Piedmont Historic Homes

Mansion Sales: 2018-2021

• Sold for $550,000 on December 15, 2022 (listed at $525,000)
• 7 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 5,119 square feet, 0.22 acre
• Price/square foot: $107
• Built in 1890
• Listed November 2, 2022
• Last sale: $150,000, August 1986
• Neighborhood: West End Historic District (local and NRHP)
• Note: About 100 years after being divided into apartments and then turned into a duplex, the house has been returned to single-family home.
• District NRHP nomination: “The Patterson House, one of the oldest dwellings in the West End, is a large two-story frame house of transitional late Victorian-Colonial Revival design.
  • “It has weatherboard siding, a pedimented gable roof, both one-over-one and nine-over-one sash windows, a projecting bay on the northeast side, and a wrap-around porch with paneled Classical posts, a plain balustrade, and a balustraded upper deck.
  • “A distinguishing feature of the house is its projecting center bay with double-leaf entrance surrounded by sidelights and transom, pair of second story windows headed by wooden sunburst designs, and pedimented gable.
  • “The first city directory listing for the house was in 1894/95, when it was the residence of Thomas Patterson, a manager at R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. He and his wife, Sallie, lived here until the late 1910s.
  • “In 1921 George C. Tudor listed the property for taxes, and he converted the house to apartments. The house was renovated as a two-family dwelling in 1985.”

• Sold for $780,000 on November 15, 2022 (listed at $829,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,646 square feet, 0.21 acre
• Price/square foot: $168
• Built in 1923
• Listed September 15, 2022
• Last sale: $235,000, March 2004
• Neighborhood: West End Historic District (local and NRHP)
• Note: The basement includes a garage.
• Something you don’t see every day: The basement also includes “the original servant’s BR (converted to a delightful Tiki Bar!).”
• District NRHP nomination: “This two-story, weatherboarded frame, Colonial Revival house is one of several in the West End to use the gambrel roof form.
  • “In addition it has a shed dormer across the facade, a pent eave between stories, and a front entrance with a fanlight transom and a gabled hood instead of a porch.
  • “The Sanborn maps suggest that there was originally an engaged porch on the northwest corner of the house, but this has been sensitively enclosed.”
  • The original owners were William Grant Tennille Sr. (1879-1959) and Hallie Wooten Tennille (1884-1954). William was manager of the Robert E. Lee Hotel. They lived in the house for more than 15 years.
  • Their son, Major William Grant Tennille Jr. of the Army Air Corps (1914-1944), died in the South Pacific during War World II. On a mission to bomb Japanese ships, the bomber he was piloting was severely damaged, but he managed to hold his course until he crashed it into an enemy ship. He posthumously received the Distinguished Flying Cross for “extraordinary heroism.”

• Sold for $660,000 on November 7, 2022 (listed at $649,900)
• 4 bedrooms, 5 1/2 bathrooms, 4,368 square feet, 0.30 acre
• Price/square foot: $151
• Built in 1926
• Listed October 5, 2022
• Last sale: $265,000, November 1990
• Neighborhood: Emerywood, Uptown Suburbs Historic District (NRHP)
• Realtor Babble: “A once in a lifetime opportunity … !”
• District NRHP nomination: “This one-and-a-half-story, truncated-hip-roofed, Tudor Revival-style house has a steeply-pitched slate roof that extends down to the first-floor level on the facade and left (east) elevation.
  • “It has stuccoed exterior with brick veneer around the entrance and at the inset porch, and faux half-timbering in the dormers. It has a wide, partially inset gabled dormer on the left end of the facade and smaller, partially inset dormers on the right (west) end of the facade and on the left elevation.
  • “The house has metal casement windows with rough-hewn lintels. Windows in the large front-gabled dormer are paired, diamond-light casement windows.
  • “The decorative brick chimney with double flues rises to the right of the entrance, a batten door with strap hinges in a basketweave brick surround.
  • “An inset porch across the left half of the facade is supported by rough-hewn posts with slender braces. A one-story, shed-roofed porte-cochere on the right elevation has matching supports and faux half-timbering in the gables.
  • “The earliest known occupant is Kenneth C. Denny (secretary/treasurer, Denny Veneer Company) in 1928.”

2115 Georgia Avenue, Winston-Salem

• Sold on October 24, 2022 for $2.1 million (listed at $2.1 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 6,873 square feet, 1.43 acres
• Price/square foot: $306
• Built in 1928
• Listed September 6, 2022
• Last sale: $750,000, April 2014
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: Designed by Luther Lashmit, original landscape design by Thomas Sears
  • The property includes a garage apartment of 817 square feet, 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom.
  • Something you don’t see very often: HVAC in the main house is geothermal.
  • From 1971 to 2014, the house was owned by Dr. George Podgorny. “George Podgorny was born in Iran, but his heritage was Czech and Armenian. His father taught physical education to the children of the Shah of Iran, and his mother wrote children’s books.
  • “It was decided that George would come to the United States after high school because the family felt that a U.S. university education would be superior. Dr. Podgorny left his family and came alone to Maryville College in Tennessee and decided to go into medicine. He became enamored with Wake Forest University School of Medicine (then the Bowman Gray Medical School) and its Baptist Hospital, was accepted there for medical school, and never left the region.” (ACEP Now: The Official Voice of Emergency Medicine)
  • After his residency in cardiothoracic surgery, Dr. Podgomy’s interest in trauma surgery led to a pioneering career in emergency medicine. He was instrumental in establishing emergency medicine as a medical specialty in the United States, serving as the first president of the American Board of Emergency Medicine and president of the American College of Emergency Physicians. He was honored as one of the founders of the specialty by the ACEP. He was instrumental in developing the EMS system and first responder program in North Carolina and served for many years as Forsyth County medical examiner for Forsyth County.
  • “One of his varied interests was herpetology, and he became recognized as a global expert in snake bites often fielding phone calls at all hours seeking advice on the appropriate treatment of snake bites and spider bites.
  • “He was a Renaissance man who spoke seven languages, lectured around the world on the history of medicine, published prolifically throughout his life, and had a keen appreciation of the Arts.” (full obituary here)

• Sold for $945,000 on October 7, 2022 (listed at $975,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,195 square feet, 0.41 acre
• Price/square foot: $225
• Built in 1922
• Listed August 6, 2022
• Last sale: $785,000, December 2017
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Realtor babble: “Stratford Road is the heartbeat of Buena Vista!”
• Note: This house has been sold six times since 2010.
  • The original owners were Grace Archer Garber (1890-1984) and Daniel Mason Garber (1888-1956). They moved to Winston-Salem from New York. Mason was a building contractor. They were first listed on Lovers Lane — the original name of Stratford Road — in 1925.
  • Two of their three daughters continued living with them as adults. Both women lived in the house until their deaths in the 21st century. Cornelia Mason “Neely” Garber (1921-2007) was a graduate of Salem College. She was a community volunteer with diverse interests, including Bundles for Britain during World War II, the Junior League, the Winston-Salem Arts Council, Family Services and the Winston-Salem Symphony, among others. She was the 1961 Arts Council Volunteer of the Year.
  • Her sister Mary Ellen Garber (1916-2008) was a pioneering and nationally recognized sportswriter. After graduating from Hollins College, she joined the Twin City Sentinel in 1940 as society editor. During World War II, she became a news reporter and then, briefly, a sportswriter. She returned to the sports section in 1946 and stayed there until she retired 40 years later. In retirement, she continued covering sports for the paper (by then merged into the Winston-Salem Journal) until 2002.
  • “When Miss Garber started writing about sports full time in 1946, the craft was essentially a man’s domain,” The New York Times said in its obituary for her. “Coaches often treated her with condescension, fellow sportswriters ignored her and professional associations kept her out.” Initially assigned to cover black high school and Winston-Salem State University, she became an early advocate for covering African American sports teams.
  • Her perseverance and professionalism gained her respect throughout the region and the nation. In 1990, the Atlantic Coast Conference established the annual Mary Garber Award to honor the conference’s top female athlete. In 2005, she became the first woman to receive the Associated Press Sports Editors’ Red Smith Award. The next year, the Association of Women in Sports Media renamed its Pioneer Award as the Mary Garber Pioneer Award.

• Sold for $1.7 million on October 4, 2022 (listed at $1.8 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 5,509 square feet, 19.2 acres
• Price/square foot: $309
• Built in 1938
• Listed July 26, 2021
• Last sale: $1 million, June 2000
• Note: I haven’t been able to find a thing about the history of this place.

• Sold for $1.25 million on September 28, 2022 (originally $2.5 million)
• 7 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, 4,000 square feet, 92 acres
• Price/square foot: $312
• Built in 1840
• Listed February 12, 2021
• Last sale: $575,000, August 2012
• Neighborhood: Hyco Lake
• HOA: $150/year (Person Caswell Lake Authority)
• Note: The property includes a barn, a guest house, a wedding venue, a garage, a workshop and three miles of trails.
  • It has a Semora (Caswell County) mailing address, but it’s just across the county line in Person County.

• Sold for $1.21 million on September 12, 2022 (originally $1.499 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 5 1/2 bathrooms, 5,066 square feet, 1.0 acre
• Price/square foot: $239
• Built in 1915
• Listed May 10, 2022
• Last sale: $251,500, August 1978
• Neighborhood: Country Club Estates
• Note: The property includes a carriage house.
  • Something you don’t see every day: “Exterior is made of historic stucco with rolled roof edges designed to look like an English thatched roof.”
  • From 1969-1978, the house was owned by Frank Christian Gray (1939-2001), one of five sons of Bowman Gray Jr., president of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company (as was Bowman Gray Sr.). Chris was a graduate of Yale. He worked for RJR in New York but then struck out on his own, establishing a consumer market research company. He later returned to Winston-Salem and worked for Merrill Lynch. He was a board member of Forsyth Technical Community College and Warren Wilson College, and he hosted the Piedmont Opera’s annual Magnolia Ball at the family farm, Brookberry, in Lewisville. He was married and divorced three times.
  • In 1978, Gray sold the house to the current owners. He lived for much of the rest of his life at Brookberry Farm.

615 N. Main Street, Mount Airy, Surry County
The Robert E. Smith House, also known as The Blue House

• Sold for $385,000 on August 31, 2022 (listed at $425,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, 4,344 square feet (per county), 0.61 acre
• Price/square foot: $87
• Built in 1910
• Listed April 4, 2022
• Last sale: Unknown; it was bequeathed to its current owner, the Gilmer-Smith Foundation, by the will of interior designer and preservationist Gertrude Smith (1891-1981).
• Neighborhood: Mount Airy Historic District
• Note: The listing shows only 4,182 square feet.
  • The house served as the medical office of Gertrude Smith’s brother, Dr. Robert Edwin Smith (1897-1971). He was an ear, nose and throat specialist and a veteran of World Wars I and II.
  • Later, the house was the location of the Mount Airy Visitors Center and, for the past 17 years, the home of the Blue House Art Studio, which conducts art programs for special-needs artists. The home’s park-like backyard hosted summer music events.
  • The Blue House art program has been forced to close by the upcoming sale of the house. The Gilmer-Smith Foundation says it can no longer afford to maintain the programs and the house. It will continue to own the Gertrude Smith House at 708 N. Main, which is now a house museum, as dictated by Mrs. Smith’s will.
  • District NRHP nomination: “Two-and-one-half story frame Colonial Revival style house with projecting front and side bays.
  • “Tall corbelled chimneys extend above a high hip roof with gabled dormers; dormers accented by fanlighted windows and sawn shingles.
  • “Originally the house had a wrap-around one-story porch with sawn brackets; a portion remains as the south, side porch, where it was moved from the main elevation and replaced by an elaborate Federal style door surrounded by transom, sidelights and oversized dentils and metopes.”
  • The nomination identifies it with R.L. Haymore, a founder of the National Furniture Company, and his sister Martha.

809 Church Street, Gibsonville, Guilford County
Valhalla

• Sold for $625,000 on August 25, 2022 (listed at $625,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 2 2/12 bathrooms, 4,364 square feet, 16.28 acres
• Price/square foot: $143
• Built in 1904
• Listed June 3, 2022
• Last sale: $510,000. The property was bought in two transactions:
  • $390,000, December 2018, for the lot containing the house and 2.6 acres
  • $120,000, January 2019, for two adjoining parcels totaling 13.68 acres
• Note: The property includes a detached two-car garage with a studio apartment upstairs and an in-ground swimming pool and pool house.
  • The three parcels have been combined into one.
  • I haven’t been able to find anything on the history of this house, oddly. I’m still trying.

7980 Valley View Drive, Clemmons, Forsyth County
The Robert and Nancy Lasater House

• Sold for $2.65 million on August 24, 2022 (originally $3.9 million, later $2.2 million)
• 7 bedrooms, 8 full and 4 half bathrooms, 12,881 square feet, 4.45 acres
• Price/square foot: $206
• Built in 1928
• Listed October 9, 2009
• Last sale: $625,000, December 2006
• Neighborhood: Fair Oaks
• Note: Designed by Charles Barton Keen for Robert E. Lasater (1867-1954), an executive of R.J. Reynolds, and his wife, Nancy Margaret Lybrook Lasater (1877-1952), a niece of R.J. Reynolds. Nancy’s mother, Mary Josephine Reynolds Lybrook (1844-1888), was a sister of RJR. She was the first of 12 children; only seven survived to adulthood.
  • Landscape architecture by Thomas Sears, designer of Reynolda Gardens.
  • Listing: “One of the largest and most historical private homes in NC. Magnificent woodwork, intricate mural, crystal chandeliers, restored original Otis elevator … Circle drive / Antique Samuel Yelin wrought-iron staircase railing / Wide plank oak floors / Nine wood burning fireplaces / Intricate woodwork and molding / Restored Zuber wall mural / Antique chandeliers and sconces by E.F. Caldwell.”
  • The house has been listed and withdrawn without a sale several times since 2009.

• Sold for $850,000 on August 24, 2022 (originally $817,900, later $975,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 4,760 square feet, 0.36 acre
• Price/square foot: $179
• Built in 1930
• Listed December 10, 2020
• Last sale: $450,000, August 2010
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: The house includes an efficiency apartment with kitchenette.
  • The lower level has a two-story playroom/studio/home office), an office area with built-ins, shelving with an attached ladder and a media room.
  • The third floor is not counted in the square footage because of its low ceiling. It has a bedroom and a full bathroom.
  • The back of the house has a screened porch, tiered deck and patio with a stone fireplace.

4719 Groometown Road, Greensboro
The Groome Inn

• Sold on August 24, 2022, price not recorded on deed (listed at $1.25 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 6 1/2 bathrooms, 4,617 square feet, 7.8 acres
• Price/square foot: NA
• Built in 1900 (per county)
• Listed August 25, 2021
• Last sale: $249,000, November 2003
• B&B website: “A rich tobacco community of leaders named for Zachariah Groome (1827-1904) bought this farmland in 1888. The Groome Family built this particular house around 1890.”
  • Zachariah was born in Caswell County in 1827 or 1828 (sources differ). By 1840, his family had moved to Rockingham County. He lived there until 1883, serving as a county commissioner 1869-72.
  • He moved briefly to Randolph County before buying 500 acres of land southwest of Greensboro in Guilford County and establishing the Groometown community.
  • Zachariah married Louisa Blackburn (1823-1850) in 1849. He married Lavinia Jane Whittemore (1835-1898) in 1852. They had 12 children, 11 of whom survived to adulthood.

428 S. Main Street, Old Salem
The Dr. J.F. Shaffner House

• Sold for $1.899 million on August 23, 2022 (listed at $1.899 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 5 1/2 bathrooms, 7,124 square feet, 0.45 acre
• Price/square foot: $267
• Built in 1873
• Listed June 22, 2022
• Last sale: $600,000, March 2018
• Listing: “hidden secrets to be disclosed once under contract!”
  • The house includes an apartment with a kitchenette.
  • District NRHP nomination: “This fine example of the Second Empire style, the Shaffner House, is symbolic in many ways. Associated with three historically significant families in Salem: Shaffner, Vogler and Fries, the house represented growth and expanding wealth of Forsyth County in the 1870s and that manifestation in the town of Salem. In addition, the house was also a hotly-debated preservation issue during Old Salem’s first forty years, with many eager to remove it as an intrusion and interpret the important early pottery site on the lot.”
  • Located on the unusually large Lot 48, previously the site of a building that housed the Salem Pottery (1768-1829) and then the Concert Hall, the Temperance Society, the 1849 Forsyth County courthouse, and a school. The lot was sold to John Nissen in 1865 and then in 1868 to Dr. J.F. Shaffner (1838-1908).
  • “Shaffner, a Salem native and son of potter Heinrich Schaffner, was then recently back from service as a doctor in the Civil War. A protégé of Francis Fries since before the war, Shaffner became a prominent physician and was an active participant in the railroad, industrial pursuits, the Moravian Church, and the Town of Salem.
  • “By 1871, Dr. Shaffner was operating a drug store in a building constructed by Nissen on Lot 48. The pottery buildings were cleared and construction of the Shaffner House began in 1873 by Fogle Brothers Company.
  • “Elias A. Vogler was the architect of this new house for his niece Caroline Fries [1839-1922] (daughter of Francis and Lisetta Vogler Fries) and her husband Dr. Shaffner. Vogler was an artist and former merchant who had designed Salem Cemetery (1857) and stylistic renovations to homes in Salem in the 1870s.”
  • “It was the first large house to be built in Salem after the Civil War. The highly decorative, two-story brick house on a brick foundation has a clipped-corner, gray slate Mansard roof with concave sides. The house was set well back from the street and connected to the pre-existing drugstore and an icehouse by several porches.
  • “The main block of the house is five bays and has a pressed brick facade of running bond (other elevations common bond) with many decorative features, including red glass transoms and sidelights at the arched paneled double door centered entrance, richly ornamented pediments and bracketed sills at the tall four-over-four sash windows, and a center-bay tripartite window above the portico.
  • “There are pilaster strips at the corners, rectangular brick panels between paired scrolled brackets set on small molded shelves supporting wide eaves, and decorative hood molds at the round arch dormers.
  • “The tall brick end chimneys feature recessed arches above the roof line (south corbelling is missing). The paired brackets and brick panels at the cornice continue around the house; however, other decorative features are less apparent on other elevations.
  • “A large frame decorative bay window room on the south elevation served as a greenhouse for Dr. Shaffner. …
  • “Following the deaths of Dr. Shaffner and his adult son John Francis, Jr. [1874-1910], their widows (Caroline and Margeretta, respectively) had changes made to the house and lot in 1913. The drugstore and icehouse were removed and a two-story brick addition (with one-story rear brick section) was made to the north side of the house by Fogle Brothers. A new dining room and kitchen were included in this addition which is dominated by a large bay window on the first floor facade, the remaining fenestration (without decorative pediments and sills) and roof line continue from the main block. The three-bay front porch was altered at this time from Italianate to Classical Revival with four Ionic columns and a modillioned cornice. The 1874 main block and the 1913 addition blended together to create a unified and pleasing whole.”
  • Margeretta Shaffner (1874-1952) left the house in 1938, and things gradually got messy. The house was unoccupied until 1944, when it was bought by Evan and Emma Norwood, Moravian missionaries returning from China. They remodeled the house as six apartments and lived in one of them. Later, their son John took responsibility for the house.
  • “It was during the Norwood family’s ownership that the house became the subject of great controversy in the debate of the restoration in Old Salem. Because of the pottery site significance and because the Shaffner house was beyond the interpretive dates for Old Salem (1766-1856), there was a strong desire to acquire Lot 48 and remove the house. John Norwood repeatedly refused to sell the property for demolition.” John died in 1993, and his brother Wilson sold the house in 1994 to owners who restored it as their single-family residence.

2034 Buena Vista Road, Winston-Salem
The Ferrell-Myers House

• Sold for $1.22 million on July 22, 2022
• 6 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 5,746 square feet, 0.70 acre
• Price/square foot: $212
• Built in 1920
• Sold privately, not listed in MLS
• Last sale: $475,000, August 1987
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: County records give 1922 as the date of the house.
  • A “distinctive Renaissance Revival-style residence, which features stuccoed walls, deep bracketed eaves, a green Ludowici-Celadon roof and a second-floor loggia above a semi-circular entrance porch with fluted Doric columns.” (Winston-Salem’s Architectural Heritage by Heather Fearnbach, p. 241)
  • Designed by C. Gilbert Humphries. “Humphreys (1867-1945), a native of London, England, worked in New York City before coming to Winston-Salem … His expertise in various revival styles appealed to the city’s social and business leaders, and his work is especially notable in Winston-Salem’s premier early 20^th century residential suburbs and churches.” (North Carolina Architects & Builders: A Biographical Dictionary, N.C. State University Library)
  • One of the first houses in Buena Vista, it was built for William L. Ferrell (1860-1923) and Mary Sorilla Walker Ferrell (1862-1952). William was vice president of the Atlantic Coast Realty Company (note that Mr. Ferrell’s name was William; Wesley Luther Ferrell, cited in the book quoted above as the original owner, was one of his sons).
  • After William’s death in 1923, the house was bought by Oscar H. Davis (1874-1950) and Bertha Gray Webster Davis (1882-1936). Oscar was president of Gilmer Dry Goods Company and later president of United Cigar Stores, the nation’s largest cigar-store chain.
  • The Davises daughter, Dorothy Hilliard Davis (1917-1994), was a World War II pilot with the Women’s Air Force Service Pilots (WASPs). In the 1970s, she led the successful effort to make the U.S. government recognize the WASPs as military service veterans.
  • Ada Belle Leake Means (1888-1982) owned the house from 1930 to 1982. She was the widow of John H. Myers (1878-1927), who worked for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. Ada and John were living in Macon, Georgia, when he died at age 48.
  • “Mr. Myers died on July 27, 1927, leaving her a widow with the six children, the youngest of whom were twins aged 14 months, and all of her business affairs in the care of Wachovia Bank and Trust Company. With the help of her cousin, Ray Johnson, who was real estate chairman for Wachovia, the large family was moved to Buena Vista Road in the summer of 1930 after the oldest daughter had completed her high school education and was ready for college.” (findagrave.com)
  • Ada was president of the Juvenile Relief Association and was active in the Girl Scouts.
  • In 1987 the house was bought by Leslie M. “Bud” Baker, about whom the less said, the better.

2989 Thickety Creek Road, Mount Gilead, Montgomery County
The Haywood House
Blog post — The Haywood House, an 1802 Mansion near Mount Gilead, $350,000

• Sold for $425,000 on July 19, 2022 (listed at $350,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 4,330 square feet (per county), 10 acres
• Price/square foot: $98
• Built in 1802
• Listed May 8, 2022
• Last sale: $255,000, August 2001
• Listing: “Nestled on 10 acres and several hundred feet off the road, with a little updating and TLC the Haywood House would quickly become a show piece family homestead, Bed and Breakfast or Wedding venue.”
  • The listing shows 4,800 square feet.
  • The property is a few miles east of Mount Gilead in the Uwharrie National Forest.
  • The earliest Haywood associated with the house identifiable online is plantation owner William Haywood (1809-1888). He could have been the son of the builder, but an obituary in the Montgomery Vidette (apparently written by his son, then an editor at the paper) describes William’s father as “a comparatively poor man, and [William] therefore inherited nothing worth mentioning.”
  • William’s epitaph: “He died as he lived — a Christian”
  • According to the obituary, William had nine children by two wives (the first of whom, Elizabeth Robinson Haywood, is identified simply as “a Miss Robertson”). The most notable child appears to have been the youngest, Oscar Haywood (1868-1943, 37 years younger than his eldest half-sibling). At William’s direction, Oscar began preaching at age 12, apparently to the plantation’s former slaves. He entered Wake Forest College at age 14.
  • “His career as a Baptist minister was phenomenal, climaxing in his leadership in the consolidation of Collegiate and Calvary Baptist Churches of New York City, which resulted in a church with a membership of 3,000 and was one of the wealthiest churches in the world.” (Mount Gilead Pride on Facebook, quoting a 1980 presentation by Ms. Frances Haywood [1901-1994])
  • Not the most humble of the Lord’s messengers, Oscar lived at the Waldorf. It is said he returned to North Carolina in the first automobile ever seen in the state. Back again in Montgomery County, he gained fame as an orator and was elected to the state House of Representatives.
  • “Oscar inherited the plantation house with 180 acres in 1888. He made renovations to the house, which included a crystal chandelier from Europe, a hand-painted landscape mural, and the installation of carved doors which were a gift from one of the Rockefellers (a member of his church).
  • “He installed an art glass window (said to be commissioned by Tiffany Studios in NYC) in the library of the plantation house bearing the initials O.H. In Oscar’s day, the library contained inscribed books and manuscript letters by James Whitcomb Riley, numerous first editions by Oscar Wilde, O. Henry, Mark Twain, Robert G. Ingersoll, Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Nelson Page, Thomas Dixon, George W. Cable, James Lane Allen, Thomas Hardy, and William Cullen Bryant. …
  • “To quote an article written by George Reed Andrews for the Charlotte Observer in 1942: ‘Upon his return to his ancestral home here, in the Piedmont, Dr. Haywood was able to set up in the midst of the wide cotton fields a literary oasis which could scarcely be equalled in the most metropolitan quarters.'” (Mount Gilead Pride)
  • In his father’s memory, Oscar donated a stained glass window to First Baptist Church in Mount Gilead. Mount Gilead Pride: “‘The Empty Tomb’ (Artist Unidentified), arguably the most beautiful stained glass window in the NC Piedmont, adorns the sanctuary of First Baptist Church. Its enormous size and scale dominate the westward facing side of the sanctuary, and the sunsets work their magic each evening through the richly colored panes for those fortunate enough to find themselves inside at that hour.”
  • Oddly, two different woman are identified as Oscar’s wife at the time of his death. Contemporary obituaries listed “the former Mary Eaddy of New York,” who is apparently untraceable online. Ancestry.com and findagrave.com list Marion Davis Haywood (1930-1946), who died at age 15 or 16, the same year Oscar did. She was about 62 years younger than he was.

2202 Buena Vista Road, Winston-Salem
The John and Gertrude Eller House

• Sold for $975,000 on July 15, 2022 (listed at $975,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 4,073 square feet, 0.34 acre
• Price/square foot: $239
• Built in 1927
• Listed May 5, 2022
• Last sale: $275,000, March 1995
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: The property includes a two-car detached garage.
  • The address first appeared in the city directory in 1929, with John DeWalden Eller (1898-1978) and Alice Gertrude Seely Eller (1901-1987) as occupants. John was a traveling salesman.
  • John’s epitaph: “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help.”
  • Gertrude’s epitaph: “O heavenly father, who hast filled the world with beauty; open my eyes to behold thy gracious hand in all thy works.”

• Sold for $1.75 million on June 24, 2022 (originally $1.99 million)
• 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 6,713 square feet, 2.94 acres
• Price/square foot: $261
• Built in 1933
• Listed August 6, 2021
• Last sale: $77,000, May 1976
• Neighborhood: Fair Oaks
• Note: The house is on Lasater Lake, through which Blanket Creek flows on its way to the nearby Yadkin River.
  • The mill was designed by Northup & O’Brien. It was built as an outbuilding for Robert E. Lasater (1867-1954), an executive of R.J. Reynolds, and his wife, Nancy Margaret Lybrook Lasater (1877-1952), a niece of R.J. Reynolds. Nancy’s mother, Mary Josephine Reynolds Lybrook (1844-1888), was a sister of RJR; she was the first of 12 children, only seven of whom survived to adulthood.
  • Listing: The mill house is functional.
  • “Listing includes three additional parcels including a boat house/guest quarters.”
  • A website that was never fully built out suggests the house was or was going to be an art gallery around 2009.

227 W. Lebanon Street, Mount Airy, Surry County
The Cecil and Elizabeth Hennis House

• Sold for $285,000 on June 24, 2022 (listed at $299,900)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,262 square feet, 0.68 acre
• Price/square foot: $67
• Built in 1942 (per county)
• Listed April 26, 2022
• Last sale: $9,000, February 1976
• Neighborhood: Lebanon Hill Historic District
• District NRHP nomination: “Cecil F. Hennis Jr. and Elizabeth Fawcett Hennis had this two-story Colonial Revival house built in 1945, according to local tradition, although the war-related construction material shortages of the period suggest a slightly later date is possible (the house appears on the 1948 Sanborn map).
  • “The brick-veneered house sits well off the street and is reached by a long curving drive, in the spirit of the gracious houses and capacious lots of the nearby Taylor Park development.
  • “The symmetrical five-bay main block has an exterior brick chimney on the left gable end and a one-story side wing with irregular fenestration on the other end. A two-story wing extends to the rear.
  • “The front entry has a wood panel door and features a broken pediment with dentils and a center urn and, below, fluted pilasters.
  • “The replacement windows have a six-over-six pattern that may evoke the original sash pattern. The roof is composite-shingled.”
  • Cecil, his father and uncle Edgar Harvey Hennis were the proprietors of Hennis Motor Cars, the local Chrysler-Plymouth dealer. Cecil was a Navy veteran of World War II.
  • Uncle Edgar’s house is on the National Register of Historic Places.

6265 Yadkinville Road, Pfafftown, Forsyth County

• Sold for $765,000 on June 13, 2022 (originally $749,900, later $774,900)
• 3 bedrooms, 4 full bathrooms, 2 half-bathrooms, 5,295 square feet, 4.57 acres
• Price/square foot: $144
• Built in 1925
• Listed August 31, 2021
• Last sale: $560,000, August 2018
• Note: The property includes an indoor salt water exercise pool and pool-house, a tennis court and a 100-plus-year-old barn.
  • An adjoining 13.42-acre parcel is available for purchase.
  • New septic system
  • Replacement windows

212 Worth Street, Asheboro, Randolph County
The D.B. McCrary House

• Sold for $400,000 on June 9, 2022
• 6 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 4,100 square feet, 0.57 acre
• Price/square foot: $98
• Built in 1890
• Not listed for sale in MLS
• Last sale: $45,000, October 1985
• Note: The house is built on the site of the home of Gov. Jonathan Worth (1802-1869), who served after the Civil War from 1865 to 1868 (that home no longer exists). The house was built by Doctor Bulla McCrary (1875-1946), known as “D.B.” (for more on his unusual name, see “Doctor Bulla McCrary” in The Strangest Names in American Political History). Also on the site are the homes of D.B.’s two sons, Charles Walker McCrary and James Franklin McCrary, both of which are Randolph County Historic Landmarks.
  • D.B. was born on a farm near Asheboro and attended Oak Ridge Military Academy and Trinity College, before its move to Durham.
  • NCpedia: “His earliest business experience was as a dealer in timber products. In 1898 he established residence in Asheboro where he opened a hardware and farm implement store in partnership with Thomas Henry Redding, who became his brother-in-law. In 1908 the two acquired Acme Hosiery Mills, a small plant in Asheboro making women’s cotton stockings. In 1916 they purchased Sapona Cotton Mills, which had been operating as a cotton yarn mill in nearby Cedar Falls for about eighty years. Sapona was a source of yarn for the hosiery plant until cotton was superseded by silk and synthetic fibers.
  • “McCrary Hosiery Mills was established in 1927 to produce ladies’ full-fashioned silk stockings to complement the circular knit product made in Acme. In 1936 the cotton mill became the Sapona Manufacturing Company, converting to silk processing at the time and later to the production of nylon and other synthetic textured yarns. With the acquisition of Marlowe Manufacturing Company of Florence, S.C., after McCrary’s death, the textile complex that he had founded became Acme-McCrary Corporation, one of the largest of its kind.”
  • McCrary led the establishment of Randolph Hospital and served as mayor of Asheboro and as a district commissioner and interim chairman of the N.C. State Highway Commission.
  • Later, the home was bought by Bartlette B. Walker (1922-1973), CEO of the B.B. Walker Shoe Company. He started the business in 1947. It is still operating, selling mainly to wholesalers. In 1985, the property passed from his widow, Edna Andrews Walker (1924-2020), to their children, Bartlette Jr. and Lorraine W. Foster, the sellers in this sale.

625 N. Main Street, Mount Airy, Surry County
The Galloway-Lovill House

• Sold for $500,000 on June 1, 2022 (originally listed at $465,000, later as low as $440,000 and as high as $525,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,238 square feet, 0.46 acre
• Price/square foot: $118
• Built in 1903
• Listed May 3, 2018
• Last sale: $66,500, August 1989
• Neighborhood: Mount Airy Historic District (NRHP)
• Listing: “Pre-Qualified Buyers Only!”
  • Property includes an outbuilding with electricity, water and heat.
  • District NRHP nomination: “Substantial two-and-one-half story frame Colonial Revival style house with high hipped roof, hipped dormers, wrap-around porch and wide molded frieze carried by tapered box posts, molded corner boards, one-over-one windows, and a well-defined Colonial Revival interior.
  • “The unaltered house is sheathed with German siding and the dormers are ornamented with sawn shingles. The elaborate entrance surround features Doric pilasters set on paneled wooden plinths, projecting corner blocks and a heavily molded lintel.
  • “The house was built by Harry Galloway during the first decade of the 20th century, but owned by the James Lovill family for more than half a century.”
  • James Walter Lovill (1880-1963) was president of G.C. Lovill Company, a wholesale grocer, and vice president of the Mount Airy Produce Exchange, of which his brother, Grover Cleveland Lovill, was president. James also was vice president of the Mount Airy Granite Cutting Company and Mount Airy Knit Company. He operated a tobacco warehouse as well.

830 Oaklawn Avenue, Winston-Salem

• Sold for $1.18 million on May 31, 2022 (listed at $1.25 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 4,809 square feet (per county), 0.67 acre
• Price/square foot: $245
• Built in 1924
• Listed April 2, 2022
• Last sale: $860,000, May 2004
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: The listing shows only 4,363 square feet.
  • The property includes a guest house with an exercise room.

2210 Granville Road, Greensboro
The Joseph and Juanita Gorrell House

• Sold for $1.375 million on May 25, 2022 (listed at $1.299 million)
• 6 bedrooms, 7 bathrooms, 8,207 square feet, 0.77 acre
• Price/square foot: $168
• Built in 1958
• Listed June 21, 2021
• Last sale: $650,000, June 1997
• Neighborhood: New Irving Park
• Note: The property includes a swimming pool.
  • The 2100 and 2200 blocks of Granville Place, the two blocks north of Cornwallis Drive, first appeared in the city directory in 1959.
  • The first owners were Joseph Palmer Gorrell (1927-2003) and Juanita Taylor Gorrell (1928-1994). He was a career executive with Pilot Life and Jefferson-Pilot, retiring as vice president of the Securities Department. He was a Navy veteran of World War II and a graduate of Duke University and the Diplomatic School at Georgetown University. In 1992 he passed ownership to his daughter Eva Jane Gorrell Hendrix, who sold the house in 1996.

1201 Crescent Drive, Mount Airy, Surry County
The Lindsey Holcomb House

• Sold for $595,000 on May 17, 2022 (originally $650,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 5 1/2 bathrooms, 4,326 square feet, 1.34 acres
• Price/square foot: $138
• Built in 1935
• Listed August 16, 2021
• Last sale: $175,000, July 1989
• Neighborhood: Taylor Park
• Note: Slate roof
  • Listing: “Shown to qualified buyers only.”
  • District NRHP nomination: “The Winston-Salem architectural firm of Northup and O’Brien designed this rambling Colonial Revival residence for H. Lindsey Holcomb in 1934. Holcomb was an executive with Mount Airy’s Pine State knitwear company, along with John Springthorpe Sr. whose 1937 house is also in Taylor Park. The two-story brick-veneered house was completed the following year.
  • “The architects artfully juxtaposed the two-story core section with other sections of one, one-and-a- half, and two-story height, set in line or at right angles to the core, in order to create the appearance of a house with a long additive evolution. The multiple gable roof planes are sheathed with slate shingles and the white-painted brickwork has randomly projecting broken bricks that create an aged, weather-beaten look.
  • “Dentil cornices, formed by corbeled header bricks, cross the front elevations of the two-story side-gable core and a slightly lower two-story section which telescopes from the core’s north gable end. The non-symmetrical placement and grouping of the many six-over-six wood sash windows adds to the overall effect of age and accretive development.
  • “The front entry features a classical surround with dentils and a broken pediment with a center urn. An ornamental metal grille covers the front door. Chimneys, one interior and one exterior, punctuate the two main gable ends and a bay window projects from the front of a one-story front wing.
  • “A story-and-a-half wing connects to a three-bay garage at the rear, which has three gabled dormers on its roof. The connection is shown as open-air on the 1948 Sanborn map but is now enclosed.”

407 Hillcrest Drive, High Point
The Robert K. Amos House

• Sold for $531,300 on May 5, 2022 (listed at $489,900)
• 5 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 4,203 square feet, 0.44 acre
• Price/square foot: $126
• Built in 1939
• Listed March 31, 2022
• Last sale: $390,000, January 2021
• Neighborhood: Emerywood/Uptown Suburbs Historic District (NRHP)
• Note: The listing shows only 3,875 square feet.
  • The property includes a detached garage with an unfinished second-floor room.
  • RealtorTalk: “Stunningly unique”
  • District NRHP nomination: “This two-story, side-gabled, Colonial Revival-style house has been significantly altered with the addition of a stone veneer on the first-floor facade and covering the two exterior end chimneys.
  • “The house is three bays wide and double-pile with vinyl siding on the second-floor level and vinyl windows. Two sixteen-light picture windows on the first-floor facade project slightly under flared, hipped copper roofs.
  • “The replacement door has a one-piece sidelight and transom and is sheltered by an octagonal porch with a flared copper roof and supported by slender columns.
  • “A one-and-a-half-story, side-gabled wing on the right (west) elevation has two gabled dormers on the front. A one-story, shed-roofed porch on the left (east) elevation is supported by square posts with arched openings and has been enclosed with screens.
  • The earliest known occupants were R. Kenner Amos (dates unknown) and his wife, Melvin Hayes Amos (1924-2016) in 1942. Amos was manager of Melrose Hosiery Mills.
  • Melvin lived in the house until 1968, when she sold it and moved to the home they built in Holden Beach in 1959. She was a Girl Scout leader and president of the Keyauwee Area Girl Scout Council. She served as secretary of the Holden Beach Zoning Board and was a board member of Holden Beach Property Owners.

102 W. Decatur Street, Madison, Rockingham County
The Charles B. Pratt House

• Sold for $440,000 on April 21, 2022 (listed at $399,900)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 4,049 square feet, 0.49 acre
• Price/square foot: $109
• Built in 1895
• Listed March 4, 2022
• Last sale: $234,000, March 2001
• Neighborhood: Decatur-Hunter Historic District (local)
• Note: The property includes a detached five-car garage.
  • An antique store operated in the house in the 1980s.
  • Charles Benton Pratt Sr. (1858-1928) was a merchant, businessman and livestock agent in Madison. He started a general merchandise store with his brother Thomas Ruffin Pratt (1856-1931); it later became the Pratt Hardware and Furniture Company.
  • “They sold farm implements, household hardware, building supplies and funeral supplies,” according to Following the Trails of the Southern Pratts, by F. P. Pratt. “They were the local agents for Oliver Plow Company and sold Majestic wood kitchen ranges. Charles also was livestock agent and sold horses, mules, and other livestock.”
  • The brothers also operated a funeral home.
  • Charles and Thomas had nine siblings. Two died in childhood; five others died by age 36.

959 Wellington Road, Winston-Salem
The Pratt-Taylor-Kelly House

• Sold for $1.577 million on April 8, 2022 (listed at $1.699 million)
• 3 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 5,043 square feet, 1.72 acres
• Price/square foot: $313
• Built in 1954
• Listed March 15, 2022
• Last sale: $250,000, May 1976
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: A 1950s mansion unusually rich in exterior detail, including two front-gable wings on either side of the center section, which features a curved portico, dentil molding under the eaves and corners with quoins.
  • The property includes a circle drive, detached two-car garage, and a pool and pool house.
  • The address first appears in the city directory in 1955 as 959 Kinleigh Street, the only house on the street and the first time the street itself was listed. The original owner was the colorful Geraldine Fleshman Pratt, who bought the property in 1954. She was a 1923 graduate of Salem College. For many years society columns found her in New York City, Winston-Salem and West Palm Beach. She was invariably identified as Mrs. Stewart C. Pratt; he was a New York investment banker (Stewart Camden Pratt, 1885-1951).
  • Geraldine was at least a part-time resident of Winston-Salem as early as 1940. She bought several properties in Winston-Salem in the early 50s, but her name didn’t appear in the city directory until 1955. In 1958, she sold the house to the Stratford Investment Corporation.
  • Geraldine’s moment of fame came two years later when she successfully went to court to adopt her 4-year-old granddaughter.
  • In 1959 the house — on the now-renamed Wellington Road — was sold to William Mills Taylor (1916-1979) and Margaret Parks Taylor (1925-2019). He was the local agency manager for Security Life and Trust. They sold it in 1976.
  • The current sellers bought the house from the Taylors in 1976.

• Sold for $709,900 on April 8, 2022 (originally $724,900)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,201 square feet, 11.67 acres
• Price/square foot: $169
• Built in 1850
• Listed February 14, 2022
• Last sale: $585,000, November 2019
• Note: The property includes a three-car detached garage with guest quarters and a barn.
  • The house has been homogenized to look as much like a modern home as possible (vinyl siding, what look to be replacement windows, etc.), particularly on the inside.

1040 Arbor Road, Winston-Salem
The Alex and Mamie Gray Galloway House

• Sold for $2.1 million on March 24, 2022 (listed at $2.385 million)
• 6 bedrooms, 6 full bathrooms and two half-bathrooms, 8,461 square feet, 2.23 acres
• Price/square foot: $248
• Built in 1926
• Listed September 2, 2021
• Last sale: $1.71 million, September 2006
• Neighborhood: Reynolda Park
• Note: Designed by Luther Lashmit, original landscape design by Thomas Sears
  • Designated as a Forsyth County historic landmark, qualifying it for a tax credit of up to 50 percent
  • The main house’s entire slate roof was replaced in 2019.
  • The property includes 1,458-square-foot guesthouse with recently remodeled kitchen and bath, not included in the square footage.
  • The house was built for Alexander Henderson Galloway Jr. (1870-1935) and Mary Eliza “Mamie” Gray Galloway (1876-1944). Alex had a diverse career among Winston-Salem’s leading corporations, including Brown Brothers Tobacco Company, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco and Wachovia Bank. Later he was a partner in the Galloway and Jenkins Insurance Agency before serving as manager of the Carolina and Zinzendorf hotels.
  • Mamie attended Salem Academy and at Miss Carey’s School in Baltimore. She and Alex married in 1901. She was a younger sister of Bowman Gray, who became president and chairman of RJR. He also was a benefactor and the original namesake of the medical school at Wake Forest University. Their father, James Alexander Gray, was one of the founders of Wachovia.
  • Alex died in an auto accident on the Greensboro-Winston-Salem highway. Mamie suffered a stroke that night and died nine years later after another stroke.

209 Shadow Valley Road, High Point, Davidson County

• Sold for $815,000 on March 24, 2022 (listed at $749,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, 4,690 square feet, 4.21 acres
• Price/square foot: $174
• Built in 1940
• Listed February 11, 2022
• Last sale: $550,000, March 2017
• Neighborhood: Emerywood Estates
• Note: The property is barely west of the High Point city limits and Guilford County line in Davidson County. The houses across the street back up to the city/county line.
  • The property includes a 528 square-foot guesthouse with 1 bedroom and one bathroom.

349 Pine Valley Road NW, Winston-Salem
The Thad and Nell Lewallen House

• Sold for $980,615 on March 11, 2022 (listed at $1.2 million)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 full bathrooms, 2 half-bathrooms, 4,718 square feet (per county), 1.28 acres
• Price/square foot: $208
• Built in 1946
• Listed November 8, 2021
• Last sale: $285,000, May 1981
• Neighborhood: Buena Vista
• Note: Designed by William Roy Wallace
  • The listing shows 5,831 square feet.
  • The property’s original address was 410 Westview Drive.
  • The house was built by Alvis Thad Lewallen (1888-1945) and his wife, Nell Shippey Lewallen (1897-1979). They bought the property in 1943. After Thad’s death, Nell owned it until 1965.
  • In 1936, Thad was a partner in Bennett-Lewallen, a wholesaler of candy, fountain supplies, over-the-counter drugs, tobacco and other products, when he bought the rights to Goody’s Headache Powder from local druggist Martin Goodman. Although Goody’s was created after rival products B.C. and Stanback, Thad turned it into the market leader (and sponsor of Richard Petty). After his death at age 57, Nell and, later, their daughter, Ann Lewallen Spencer (1928-2016), ran the company. It was sold to GlaxoSmithKline in 1995 and then to Prestige Brands in 2012. (Click here for more on the company and the headache-powder industry)

2011 Granville Road, Greensboro
The L. Homer Hole House

• Sold for $1.5 million on February 25, 2022 (originally $1.75 million)
• 7 bedrooms, 5 full bathrooms and two half-baths, 7,247 square feet, 1.4 acres
• Price/square foot: $207
• Built in 1926
• Listed May 10, 2021
• Last sale: $850,000, October 1987
• Neighborhood: Irving Park
• Greensboro: An Architectural Record: “A full-height portico of four columns fronts this Neoclassical Revival-style dwelling. In its shadow, the central entry is framed by an oversized Palladian surround.”
  • Lemuel Homer Hole (1874-1948) and Marguerite Forbes Hole (1885-1941) were the original owners. He was in the insurance business, according to the city directory (Greensboro: An Architectural Record says he was an executive with N.C. Public Service Company; the city directory’s roster of executives for the company doesn’t include him). He later served on the city Planning and Park Commission.

623 Woodland Drive, Greensboro
The Norman and Mildred Cooper House

• Sold for $1.635 million on February 18, 2922 (listed at $1.599 million)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,424 square feet, 0.44 acre
• Price/square foot: $370
• Built in 1933
• Listed February 8, 2022
• Last sale: $1.01 million, February 2015
• Neighborhood: Irving Park
• Note: The property includes a detached two-car garage, workshop, playhouse and separate bike storage.
  • The property was bought in 1934 by Norman Copes Cooper (1904-1972) and Mildred Hudgins Cooper (1909-1997), who owned it for 49 years. The address first appears in the city directory in 1935 (as 723 Woodland). Norman was district agent for the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company. Mildred served as president of the Children’s Home Society in 1945 and was active in the organization for many years. After Norman’s death, Mildred stayed in the house until she sold it in 1983.

907 Rockford Road, High Point
The Charles Kearns House

• Sold for $712,500 on January 26, 2022 (originally $775,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,306 square feet, 2.58 acres
• Price/square foot: $165
• Built in 1946
• Listed September 4, 2021
• Last sale: $235,000, May 1980
• Neighborhood: Emerywood
• Note: The original owner was Charles Leslie Kearns (1910-1979), executive vice president of Crown Hosiery Mills, which was founded by his father, Gurney Harriss Kearns. Charles was a longtime member of the Greensboro-High Point Airport Authority, president of the High Point Rotary Club and director of the Chamber of Commerce, High Point Hospital and other organizations. His brother, Amos, was secretary-treasurer of Crown Hosiery and served as mayor of High Point.

5405 Mecklenburg Road, Sedgefield, Guilford County

• Sold for $850,000 on January 6, 2022
• 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 4,326 square feet (per county), 1.12 acres
• Price/square foot: $196
• Built in 1940
• Not listed publicly for sale in MLS
• Last sale: $580,000, December 2017
• Neighborhood: Sedgefield
• Note: The property includes a two-car carport and an in-ground swimming pool. It’s located in the Sedgefield Country Club Golf Course.