The waning Northern economy made me start looking for a new direction in life. A friend from New York was traveling south quite a bit for business and said I should check out North Carolina. Their economy was booming and would be a good place to possibly set up shop. Taking the plunge, I moved south of the Mason-Dixon line to a new world and adventure!
I couldn't wait to find the stately, white columned mansion so fondly depicted in many a movie and novel of the early twentieth century. When I arrived permanently I was shocked to discover that this part of the state not only did it not possess many historic houses, but were also priced in the stratosphere. I could not touch even a 1920s bungalow for under $300,000!!!! So my dreams had been dashed of finding that structure that was the epitome of the "Old South".
My business partner and I established our design/build firm creating high end homes in subdivisions around the area, but on weekends I was out looking for a historic project to feed my illness! Unfortunately again, the small towns in this part of N.C. did not boost a bounty of treasures waiting to be found. So I had to keep casting my net out farther all the time. This lead me to different places I had never heard of and none the less been to!!!!
My spouse was of southern descent and took me to small towns and large cities in other parts of the South where we explored these communities in hopes of finding a new place to settle and bring back to life! Our search took us from North Carolina through its southern sister all the way to the top of Florida where it still feels like the "South" with live oaks and waving palmettos. The search was futile until one day I suggested looking in Virginia. To much surprise my spouse exclaimed that "Tarheels" did not cross that dividing line into its northern neighbor. Well, I thought the looking had come to an end and we would then start going more into the interior sections of Georgia to possibly find that gem of the past!
Several weeks had passed and my spouse called me up to the computer to see what had appeared. When I looked at the screen I was taken a back! Not because a beauty of 18th century architecture that was 95% original loomed in front of me on the screen, but because my spouse had found it in Virginia!!!!! Within a few days we had made the appointment to go see the home.
We were both astounded when we walked in the front door. The foyer was entirely made of heart pine and the average boards were at least ten inches wide. We passed from room to room in awe of this beauty and finished our tour on the third floor which was used as a ballroom during the Federal period. The house possessed everything we were looking for in its originality and not being bastardized through the decades. The home had received a ground up museum restoration in 1972, but the children of the original restorers did not want it. Still we were not convinced that this was the house for us.
It was originally built in 1773 in what you could call vernacular colonial style. A one and a half story structure with a boxed staircase with one room down and one up. The historic register called it a plantation to begin with, but it was quickly converted to a tavern since it lie on the stagecoach route between New York and New Orleans. By the early 1800s it was expanded with a large two and a half story addition. What is so rare about this structure is that it's in the county, but the inside was done with very high finishes of its time. Doors are faux grained to look like mahogany; baseboards marbleized; wainscoting painted to resemble very expensive woods and highly carved mantles that possessed dazzling painting schemes. Our problem was that the two dining rooms of the tavern were very large and would be difficult to furnish. The other rooms were more manageable, but still had challenges. Undeterred we bought the house.
After more than a decade, I finally owned an historic house once again! My jitters and withdrawal symptoms had faded.
