The 500 and 600 blocks of Willard Street extended from Jackson to the ‘point’ with Warren St., divided by Yancey Street on the west side of the street. (Yancey didn’t extend east of Willard.)

Moving north to south:

505 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

507 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

511 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

513 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

515 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

517 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

519 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

605 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

607 Willard, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

These houses were torn down in 1967 by the city using urban renewal funds.

Looking southeast from the NC Mutual building, 02.15.67.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

The northern portion of these blocks is the Durham Center (Durham County mental health) – a Greenfire property. The southern portion is part of the University Ford dealership.

Looking southeast, 02.10.08

500 block of Willard, looking northwest, ~1950.
(Courtesy Herald Sun)

Moving south to north.

530 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

526 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

524 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

520 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

518 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

516 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

514 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

512 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

510 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

508 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

506 Warren, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

These houses were torn down by the city of Durham in 1967 using urban renewal funds. Warren Street was closed and absorbed into a giant parcel that became the Alexander Ford Car Dealership.

Approximate location of the west side of the 500 block of Warren Street, 02.10.08.

Warren Street ran just to the west of the old Morhead School, between Jackson Street and Willard Street, which it met at an acute angle.

The eastern side of the street consisted of relatively few houses, given the presence of the Morehead School to the north and two American Tobacco warehouses to the south. But between Portland Avenue and the playground of the Morehead School were 6 houses. Moving south to north:

527 Warren, 1965 – on the corner of Warren and Portland Avenue.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

525 Warren, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

523 Warren, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

521 Warren, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

519 Warren, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

517 Warren, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

These houses, and everything else around them, were torn down in 1967 by the city using urban renewal funds.

Looking north up Warren Street, 1967. The side gable of 527 Warren is visible on the right side of the street.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

Warren Street was closed to form a great big parcel for the Alexander Ford Motor company – renewal, indeed.

Looking east at where the 500 block of Warren St. used to be (the houses would have been about where the white warehouses are) 02.10.08

Few structures are more intriguing to me than triangular (or nominally trapezoidal) ones – I don’t know why, but perhaps it’s because they usually were built to reflect the acute angle of the street intersection – in this case, Warren and Willard Streets. Standing at the intersection, facing (often) the door of the building and looking down the two streets at once – I’m smitten.

This little triangular building appears to have been built in the 1920s – by the late 40s/early 50s, it was Rattelade’s Grocery. A reader tells me that he used to walk down to the store to buy penny candy – for a penny.

By the 1960s, when this picture was taken, the name was the Warren Street Grocery.

By 1967, the city Redevelopment Authority had begun tearing down houses, and buildings, like this, willy nilly.

Looking northeast from South Duke St. at the intersection of Willard and Warren Streets, 1967.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

Warren Street was eliminated, and Willard was curved to the east where it would have dead-ended at the freeway. The resulting large parcel of land was turned into the Alexander Ford (later University Ford) car dealership.

Looking north at where Willard and Warren used to meet (Willard is still on the left)

Sanborn map showing New Street and the warehouses, 1937.
(Copyright Sanborn Map Co.)

Below, an aerial shot looking north from Morehead Ave in the foreground. One of the two small houses on the north side of New Street / Portland Ave appears to have already been torn down by the time of this mid-1950s picture.

(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

By 1959, its name had been changed to Portland Ave, and by 1965, the other house torn down as well.

309 Portland, as seen from Warren Street, looking north.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

The rear of 309 Warren, looking east., 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

The site of 308 Portland, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

The site of 306 Portland, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

Portland Ave. disappeared in 1967 with all of the houses and buildings courtesy of urban renewal, and was converted to a massive car dealership in 1972 by the Alexander Ford Motor Co.

Approximate location of Portland Ave., 02.10.08.

“This morning, 2/25/08, a few minutes before my 88 year old dad was admitted for elective knee replacement surgery, he presented his 61 year old son (me) with a printed photo of our old house, 416 Ashton Place. He said, “Ted, I think you will find this photo interesting”. Yeah, to say the least! I cannot begin to tell you the memories this photo brought back to me this evening. His printer did not do justice to the print on your website so I recalled it tonight and printed a good copy. Thank you so much dad and Mr. Kueber (I hope that is right). That photo makes me very happy!!!

Please allow me to give you a few of my childhood memories of this house. I was 2-5 years old at the time (1948-1953). My parents and I, their first and only child, resided in this house with an older couple. I believe their name was Mr. and Mrs. Riddick (or something like that). They leased out the left-half to my mom and dad, and they lived in the right half. We shared the kitchen and living room. I remember we ate together. There was no tv but we listened to Mr. Riddick’s radio together. Listed below are some of my more vivid memories of this place:

1. My dad and I used to shout down the street to hear our echoes rebound off of the old Chesterfield plant at the end of the street (seems like the direction was South).
2. My dad used to buy me small wire framed, silk-winged glider planes to toss around the yard. Some were bright yellow, others were orange, and yet others were green.
3. I am told that one Christmas my parents could afford little, but on Christmas morning I received a new tricycle and a chrome and leather 2-gun cowboy outfit complete with red cowboy hat and a black cowboy vest. They purchased no other gifts that Christmas, not even for each other. My dad worked for the Durham waste collection system just after getting out of the Army so cash was in short supply for this new family. They must have spent their last dollar on me.
4. One evening I remember rushing out of the house with my mom and dad to see a sort of fireworks show in the street. A dark huge (to me) coupe filled with young people was racing north up the street shooting sparks from the right rear wheel. I was told later that they accomplished that feat by mounting a full-cover metal tire carrier to the right rear tire. I guess that would set off sparks pretty good wouldn’t it! What a racket.
5. One evening we were all petrified when my dad hid behind our bedroom door with a two foot long wooden baseball bat, waiting for a burglar to enter the bedroom. I remember dad shouting something. Next we hear a crash as the burglar ran out the back door, smashing out the screen door as he went. I remember the police being amazed at the bent over top of the sturdy wrought iron fence. Police surmised that the burglar bounded over it using one hand on the fence to catapult himself over.
6. I vividly remember the night my mom and dad were playing cards in the kitchen (left rear corner of the house) and a bat flew in the window. You have never seen such a commotion in all your life. My mom and Mrs. Riddick were cowering in a corner with towels over their heads while dad and Mr. Riddick swiped at the dive-bombing bat with anything they could get their hands on at the time.
7. I remember being in the bathroom one evening. We had an old cast iron claw-foot bathtub. I was sitting in the tub playing and a huge tarantula-sized spider made an appearance on the back edge of the tub a few inches from my arm. I screamed to high heavens. To this day I am not a friend to any spider! A few years ago when the subject came up, mom told me the huge spider was about a quarter inch in diameter.
8. For some reason I have a memory about me poking at a kitten with the business end of a broom. I believe the kitten was under the back porch, and I really think I was trying to do it harm at the time. What gets into little kids to do something like that?!

Thanks for the memories.

Ted

Dayton, Ohio

PS- I just got off the phone with my dad. He said the plant down the street was not a Chesterfield plant. He said it was an American Tobacco plant. I’m sure he remembers much more than me. He is very sharp for his age.

Oh, by the way, if you run into any information about a Garland Woodcraft Company in downtown Durham, that was owned by my uncle, the late A.B. Stone. He went by “A.B.” because his name was really Alizah Bunion Stone.”

The 500 and 600 blocks of Carr, situated directly across Carr St. from the American Tobacco warehouses, were the early location of company housing – what we’d call ‘mill housing’ were this a mill; small detached houses with yards that catered to company employees.

A view looking east across the tops of these houses, 1920s.
(Courtesy Duke Archives / Digital Durham)

Below, a view looking north up Carr St. from Morehead Avenue.

(Courtesy Robby Delius)

The picture below gives the best sense of the relative uniformity and quantity of these houses – although it a is broader shot, showing Carr St., Willard coming it at an angle to meet Warren St. and Portland Ave – the short east-west street that intersected Carr and formed the division between the 500 and 600 blocks.

(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

This picture also shows how Morehead Ave., at the right edge of the picture, initially ran by the south end of American Tobacco, along the path of current-day Jackie Robinson, before terminating one block east of the complex.

The storyline here is slightly different than usual, in that the pressure of car commuters took their toll on these houses before urban renewal did.

Looking northeast, 1950s.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

Most of these houses were torn down during the late 1950s/early 1960s for surface parking for American Tobacco, leaving only a few structures.

Sandwich shop on the southwest corner of Jackson Street and Carr St., looking southwest. The picture is a bit distorted because I spliced two old pictures together.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

512-528 Carr St., looking northwest, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

600-608 Carr St., looking south, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

612 Carr – a later bungalow, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

614 Carr – one of the small houses that persisted, near the corner of Carr and Morehead, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

The remainder of these were torn down by urban renewal.

Looking east-southeast, 1968.

All of the parcels, with many others to the west, were combined into a big parcel and sold off to the Alexander Ford Motor Co., which had moved from its previous location on East Main Street, in 1972.

Looking north-northwest, 1972.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

This later became University Ford, which it remains today.

Looking northwest from Carr and Jackie Robinson, 02.10.08.

This remains among the lowest and least appealing potential uses of this land. I do hope this car dealership will go live with its friends out at Southpoint sometime soon, and that it will be redeveloped into a dense mix of uses, as it originally was. Rumors have abounded about the quantity of cash University Ford wants in order to go elsewhere. While I’m sure they want to maximize their profit, I hope they take something reasonable at some point – I think it’s crucial to creating the connectivity with the southwest neighborhoods that will help both those neighborhoods and downtown thrive.

Looking west, 1880s.

Looking northeast at the northwest corner of Jackson and Carr, 1920s.
(Courtesy Duke Archives/ Digital Durham)

Looking southwest at the northwest corner of Jackson and Carr, 1920s.
(Courtesy Duke Archives/ Digital Durham)

By the late 1920s, both corners of Jackson and Carr were developed with commercial buildings serving the employees at American Tobacco and the neighborhood.

410 Carr, northwest, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

412 Carr, northwest, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

414 Carr, northwest, 1965
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

These buildings were torn down by the city in 1967 by the city redevelopment authority/urban renewal funds. It became a parking lot.

In 2005, this street was closed and the city deck for American Tobacco was built with its southeast corner on the site.

Looking northwest, 02.10.08.

Which shouldn’t surprise anyone, although universities seem to feel they have a particular right to expand. Much like churches, their need to expand is usually adorned with self-affirming statements of the noble mission to improve humanity.

Call me more than a bit dubious that tearing down 136 houses to build new buildings and parking will lead to a net increase in community educational attainment.

When Central first started to expand across Fayetteville ~5-6 years ago, they made the decision to tear down several square blocks of houses in the College View community – many of them houses of prominent early to mid 20th century community leaders – as well as the old Hillside High School. I was on the board of Preservation Durham back then, and chairing their Endangered Properties program. We managed to move just one house – the Stanford Warren house – from Brant to Pekoe Street in order to save it from the wrecking ball. I’d characterize NCCU’s attitude towards the historic houses as, well, impatient with the impediment.

Old Hillside and the surrounding neighborhood, 1950s. Fayetteville St. and NCCU are at the right side.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

I haven’t really forgiven them for hacking into the neighborhood and its history, and destroying the landmark high school.

But I should have realized that their work isn’t done – that they intend on dominating the spine of Fayetteville Street by tearing down the residential street frontage, and increasing intrusion into the neighborhood with space for buildings and a lot of parking.

Existing conditions.

Planned expansion.

I hope the city administration doesn’t give NC Central a pass on this – they deserve at least the same scrutiny that Duke got for their Central Campus plans. At some point, NCCU will destabilize the College View neighborhood – anecdotally, they already have. We can bet that, when that happens, the solution will be further expansion of the campus.

Other than our enthusiastic approval of higher education bonds that made this (and the flock of construction cranes at UNC) possible, I question what purpose is served by expansion. To be clear, I feel the same way about Duke, UNC or any higher education institution. Is it just an arms race between campuses to provide more and more of what they perceive the Other Place to have? Kevin has more about project growth and the master plan with a typically insightful post at his site.

The question of expansion necessity aside, I give Central some credit for focusing more of their expansion on the Alston Ave corridor this time, which I think would be better served by some addition by subtraction. I think they could do more here. It’s a bleak corridor – much of which is attributable to the width and sense of style that NCDOT wants to provide to Alston north of the Freeway. Dense expansion on this corridor would be more appropriate than spilling out to the east and west.

But I’m sure part of NCCU’s expansion across Fayetteville is attributable to the fact that College View is just a nicer neighborhood; skinny Fayetteville is a more attractive, pedestrian negotiable street than the depressing, too-wide Alston. Will College View remain that way as its residents and historic housing are displaced?

The house at the right edge of the above picture, two stories and with two chimneys, presents an interesting conundrum – and that is, whether or not it was Julian Carr’s first house when he first moved to Durham in 1870. The evidence for this is conflicting and intriguing. An initial observation is that the house, 402 Carr St., closely resembled WT Blackwell’s house, built on the northwest corner of S. Duke St. and W. Chapel Hill St. around the same time. It is certainly larger than any of the houses around it in the above picture. Hiram Paul, Durham’s first historian (who published his history in 1884) notes that Carr gave land for the first graded school (eventually the Morehead School one block south of this house) “near his house on Railroad Street” (which was the first name for Pettigrew Street.) There is, of course, the eponymous street as some small measure of circumstantial evidence.

A view of the house from the north side of the tracks, looking southwest, 1920s.

Another view of the back of the house from Carr St., looking north, 1938 (the back of the Snow Building is visible across the tracks.)
(Courtesy Robby Delius)

However, a Durham Sun news article from July 21, 1949, entitled “Carr St. Landmark Torn Down” provides the most direct evidence that Carr lived on the street – but in the small house immediately behind it, at 408 Carr.

408 Carr being torn down, looking southwest.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

408 Carr being torn down, looking southwest.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

The houses were both razed for a parking lot,

Looking northeast, 1965.
(Courtesy Durham County Library)

which was eventually paved.

Looking southeast, 1981.

The city took this lot and Carr St. to build a parking deck for American Tobacco, eliminating this corner. I find the closure of Carr St. fairly bizarre and unnecessary, actually. I’ve heard people claim that it’s still sort of a ‘street’ through the garage – and I drive that route periodically, but c’mon – it’s not a street.

Looking southwest, November 2007.

So did Carr live here, where we have a parking deck? (Which provides some continuity with the location of his later mansions, Waverly’s Honor and Somerset Villa, about to be converted to 400+ space surface parking lot by Durham County.) I don’t know – some sources say Waverly’s Honor was built in 1870, the same year Carr joined the WT Blackwell firm. But it’s a good, as yet unsolved, mystery.