GEORGE LYON HOUSE/ FIRST GEORGE WATTS HOUSE / CALVERT (DURHAM) ACADEMY

As detailed in other posts, Eugene Morehead and George Watts were pioneers in the area that would become Morehead Hill when they built their houses on the western side of Lee (later Duke) St. in 1880. As the activity in the neighborhood increased, WT Blackwell sought to purchase the land on the eastern side of Duke St., directly across from their houses, to build worker housing for employees of Blackwell's Durham Tobacco Co. Evidently this was too close to the common folk for Watts, who purchased the land to avert this sale.


(Courtesy Duke Archives)

The George Watts house, picutred above in its original location, was originally built by George W. Watts in 1890, at the northwest corner of Lee St. (now South Duke) and Proctor St.

In the late 1890s, George Watts moved his original house across the street, to the northeast corner of Proctor and S. Duke, in order to make way for his larger mansion, Harwood Hall. The house was renovated and used by John Sprunt Hill and his wife Annie when they returned to Durham from New York in 1903, before they built their own house in 1911.

On the southeast corner of Morehead Ave. and S. Duke, George Lyon, a grandson of Washington Duke, built a stone and frame house. Lyon owned the first car in Durham, and also was a champion marksman, representing the US in the 1912 Stockholm Olympics in trap shooting. Lyon was married to Snowden Carr, the daughter of LA Carr - who lived one block to the south. Lyon, unfortunately, died of tuberculosis in 1916 at age 35, and the house was subsequently owned by his brother, J.B. Lyon.

The use of the old George Watts house from 1911 to 1937 is unknown, but it evidently stayed in the family.

By the 1930s George Watts Hill, Sr., and his wife Ann and were disappointed by the quality of the education George Watts Hill, Jr. was receiving at Morehead Hill Elementary - per Watts Hill, Sr., the only thing his son had learned to do at Morehead Elementary "[was] to 'cuss'."

Ann Hill's family was replete with teachers, and she tapped their information for another solution. This pointed her towards the Calvert School of Baltimore, which had been founded by an educator named Virgil Mores Hillyer. Hillyer had designed a homeschooling program for children of parents living outside of the county, and thus without access to US schools. He had produced an entire curriculum, including books and supplies.

In the summer of 1933, Ann Hill and the mothers of six other children arranged for the use of the Forest Hills clubhouse, which had bought by her father-in-law along with the old golf course 3 years prior, for the school, which they called the Calvert Method School. They began with a single teacher and slowly grew. By 1937, they had outgrown the Forest Hills Clubhouse with 19 students; George and Ann Watts arranged for the school to take over the old George Watts house at 815 S. Duke; Watts Hill set up a $15,000 mortgage for the school through Durham Bank and Trust and paid for a $9000 renovation of the house.

The school had grown to 210 students by 1950 and 16 teachers.


Looking southeast, 1950.


The Calvert School in 1960, looking northeast from Proctor and S. Duke.

The school purchased the Lyon house (also known as the Williams house) in 1957, and constructed a modern kindergarten building between the two structures.


Williams House, 1960.


Modern kindergarten building, 1960.


Kids playing in the playground behind the buildings, overlooking Willard St. and American Tobacco, ~early 1960s.


Aerial photo of the whole complex, 1959.

In 1967, the school moved out to 751 (the eponymous Academy Rd.) and expanded to a high school, changing its name to Durham Academy. These houses / buildings were abandoned.


The old Watts house, abandoned, early 1970s.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)


Interior shot, early 1970s.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)


Interior shot, early 1970s.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

Below, the only picture I have of the old Lyon house at 803 S. Duke St., also abandoned.

Looking east from S. Duke St.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

These houses were demolished by Durham in the mid-1970s to construct public housing - the JJ Henderson towers.


Under construction, July 1976.


Under construction, July 1976.

I posted my feelings about high-rise public housing for elderly and disabled awhile ago when there was a fire in this structure, here. Namely, I think it is a bad thing - disempowering of both groups. I wish I would see folks who live in this building be able to make it one long block down the hill to American Tobacco, which seems a much more convivial environment than this stark grey slab.


Looking northeast from Proctor and S. Duke - site of the old George Watts home / Durham Acadmey, 01.01.08


Looking southeast from S. Duke and Morehead Ave., site of the old George Lyon house, 01.01.08.