Greenfire moves to Tear Down Three Historic Downtown Buildings

Left-to-right, 122, 120, and 118 West Main St., 07.24.08

In disappointing but not-very-surprising news, Greenfire has applied to the planning department to demolish three buildings in the downtown historic district: 118, 120, and 122 West Main St. This action would remove 50% of the buildings from this block face, and leave only one relatively-intact historic structure on this side of the street.

I asked Mike Lemanski about this at the public meeting to discuss our public subsidy of Greenfire's development plans, because the historic structures on the renderings clearly disappear. He gave me a refreshingly honest, if vague, answer: "That would be a fair assumption." Carl Webb gave a more defensive, meandering, and less forthright response about looking at "[their] track record".

The fact is that there has been a concerted effort to tear down these buildings for years now, because the ambitions of a varied group of downtown players who believe that something that meets their criteria for impressiveness needs to sit on the northeast corner of West Main and Corcoran Streets.

In fact, the fight to save these buildings directly resulted in my decision to start this website, two years ago this week. I retroactively published an op-ed column I wrote for the Herald-Sun in January 2006 on this site much later, which you can read here. That column earned the ire of the city and my former colleagues at Preservation Durham alike for its criticism of the city's involvement in the push to tear down some of our few remaining downtown historic structures, supposedly protected by local historic district status.

This was the point at which I lost patience with NIS, then still part of Housing and Community Development, an organization I had politely pled my case to many times, despite the persistently deaf ears those arguments fell upon.

It seemed back then that we could at least hope that the Historic Preservation Commission and our local historic districts could act as a bulwark, albeit a leaky one, against the (seemingly) inexorable tide of demolition in this town. Unfortunately a bristling group of later-NIS folks appearing in front of the Historic Preservation Commission and denying the authority of the HPC to stop the demolition of 120 W. Main back in 2006 resulted in just such a shift in power becoming reality. One of several loopholes in the city's preservation ordinance is the ability to tear down unsafe structures without delay. The point is to be able to avert a public health calamity posed by a building that will imminently collapse. Unfortunately, this loophole is like red meat to a demolition-focused department. When the city attorney confirmed that the HPC could not delay the demolition of 'unsafe' structures, NIS simply proceeded, and proceeds, to deem structures they want to demolish as unsafe. This has had much larger ramifications for the loss of historic structures in Durham. But, 2.5 years ago they argued such about 120 West Main and pushed to demolish it immediately because of the imminent threat it posed to the public.

Somehow, that structural instability was averted by a Greenfire purchase, or perhaps a coat of magic green paint, as NIS hasn't been heard from since on these buildings.

The desire to clear out this block for something Impressive dates back further, to the case made to tear down the Woolworth's structure, the last remnant of the truly impressive Geer Building that once stood on the corner. I was less informed about things-Durham back in 1999-2000, but the building, transferred to the city from Woolworth's for $1, came down in a hazy indictment of 'toxic mold' and asbestos - while there was clearly a desire to build something Important to replace it.

Enter Greenfire, which has shown renderings of their proposed tower, which I'll dub the Pickle on Parrish. (Have your own alliterative fun with "Corcoran" and "Woolworth".) But really, I don't have anything against the architecture per se (not that it's anything more than a gauzy rendering at this point) - simply the notion that it is somehow so important to build something outsized on this block that we must demolish historic structures to accommodate it.

In a politically savvy move, by allying this structure with the Parrish Street museum-without-walls concept, denying this structure can be framed, if convenient, as counter to the celebration of 'Black Wall Street.' But really, tearing down history to enshrine history? Does this make any sense?

If there's anything I hope to have accomplished with this website, in the 2 years I've been doing it (as of this week) it's to hopefully have put the loss of these structures in perspective for people in the community. They aren't just a couple of buildings, but a set of structures built immediately after the big fire of 1914. 122 is the Pritchard-Bright Building, clothing retailers, and longtime Eckerd's drugstore. 120 is the Pollard Building, longtime Silver's five and dime store. 118 was the Straus-Rosenberg building, later Roscoe-Griffin and VanStraaten's clothing store. They are the the meager remnants of our once-very-urban and bustling downtown. We don't have a lot left of the historic fabric of Durham.

Local historic districts were ostensibly created to protect these fragile resources. Unfortunately, their weak protections (a maximum 365 day delay) have been further diluted by the city. It isn't even clear whether Greenfire needs the approval of the historic commission to proceed, as NIS has previous used the Big Ol' Rubber Stamp that says 'unsafe' on the buildings.

And really, given the fact that Greenfire has asked for the public's help in funding this development and others, one has to ask if we, as a city, are going to not only take an entirely spineless role in protecting our historic resources, but also take an active role in subsidizing their destruction through public financing?

These buildings will come before the Historic Preservation Commission on August 5th - I'm not convinced that the HPC can actually avert their demolition, but make your voice heard, and attend the hearing if you can. Don't be surprised if Greenfire chooses to delay a cycle or two, though.


118, 120, and 122 West Main, looking west, early 1920s.
(Courtesy Durham County Library / North Carolina Collection

THE RESTOVER / CC WOODS HOUSE

(Courtesy Jon and Shannon Thornburg)

Carl C. Woods, a general contractor later known simply as "CC Woods" built the large house at 217 West Geer St. around 1939-1940. It evidently served solely as the primary residence for him and his wife until about 1948, when they opened a 'tourist hotel' (a bed-and-breakfast of sorts) in their home. The obverse side of the above postcard reads:

"Private or Connecting Baths and Showers, Steam heat, Beauty Sleep Mattresses. The Restover - Tourist

Mrs. CC Woods
217 W Geer Street

Running Water in Rooms
US Highway 15 and 501
Durham NC"

The Woods evidently lived in the house and ran the Restover until 1959, when it appears they moved elsewhere, and the house became an apartment building. It appears that it has been such ever since, albeit in ever-declining form as the neighborhood fell on increasingly harder times. Most recently, it appears to have suffered from a bad case of off-the-rack-window home depotitis. If the window doesn't fit, just shrink the opening.


217 West Geer, 07.24.08

The house was purchased by CASA in 2010 and is being renovated as apartments


04.17.11


36.003682 -78.897471

EPHPHATHA CHURCH

(Courtesy Durham County Library / North Carolina Collection)

A fascinating bit of relative uniqueness surrounds the handsome but otherwise unremarkable church at the northeast corner of West Geer and North Streets. When constructed in 1930, the Gothic Revival church was one of only four in the country exclusively for deaf worshipers; services were conducted entirely in American Sign Language.

The historic inventory recounts how the church came to be. When Reverend Oliver Whidlin, a minister who worked with impaired-hearing worshipers in Baltimore, came to give an ASL sermon at St. Philip's Episcopal in 1906, the response was so strong that Rev. Bost of St. Philip's organized special ASL Sunday School classes. Interest remained strong, and in 1926, Bost commenced a fund-raising drive to build a church that would conduct business in sign language. By 1930, the cornerstone for the George Watts Carr, Sr.-designed church was laid, and services began in May 1931.

Rev. Roma Fortune, himself hearing-impaired, served as the first rector of the church, and was succeeded by his son, James Fortune; both served as ministers to the deaf throughout North Carolina. James was still rector of the church in 1977, when the church ceased to operate in this building.

It appears to now house the "Full Gospel Tabernacle".


Looking northeast, 06.07.08

36.003996 -78.897661

911 N. MANGUM - JAMES MANNING HOUSE

911 N. Mangum, 1980

One of Durham earliest extant houses, and certainly one of its most elaborate surviving houses is the James Manning house, at 911 N. Mangum St. Constructed circa 1880 by attorney and, later, Judge James Manning, the house is an exuberant demonstration of the Queen Anne Style - a multifaceted roofline, projecting offset gables, copious sawnwork ornamentation adorning the gables and a polygonal wrap-around porch. The interior is no less decorated, featuring plaster ceiling medallions and frequent ornate mantelpieces. A small room projecting from the north side of the house served as Manning's office.

The Manning family was prominent in early Durham, as well as Chapel Hill. James' brother John Manning, who had his own stately house on N. Dillard St. was a physician, health officer, and mayor of Durham. Brother Isaac Manning became Dean of the medical school at UNC; Manning Drive, which runs in front of the hospital, is named for him. Judge Howard Manning, who appears in the news from time-to-time chastising low-performing schools, is a contemporary member of the family, as is local physician Stuart Manning.

James Manning later moved to Raleigh when he became Attorney General of North Carolina. The house at 911 N. Mangum was later owned by the Whitted family and the Guthrie family.

In the mid-1980s, the house was featured in the movie "Bull Durham" as the candle-strewn home of Annie Savoy. Some people locally therefore refer to the house as the "Bull Durham House."

Per Jeff and Trudy Burdette, who purchased the house in 1996, it was in significant disrepair when they acquired it.


911 N. Mangum, 1996.
(Courtesy Jeff and Trudy Burdette)

They undertook a painstaking, multi-year renovation of the entire house before selling it to new owners last year.


James Manning house, 07.23.08.


36.004575,-78.894784

Endangered Durham Has a Theme Song!

Put this in the category of "things I never would have envisioned when I started this website", but local band (and good friends) Beloved Binge surprised and greatly flattered me by recording a song inspired by Endangered Durham and the loss of historic architecture in Durham.






Endangered Durham

Civil rights pounded down
rubble resounds
no ice cream now
'till the royal resurgence

no landlords around
houses burnt down
was it bad luck
or was it insurance

new houses need ground
graves in mounds
do the dead sleep sound
in endangered Durham

(chorus)
Don't knock those buildings down
mapping the history of this town
Don't knock those buildings down
mapping a history of this town
Windows, porticos, Durham houses are not dominoes (repeats)

Buildings knocked down
save them now
history lost then found on
Endangered Durham

Renaissance abounds
save our downtown
and the 'hoods that surround
Endangered Durham

Save our save our save our Endangered Durham

(chorus)

Durham County Unveils Latest Design for Judicial Center

As reported on Bull City Rising and in today's Herald-Sun, the County unveiled a new set of renderings for the south-of-the-jail (SoJa?) Judicial Center complex. Kevin over at Bull City Rising has done his usual thorough job of reporting the details, and I suggest checking out his post for the detailed breakdown.

One point I'd like to emphasize, which Kevin has already noted - but I feel is a serious flaw in the design: the lack of street level activity along the Roxboro-Dillard frontage.


(Courtesy of Bull City Rising)

The county's explanation that a wrapper, or street level office/retail is not feasible here - either for logistical reasons, or due to some legal obstacle to a public-private partnership - simply does not hold water. The only reason that the county is not going to build street presence on Dillard and Roxboro is because they are unwilling to do so.

The county has shown little sensitivity to the need to create street level activity at crucial intersections - most notably in the 500 block of East Main Street, where the county still intends to demolish several historic structures for temporary parking needs, but also with initial designs for the Human Services Complex. The general unwillingness to think about pedestrian-scale interaction with the city extends to plans for a parking deck plan for the 300 block of East Main St., where Glen Whisler told me several years ago that they might leave space for a wrapper on East Main St., but they wouldn't build it, or partner with anyone to build it, because they don't like to get involved in public-private partnerships.

Back to the deck at hand, the corner of Roxboro and Dillard is a crucial intersection for continuing the urban energy of American Tobacco eastward - one that needs to be matched by efforts north of the railroad tracks. By treating Roxboro purely as the back of the property, the county will squander the energy that could be created at this intersection by the judicial complex, the Venable campus, and the future redevelopment of the Elkins Chrysler dealership across Dillard St.

The body of evidence suggests that the county just does-not-get-it when it comes to elements of urban design that are crucial to the success of downtown Durham. I'm an architecture fan, obviously, but what the roof of the building is made out of is going to have a far smaller impact on the success of Durham East than two huge walls of parking deck greeting people driving north on the primary entryway into downtown from the freeway, and greeting people coming out of the Sommerhill gallery immediately to the east.

PERRY BUILDING

The Perry Building was another of several 1920s-era apartment buildings that accompanied the transition of the near neighborhoods to higher density development, and the shift of Mangum and Geer Streets to major transportation corridors.

An earlier 2-story frame structure stood on the northwest corner of N. Mangum and W. Geer.


Mangum and Geer, 1913

It was torn down in 1928 and replaced with the Perry Building.


Mangum and Geer, 1937

Consisting of 4 apartments with front porch/balconies, the Perry building was, like the majority of the 1920s apartment buildings, brick construction with copious detailing - keystone arches, stone-topped arched rails, a single mission-style dormer (which I suspect lost its detailing at some point) and a large fanlight above the front entry.

Later in life, the Perry building evidently became a shelter or office for the
Salvation Army in Durham.


Perry Building inhabited by the Salvation Army.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

That organization moved to the former Durham Sun building in the late 1970s or early 1980s. It was converted to a 4-unit condominium building during the 1980s.


901 N. Mangum, 07.24.08


36.004071,-78.89473

BOONE HOUSE

Boone House, late 1970s

Demetrius Boone moved to the southwest corner of N. Mangum St. and West Geer St. around 1910 - the Historic Inventory opines that the original structure was remodeled by Boone around 1913 to its present form - with the unusual feature of a gambrel front gable projecting from a hipped roof.

Boone entered the drugstore business with Claude Haywood, forming the Haywood-Boone Drugstore at North Mangum and West Main St., and later Boone's Drugstore at West Parrish, Orange, and N. Mangum Sts.

The house has been owned for some time by Floyd McKissick, Jr., who let the house deteriorate quite a bit while he tried to sell the house for several years - first through Preservation Durham, and then via a large sign on the property. The house has since been renovated, and is the home of record for McKissick's representation of Durham in the NC State Legislature. As others have noted, the exterior of the house remains immaculately undisturbed - seemingly unsullied by the trespass of human traffic.


Boone House, 06.23.08


36.003648,-78.894922

NE CORNER - NORTH MANGUM AND WEST GEER

I have no picture of the frame house that stood on the northeast corner of North Mangum and West Geer Streets prior to the 1930s - by 1937, it had been replaced with a simple 'filling station' in the common style of the 1920s and 1930s. By the 1950s, this station had been expanded to include garage bays to the rear.


Looking northeast, 1952
(Courtesy Wayne Henderson)

I'm not sure of when this was last a gas station - it's currently the "Good Works Bargain Store."


Looking northeast, 06.23.08


36.003918,-78.894337

Clifton and Leah Garrett Farmhouse on the Move.

In a bit of "well, at least..." preservation news, the Clifton and Leah Garrett farmhouse appears to be headed to another location rather than the landfill. While it would be great if the whole farm had been preserved rather than converted to yet-another-apartment-complex, it's some solace. I haven't had a chance to track down where it's headed to, so if someone out there knows, please pass it along.

110 EAST GEER ST.

110 East Geer, looking east-southeast, 01.24.63

The apartment building at 110 East Geer St. was built in 1928 - one of a series of handsome apartment buildings built in the 1920s - typically displacing earlier single family homes. As mentioned in earlier posts, the apartment building was somewhat of a novelty in 1920s North Carolina - a new alternative to the rooming houses and hotels that people often used for itinerant lodging.

This example is typical of apartment buildings of this era - masonry construction with decorative detailing, porches/balconies, and front-to-back orientation of rooms (commonly known as 'railroad flats.')

This building was constructed by Clara Bellamy, a cousin of Fred Geer, who owned the large farmstead that encompassed this land; the Bellamy family also likely constructed the Bellamy apartments that adjoined the back of the property. It remained in the Bellamy family for many years. In 2002, it was purchased by Gold Leaf Construction Company, and subsequently, in 2006 by the Community Reinvestment Association of North Carolina, which uses the building for their offices.


110 East Geer, 06.23.08

Find this spot on a Google Map.


36.003437,-78.894092

SE CORNER N. MANGUM AND W. GEER / BELLAMY APARTMENTS/ O'BRIANT MOTOR COMPANY / MIKE'S TRANSMISSION

(Copyright Sanborn Map Company)

I haven't uncovered any pictures of the two-story frame house that stood on the corner of West Geer and North Mangum through the 1950s. From the above 1937 Sanborn map, it appears to have had a large, wrapped front porch and projecting bay windows on the north side. The building immediately to the south of it, however, was the Bellamy Apartment building, constructed by the Bellamy family, who were cousins of Fred Geer - as in the street and the farm that covered much of what is now Old North Durham.


Bellamy Apartments, 1924.

By the 1960s, the house on the corner had been torn down - replaced by a used car dealership: the O'Briant Motor Company. The Bellamy Apartments persisted next door to the car dealership.


Looking east-southeast down West Geer St., 01.24.63.
(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

By the 1990s, this space had been taken over by Mike's Transmission, which had started several blocks to the east, also on Geer St. The Bellamy Apartments were torn down to expand the footprint of the business and parking area.


Looking southeast, 06.23.08.

While I have nothing against Mike or his transmission shop as a business, it is a most unfortunate land use for this corner. It stops the surrounding residential character to the north abruptly at Geer St. with its tall, barbed-wire topped chain link fence and sea of asphalt - typically filled with helter-skelter array of vehicles. This is where the revitalizing energy of Old North Durham goes to die.

While I doubt that much would influence the business to relocate and sell this property at a price that would make it feasible to redevelop it with a some more appropriate combination of neighborhood-scale commercial and residential - in an architectural package that reinforced the beauty of the surrounding neighborhood - I do hope for it.


36.003466,-78.894371

830 N MANGUM - CONRAD HOUSE

830 North Mangum, looking northeast, late 1970s.

The Conrad House, at 830 N. Mangum, has always felt like a bit of an oasis to me - while boxed in by fairly bleak surroundings to the north and south, it retains the early 20th century character that once predominated along this block of North Mangum St.

Built in 1910 by Joseph Conrad (not that one) the house is adorned with multiple distinctive Victorian architectural elements, such as the pedimented window casings, the medallion and decorative barge boards in the front gable, and the paired front windows. The original decorative box posts have been lost unfortunately, and the original curved-top window sashes have been removed as well. But overall, much of the distinctive character of the house is preserved. I hope it can persevere.


830 N. Mangum, 06.23.08


36.003135 -78.89448

113 BROADWAY

Residential area extending west on Broadway from Little Five Points, 1891.
(Courtesy Duke Rare Book and Manuscript Collection / Digital Durham)

A surviving representative example of the early residential development that characterized the area surrounding Little Five Points (also referred to ~50 years ago as "North Durham Five Points") is 113 Broadway. Built by CB Irwin, an agent for the Seaboard Railway, the house is distinct for its 1 1/2 story ('story-and-a-jump') configuration and rosette gingerbread along the roofline.


113 Broadway, ~1980.

There are few houses that remain from this era, and several more have been lost on Broadway in the last few years due to demolition.


Looking southeast, 06.23.08

Find this spot on a Google Map.

36.000615,-78.897347

MARKHAM APARTMENTS

Markham Apartments, 1924.

A series of impressive apartment buildings were constructed in Durham neighborhoods during the 1910s-1930s. Many of these still survive, primarily in Trinity Park, although a few in Old North Durham and the West End still persist.

These apartment buildings were a new alternative to the more common rooming house, subdivided house, or hotels that people who did not own their own homes lived in at the turn of the century. Often they supplanted earlier single family homes on the site as neighborhoods grew.

The 8-unit Markham Apartments at 123 Broadway St. were built in the 1910s, adorned with decorative brick facing, balconies with turned balusters, and a metal faux-terracotta tile roof. It remained at apartment building through the 20th century, and was quite worn out by the 1990s. It was purchased by TROSA and renovated as housing for TROSA residents in 2001-2002. I'm not always a fan of TROSA's renovations, but they did a decent job on this structure. I'm never a fan of fake muntins and standard-issue Home Depot metal doors, but at least the other structural elements have been preserved.


Looking southwest, 06.23.08


36.000688,-78.897698

LITTLE ACORN RESTAURANT

The Little Acorn restaurant was started in 1940 by Robert Roycroft. Like many of the eating establishments that lined Rigsbee Ave. and Morgan St., the Little Acorn catered to businesses in and patrons of the warehouse district, but it appears to have had far wider appeal as well. Per a 1951 writeup, the Little Acorn

"[was] one the most modernly equipped establishments of its kind in Durham. ... Private dining rooms [were] maintained for parties and banquets. They specialize[d] in pit-cooked barbecue, brunswick stew, Southern-style fried chicken, and sea foods [sic]."


(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

A glimpse of the Little Acorn behind a car-carrier that lost a car, looking southeast, 07.29.69.
(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

It appears that the Little Acorn closed in the 1970s, although I don't have an exact date. It appears to have been torn down by the 1980s and replaced with a very bland single-story commercial structure.


Looking east-northeast, 06.08.08


36.002534 -78.899486

516 RIGSBEE AVE

The warehouse district area north of Morgan St., what is left of it, is a mid-20th century creation. The area near Rigsbee Ave. and Broadway St., in particular, was a higher-end late 19th and very early-20th century residential area.


Looking north-northwest up Rigsbee Ave., 1924. The houses are clustered around Broadway and Rigsbee.
(Courtesy Duke Rare Book and Manuscript Collection / Digital Durham)

By the 1940s-1960s, almost all evidence of this residential area had been displaced by light industrial/commercial enterprises. The building at 516 Rigsbee Ave. was built in the early 1960s by the Southern Parts and Electric company, and remained such through a portion of the 1970s.


Looking southeast down Rigsbee Ave., 09.02.67
(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

Sometime in the 1970s, the building became a NAPA auto parts store before being purchased by the city. The city utilized the building as a machine shop.

At this point abandoned for an indeterminate period, the currently city-owned structure is, along with 213 Broadway (immediately behind the building) currently under renovation as the downtown district (District 5) substation, forensic unit, and special operations buildings.


Looking northeast, 06.08.08

I'm happy to see the city renovating old structures for these purposes, and that District 5 will have a location distinct from police headquarters. Given the current desolation along this portion of Rigsbee Ave., it is a welcome addition.

Update 4.21.09.

The substation appears to be complete at this point - I like that they have adopted the old look of the letters atop the sign, although, even though it is a police station, I'm not sure how well Di trict 5 will be able to hang onto those letters. The random-ish assortment of windows is a bit strange, but it seems like an appropriate building to get a little bit crazy with. All in all, I think the design is interesting.


Looking northeast, 04.19.09.


36.000631,-78.899633

Neighbors organizing in Morehead Hill to save 804-806 Jackson

A few months ago, I wrote about Healthy Start Academy's desire to demolish historic housing in the Morehead Hill neighborhood to expand their school campus. The Herald-Sun profiled the nascent effort by the surrounding neighbors to protect their neighborhood from the school's expansion plans.

Predictably, the school director frames the debate as save-some-old-dilapidated-houses versus save-the-children. Like any good salvo in an argument, there is an element of truth to it; playgrounds and physical activity are good for children. If the school really intends to build a playground rather than just more parking, they might encourage more physical activity in the youth that attend the school.

But it isn't a dichotomous choice, really. Is it necessary to place whatever it is that the school wants in place of these houses? Are there other options for a playground? Could the school replace some of its asphalt parking lot with a playground instead? Could it contribute to the renovation of the Burch Avenue Park two blocks away, and use that instead? Could it partner with Immaculata for shared playground space? Could it use some of the area in front of the school - including some of the former Shepherd St. right-of-way adjacent to the freeway?

Hardly an extensive list of options, but the point is that the notion that these two houses represent the only obstacle to prevention of the 'obesity epidemic' in Durham's youth is misleading. These houses aren't spectacular manses, but they are integral to holding together the fragile historic fabric on the north edge of the historic district - compromised so heavily in the past by the freeway and the prior expansion of Immaculata and Temple Baptist.

The neighbors have started a petition - feel free to sign if it's something that you agree with.

Really? Medical Arts Building Renovation?

(Courtesy News and Observer)

In spill-my-coffee-on-my-paper news in this morning's Durham News, Bill Fields talks about his plan to renovate the Medical Arts Building. While I've noticed some heavy equipment out there, this certainly falls heavily into the I'll-believe-it-when-I-see-it column. The rendering in the paper shows a heavy-handed remuddling of the nice mid-century modern lines of the building with awnings and such. But it would be nice just to have the building and land around it become an active, occupied part of the landscape, and from the looks of the rendering, the adornments could be removed at some point.

LIBERTY WAREHOUSE

Liberty and Mangum Warehouses, looking east from ~Gregson St., 1948.
(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

The No. 3 Liberty Warehouse was built around 1940, just to the north of the Mangum Warehouses and extending from Rigsbee Ave. to Foster St. along West Corporation St. The last of the large tobacco auction warehouses built in the Durham warehouse district, the Liberty was evidently well known as the venue where auctioneer 'Speed' Riggs plied his trade.


Tobacco Warehouses in the warehouse district, 1959.
(Courtesy Durham County Library / North Carolina Collection)


Planting tobacco in front of the Liberty Warehouse, looking north, 07.04.64
(Courtesy The Herald-Sun Newspaper)

The Liberty was still holding tobacco auctions up until 1984, but even after that point, the Liberty Cafe (which had moved north with the warehouse ~1940) was still serving up guaranteed artery-clogging fare for many years afterward.


Liberty Warehouse, looking northwest from Rigsbee Ave., 1987.
(Courtesy Durham County Library / North Carolina Collection)

The Liberty was purchased by Greenfire Development in October 2006.


Looking southwest, 06.07.08

It's a bit of a curious acquisition, although I've never quite understood Greenfire's acquisition strategy. Although they've hosted arts-related programming in the space, I think such a large parcel of DDO-1 land underneath the warehouse is rather concerning to me, vis a vis the future of the Liberty. As Durham's last surviving tobacco auction warehouse, I hope that it has a long future ahead of it.

Update: In 2010, Greenfire recieved local landmark designation for the property.

Update: In April of 2011, the city began to take action out of concern for the stability of the structure's roof; per the Herald-Sun, years of persistent leaks had resulted in rotting of the structural supports below. The structure had received a "Condemned" sign courtesy of NIS and a meeting was to have occurred on May 4, 2011 between Greenfire and the city to resolve what was to be done to repair the roof.

On 05.14.11, a large section of the warehouse roof collapsed in a brief but violent thunderstorm.


(WTVD)

Fortunately, no one was hurt, but businesses were flooded, and of course it is a terrible thing to happen to Durham's last tobacco auction warehouse - for which Greenfire sought and received local landmark designation last year. Commercial spaces on the south side of the warehouse, mostly artists and The Scrap Exchange were flooded. The city condemned the entire property and barred entry except for brief periods to remove items, and by the weekend of 5.21.11, there was a frantic push by tenants on the south side of the building to remove their belongings.


Portion of the collapsed roof, 05.21.11


Same area from Foster St., 05.21.11

Greenfire has sounded positive in public statements regarding their intention to repair the warehouse after meetings with their insurer and the city. It would, of course, be terribly tragic to lose Durham's last standing tobacco auction warehouse.


36.001592 -78.900507