Note: Post-restortion photo above by Kirk Franklin Mahoney from Davie County Historical and Genealogical Society, via Davie County Public Library and DigitalNC.org.

The Federal-style house was built by prominent plantation owner and businessman Jesse Adam Clement (1808-1876). It remained in the Clement family for 150 years. It was bought in 1978 and restored by Rev. Dr. William Fife Long (1926-2020) and Dr. Ann Phifer Hammond Long (1931-2023). They lived in the house until selling it in 2006 to the current owners, who operated a B&B in the house, the Clement House Bed and Breakfast, with two guest rooms.

93 Broad Street, Milton, Caswell County

• $450,000
• 5 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 3,472 square feet, 0.87 acre
• Price/square foot: $130
• Built in 1835
• Listed February 13, 2025
• Last sale: $100,000, April 2020
• Neighborhood: Milton Historic District (NR)
• Note: The original, detached brick kitchen still stands behind the house, now converted into a short-term rental with a kitchen and two second-floor bedrooms and a frame smokehouse at the rear.
  • The restoration of the house by its current owners was recognized with an award from Preservation North Carolina in 2024. The restoration included the removal of a 20th-century double front porch. The project also returned the house to single-family occupancy; it had been divided into apartments.

“2-story Flemish bond brick house of retrained transitional Federal-Greek style Revival design on the exterior, and delicate, slightly eccentric Classical Revival interior trim, including an open-string ramped stair and columned mantels which have the stamp of local cabinetmaker Thomas Day.” (An Inventory of Historic Architecture: Caswell County, North Carolina, by Ruth Little-Stokes and Tony P. Wrenn, 1979, p. 222)

The original owner, John Wilson Sr. (1796-1875), was a merchant and planter. He had three wives and 13 children and outlived all three wives and at least eight of his children. One son who outlived him was Dr. John Wilson Jr. (1828-1892), a prominent physician and educator. His notable home next door at 77 Broad Street is also for sale.

2383 Cedar Falls Road, Cedar Falls, Randolph County
Sale pending February 14, 2025

• $400,000
• 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2,668 square feet, 5.57 acres
• Price/square foot: $150
• Built in 1848
• Listed February 11, 2025
• Last sales: $220,000, February 2019; $39,000, August 2002; $34,000, December 2000
• Neighborhood: Located about 6.25 miles northeast of Asheboro and 2.5 miles west of Franklinville. The property has a Franklinville mailing address.
• Note: The property has been designated a Randolph County Historic Landmark.

Local Landmark Designation Report: The house is “built on a rock outcropping on a steep hillside overlooking the Deep River. Its first owner was Austin Lawrence [dates unknown], a mill manager from New England who came to Randolph County with his family to work in the burgeoning textile industry. … After the Lawrence family moved away around 1855, the Cedar Falls Mill Company owned the house and it was rented to various tenants for over 100 years.” In 1999, the Randolph Heritage Conservancy acquired the house from Sapona Manufacturing Company. It sold the house in 2000. A book on the county’s historic architecture calls it “one of the landmarks of the Greek Revival style in Randolph County.”

523 E Main Street, Haw River, Alamance County

• $200,000
• 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1,944 square feet (per county), 0.50 acre
• Price/square foot: $103
• Built in 1894 (see note)
• Listed January 10, 2025
• Last sale: $162,500, April 2004

Alamance County Architectural Inventory: “This house was built for Mr. Haywood Simpson, one of the first merchants in Haw River who ran the mill commissary with William Anderson. He contributed part of the land for the First Christian Church. Originally a two-story, three-bay wide, single-pile house with a side gable and a ‘Triple-A’ roof form. The house has a hipped roof wraparound front porch supported by piers with slanted sides on brick stacks.” The house remained in the Simpson family for 94 years.