Past Residents: Finding a Connection with an Old House Based on Personal Connections

You meet many interesting people in your life. Each with a different story to tell. But sometimes the most interesting story comes about after they're gone, and as such their memory lives on.

Growing up in Danville, I barely had my own identity. I was the son of the president of the Chamber of Commerce and of someone who grew up in Danville. On top of that, I was the grandson of the first president of DCC and of a former teacher at GW. Almost anytime I was introduced to any adult, it was met with "Oh, I know your father," or "Oh, you're Joe Taylor's grandson," or even "oh, I went to school with your mom." Of course, my favorite will always be "oh, your mom used to babysit me." I was able, however, to meet many interesting people.

It was when my grandmother was at Stratford House, however, that I roughly created an identity of my own. I was still "Louise Taylor's grandson," but that's part of why I was able to do the things I did. The residents who had been long-time friends of my grandparents knew my background, and most of the ones who didn't were just glad to see some young blood. Granted, the identity I had was the little boy who used to roam the halls and play under the dining room tables, but still...I was recognizable outside of who I came from for the first time.

Though I've been really busy lately, I still try to research Ms. Gott's house and my friend Micah's house (formerly Hope Harbor). Last night, my personal life finally intersected with my research. I was browsing through old copies of the city directory, looking at former residents of 1021 Main Street, when a familiar name crossed my path: Lefty Wilson.

Lefty Wilson
Photo courtesy of Virginia Sports and Museum website.

My first thought was "sweet! A famous Danvillian boarded at the house in the late 1920s." So, I texted Micah to tell him. Then, just for my own curiosity, I typed Lefty Wilson into Google. I knew he had been a baseball player because of Lefty Wilson Field. I learned through the city directory entry that he was also a teacher at GW, which was then located on Holbrooke Avenue where the Sutherlin Place townhouses are; the athletic field at the corner of West Green Street and Rison Street.

George Washington Highschool ca. 1951 (There wasn't a map from 1930).

Rison Park School ca. 1920 for comparison.

So, just out of curiosity, I typed his name into Google. The Virginia Sports and Museum Hall of Fame page for him came up, as long as information about Lefty Wilson Field. I learned that he was father of the year in 1955, and teacher of the year in 1957. Scrolling down on Google, an obituary caught my eye. It was for his wife, Mary, and the snippet showed Stratford House. I clicked the link just out of curiosity, wondering if it was someone I knew. It's funny, actually, because I first saw the apartment number, 206, and then thought to look at the year of death: 2002. My grandmother was in apartment 201, so I could picture the door to apartment 206 instinctively. But when I looked at the year of death, I thought to myself "that's after my time" as it was five years after Grandma died.

I backed out of the page and then stopped, immediately. Something had clicked in my brain, and I went right back to the page and looked at the name: Mary Wilson. Apartment 206. Of course. It was Mrs. Wilson! She had lived there when Grandma was there. Moreover, I suddenly recalled all the times that we passed Lefty Wilson Field and my father would say "that's named for the husband of Mrs. Wilson who lives up the hall from your grandmother."

So, I dug a little bit more. I thought it was cool that I knew the wife (and, actually, the great-grandmother of a couple of guys I knew growing up), but what I found was even better. After the marriage, Mr. and Mrs. Wilson both resided at 1021 Main Street.

Aside from my research and the work I've done on the house, I now have a personal connection with the house. Someone who knew me growing up, a sweet woman who always smiled and spoke to me, had lived in one of the houses I'm actively researching, thereby reviving the memory of Mrs. Wilson in my mind.

Hylton Hall: History in Flame Part II

Note: I know I said I would get this posted much sooner, but alas I have been busy. I did, however, have time to research. Please forgive the delay, but I guess it's appropriate since today they announced the cause of the fire as arson.

I remember Hylton Hall well. It, along with the "Home of Dan River Fabrics" sign that used to rest atop the mill, were staples of my childhood. After long trips to Greensboro or Sumter, SC, it was a sign that I was home. I can, and always will, remember sitting in the rear facing third row seat of my mother's 1991 Ford Taurus station wagon and watching the building go by. I can remember long day trips with my father to Sumter, and seeing the "Home of Dan River Fabrics" sign lit up as we merged onto West Main at the split with Memorial Drive, and I can remember passing by the huge brick building, with tall white columns hidden in the darkness across the tracks. This is my ode to Hylton Hall.
 
Situated just across the train tracks from the ruins of Schoolfield Mill rests a now charred and dilapidated building that was once a mainstay of Schoolfield as a community and as a mill. Named for "Miss Hattie" Hylton, Hylton Hall rose out of the need for welfare, and "Miss Hattie" took to the task of creating a better lifestyle for the workers and community in general.

A brief history of Hylton Hall has already been given by the Danville Register & Bee, so this will be an expansion thereof. My detailed information only goes back as far as 1922, but luckily I was able to find some retrospective articles that gave an in-depth background.

As the Register & Bee stated, Hylton Hall opened it's doors in 1918. What was left out, however, was that Hylton Hall was a pivotal part of the development of Schoolfield.

Originally intended as a dormitory for female mill workers, it's role quickly changed to become essential in the growth of Schoolfield. The building was designed to house 200 women, but quickly grew to fill-in other roles to meet the needs of the mill and the community. As time progressed, Hylton Hall housed not only single women, but single men and couples as well.

As Schoolfield village grew, the needs of the community changed. Hylton Hall was home to a 45' x 15' foot (the largest in the community), which was used to provide swimming lesson to women and children, and a nice place to cool off on a hot, summer day. Hylton Hall also became home to the Schoolfield YWCA -- the YMCA being located in the now razed Schoolfield Recreation Center.

The dining hall and auditorium at Hylton Hall were put to use by both the mill and the residents of Hylton Hall. Dignitaries and other important visitors were treated to meals in the dining room, and Hylton Hall was also the chosen location for the annual meetings...a precursor of the later use of the building as executive offices. The auditorium, as well, became a gathering places for residents, townspeople, and executives alike, to view and perform plays.

Throughout the years, Hylton Hall was also the home to a few churches. The most notable of which is Ascension Lutheran Church. The church we know now, situated on West Main Street, with the huge window where the large Chrismon  Tree can be seen is actually a relatively new structure. Prior to that location, it was housed in the small church across the street. But it's very humble beginnings were at Hylton Hall.

Perhaps the most eventful year in Hylton's Hall history (maybe even more so than 2012) was 1930. The economic downturn and after effects of the depression hit hard, and Schoolfield had to make sacrifices. One of which, on September 1st, was Hylton Hall. Money was tight, wages were cut, and within weeks one of, if not the worst, strikes to confront Schoolfield.

It was during this strike that those who were continuing to work were harassed and attacked trying to enter the gates. It was also during this strike that houses, buildings, and yards were dynamited. To counter these attacks, soldiers were brought in to police the village and protect the mill. Hylton Hall, designed to be home to no more than 200 people, ended up housing over 900 soldiers for six months. On March 14th, 1931, Hylton Hall reopened and once again became a home for mill workers and a place for the women and children of Schoolfield.

Following the strike, things seemed to settle down for old Hylton Hall. The auditorium continued to be used for church services, most frequently by Ascension Luthern, the swimming pool remained open for use by the community, and the Mill's annual meetings were still held there. The strike, however, really represented the building's climax, as that appears to be the last big event to center around Hylton Hall until the fire two weeks ago. References to the building in the newspaper throughout nearly four decades following slowly fade from ads for the pool and as living quarters and references to executive offices begin to appear. The last major references to the building come at the time of "Miss Hattie's" death and also during a special bicentennial edition of the newspaper on July 4, 1976. The online archives for the newspaper stop during 1977, so that's as far as my information goes. But considering that even during my lifetime the building was still used for executive offices, I can't imagine too much happened.

We all know the rest of the story...the mill closed, Hylton Hall was vacated and boarded up, and was left as a reminder of what used to be. It sat lonely and empty, watching as the mill to which it was partnered, was slowly torn down until so little remained that it's almost just an empty shell. Then, on a beautiful, breezy Sunday afternoon in April, 2012, the building went up in flames; engulfing Schoolfield village in smoke. I know I probably shouldn't be refererring to the building in the past tense, as it's technically still standing...but God only knows what's to become of it. And it's sad to think that lot may soon stand empty. I can only hope that it is somehow, in some way, salvagable. Lest we lose another important piece of Danville history.

It's Funny How Things Can Change but Not Change at the Same Time

I know I said my next post would be about the history of Hylton Hall, but I simply haven't had the time to do the research. Work has been keeping me busy and wearing me out physically, but I will get to it. Maybe tonight before I go to bed, who knows.

This post, however, isn't necessarily historical. A few thoughts have merged in my mind tonight and it reminded me of something I feel worth sharing.

A year or so ago, I red an article in the Register & Bee about residents in Forest Hills complaining about the projected extension of the Riverwalk Trail through Ballou Park. I've mentioned before, I'm sure, that I grew up in that part of Forest Hills. Ballou Park was my backyard. In my younger days (God, am I really referring to 15 or so years ago as my younger days...eek!), I would have been thrilled at having access to the Riverwalk trail from my backyard. I mean, I used to ride my bike from my house all the way to the train station and get on the trail there. Retrospectively, I'm surprised I didn't die. But that part of Ballou Park is logical for a trail considering the network of roads that exist back there.


What the article was about, however, was reminiscent of a story I've heard many times over the years. Residents on Linden Drive were complaining about the trail bringing, essentially, unwanted traffic behind their houses. I can understand that...sort of. Those old, worn out, closed off roads provided peace to my street. And you can be sure we'd all go running for houses if we saw a car back there. Sure, people would wander through, but there was relative peace most of the time. My friends and I would play back there on fallen trees, ride our bikes on the road. If we were lucky, we could ride our bikes on "The Circle." That, however, was the farthest we were allowed to really explore. Mainly because it was the farthest away that we could get where we could be seen from my house. My neighbor's mom covered the upper part of the park.


I got some amusement out of the article, though, because something incredibly similar happened around 1980. You see, there is a reason why there are roads back there. When Ballou Park opened, some 100 or so years ago, they were open to traffic. On Sunday afternoons, people would take leisurely drives through Ballou Park in what was dubbed "the Sunday Motorcade."


By 1980, the residents of that side of Linden Drive were getting into their 60s and 70s. The noise of the Sunday Motorcade was becoming a nuisance. My father said the first time he ever went to my grandparents house in the late 70s, it was a constant succession of cars all afternoon. And, so, the residents petitioned to have the roads closed to traffic...and the rest is history. Well, at least until recently.


I could not, for the life of me, figure out why no one made that connection. But then it dawned on me: not a single person on Linden Drive whose house backs up to the park has lived there for than 15 years or so. It was the same argument, but a different time and different people. And it seems that no one even knew that the deteriorating pavement was left unkempt for some 30 years because no one on that stretch of Linden Drive wanted to deal with a disturbance.


There is my little random tid-bit for the night. It's nothing special, nothing important. Just something I wanted to write down.

Hylton Hall: History in Flames, Part I

Note: As I do not have time to adequately research at the moment, consider this a prologue to my next entry. When I return home this evening, I will research the background of Hylton Hall and, hopefully, do a good write-up on the building.

Fire has a fascinating ability to bring people together. Whether gathering around a fire for warmth or to investigate a burning building, people seem naturally drawn to the comfort and destruction that fire brings.

Situated on Lanier Avenue, just across the train tracks from Schoolfield Mill, Hylton Hall was a staple of the Schoolfield scenery for decades. That is, until April 15, 2012. At around 3:35 pm, a fire was reported in the grand building that once, I believed, was home to the administrative offices of Schoolfield Mills.

Shortly after 4:00 pm, I had gone to Mt. View Cemetery to visit my grandparents' grave. As I left, I smelled something burning. I quickly shrugged it off having not seen smoke. Then, as I turned onto Surry Lane, I could see a light cloud of smoke over Maple Lane in Forest Hills and assumed it was just someone having a cook out. That is, until I got on West Main Street to get gas. I could smell smoke and see it billowing from somewhere in Schoolfield and decided to investigate.

I proceeded up West Main, and was greeted by a wall of smoke when I got to the building where the Dan River Outlet Store used to be. As the smoke thinned, I could see cars parked in the old mill parking lot, and a wall of black smoke obscuring Hylton Hall. I pulled over and joined the crowd of people taking pictures and talking. After 10 minutes or so, a police officer came and told everyone to leave because the fire fighters were worried about something exploding and harming people.

I left for about an hour and visited a former neighbor before returning to the scene. The road was closed from Baltimore Avenue up, so I parked and walked to the overpass for another 10 or 15 minutes. The roof of the building appeared to have been destroyed by the fire, but smoke and trees obscured everything.

I don't know the condition of the building, but I doubt it will survive the night...if it's still standing now. As a friend said on Facebook, it "seems a sad testimony of the state of the city." One more old building down, one more memory of Danville's past reduced to smouldering timbers and charred rubble.

So long, Hylton Hall. You won't soon be forgotten.

Firemen breaking in.

Still on fire, but under control enough for firemen to enter.

Researching an Old House: Efforts and Methods

I have spent so much time focusing on the facts that I haven't even taken the time to try to documents the methods I've used to gain the information I've used in this blog.

As a child, I was fascinated by the wreck of the old 97. To this day, I still have my copy of the book written by Clara Garrett Fountain. I even read it to the children when I worked at the YMCA Afterschool Program in Wilmington. I'm sure most children in my generation who grew up in Danville owned the book or at least read it once. Written in 1977 and illustrated by children at Grove Park Elementary School, I don't believe there is any better way to begin a fascination with the history of your hometown.

It's that same story that lead me to explore even further in middle school. When my father worked at the Chamber of Commerce, I used to go into the archive folders and read the newspaper articles and, if I recall, a copy of the telegraph sent on that cold September day. Through those archives, I ultimately found a copy of the 1965 city plan book. Which fascinated me to no end.

Also in middle school, I got copies of the postcard history book and the Images of America book which I always enjoy flipping through and reading.

Then, in high school, my interest was renewed yet again. I moved into my first apartment, which was in an 1870s farm house. For my 17th or 18th birthday, a friend's mother gave me a copy of Victorian Danville: Fifty-Two Landmarks, Their Architecture, and History. Included in that book was the house in which I lived.

Through college, I loved reading that book and exploring the attic and "dungeon" of Ms. Gott's house. But it wasn't until after college that I realized I could make use of my mother's Ancestry.com account to get information on the house. I then learned that the Register and Bee were archived through that.

Within the past year, I finally got the opportunity to do real research at the courthouses in both Danville and Chatham. There, I was reading the actual deeds to the house. Most were typed, but others were handwritten. As Mr. Gott said, I was getting my hands dirty.

The hardest part, I think, of researching an old house is the more historical documents. When researching the newspaper online, you have to be able to account for typos. That can make searching online hard when the exact thing you need could be in any given article, but one typo means the search won't pull it up. I've lucked out a few times by a necessary article being on a page I was taken to for some other reason. It's daunting, to say the least.

When it comes down to doing the dirty work, though, deed searches are about as tedious as it gets. It's only been within the past 100 or 110 years that deeds were typed. In 1800s, the deeds were handwritten. Not only is it time consuming to decipher 130+ year old handwriting, but using indexes to look up which deed book and page to go to requires a lot of back and forth.

It's fun, though. I can honestly say I enjoy the time I spend doing this research, even if I come up empty handed. I may not find what I need, but every time I try, I learn something new and find another interesting story. And isn't that what it's all about?

Researching an Old House: Did I Find My Answers?

Highway 29 is the perfect road to drive when researching an old house. If you have to drive between two places, I can't picture a better road to take. The route between courthouses takes you by a number of historic buildings and houses that just seem to set the mood for researching an old house.

I immediately got to work. My first task was to find the old map located in Deed Book Q on pages 602 and 603. I had no idea whether these pages would be of use, but it was sure to be a start. The map shows how the land of Abram Wimbish was subdivided in the 1880s.

Abram Wimbish owned the house at 413 Greensboro Road, which became 413 West Main Street, and then 120 College Avenue in the 1920s. The beautiful yellow Gothic cottage was the starting point for my quest. Although the house now sits on a small parcel of land, in 1877 it sat on 81 acres land that extended from Howeland Circle to just past Virginia Avenue. There will be a more detailed entry on the house itself soon, but for now I'm going to stick to what is relevant to Ms. Gott's house.

While I was at the Danville Courthouse, I thought to snap a picture of the F.W. Beers Map of Danville and Pittsylvania County from 1877 that hangs on the wall just inside the record room. Ms. Gott's house doesn't appear on the map, but it's important when combined with the later map that a deed pointed me to.

 For reference, the area that says "LARGE ORCHARD" is roughly where Howeland Circle is today, and the "Danville Water Reservoir" is, as best as I can ascertain, where Virginia Avenue and Mount Vernon Avenue intersect. Another reference point would be the small stream, that runs through the property. I read of a swamp or marsh that was once at the bottom of Avondale Drive. So, I would assume where the stream crosses the train tracks is somewhere near Southampton Avenue and Stratford Place. In fact, now that I look at it, the proposed half mile race course may have become a reality. In looking at Google Maps, the curve of Westhampton Avenue seems to mimic that of the race course, but that could just be coincidence.

In the 1880s, Abram Wimbish passed away and his family was left with massive amounts of debt. In 1882,  an agreement was made so that his wife, Fannie, could keep the house if the property was subdivided and the land sold at auction to satisfy the debts.The Wimbish property was divided into 5 parcels. J.T. Watson bought a triangular piece at the outer left edge of the property, extending from about the intersection of Virginia Avenue and Carolina Avenue to the train tracks, down to South Main Street, and at an angle back to Carolina Avenue. J.M. Neal and E. H. Miller bought the land that now makes up Howeland Circle, Westhampton Avenue, Stratford Place, Brockton Place, and Southampton Avenue to the train tracks. Mrs. Wimbish was left with land that extended to back to Carolina Avenue, east to Virginia Avenue, and west to about halfway to Westhampton Avenue.

The last parcel of land, which encompasses the upper part of Carolina Avenue, parts of College Avenue, and Avondale was sold to W. P. Robinson. It is he who bought the land which now contains Ms. Gott's house.

Unfortunately, the revised Wimbish Property is entirely in the margin on the book, and thus nearly impossible to make out. The road that runs through the center of the area is part of Howeland Circle and then follows a straight line to Carolina Avenue and ends where the alley is today. In fact, it wasn't until 1920 that Carolina Avenue was extended to meet Virginia Avenue.

This map was made in 1882. I could, unfortunately, find no evidence of a house on the land that W. P. Robinson purchased. In fact, the first mention I could find of anyone living there was 10 years later, when his wife was suffering the same fate that Mrs. Wimbish did. She was in debt from payments on her house, merchandise for the Dry Goods Store she and her late husband ran on Main Street, and other things.

So, did I get my answers? Not entirely. I know that there was someone living in the general area of Ms. Gott's house in 1892, and I know that in 1924, only 32 years later, the newspaper suggested that Ms. Gott's house was the oldest house in the neighborhood, other than 120 College Avenue (the Wimbish property). But, I still have questions...many questions. My search did not yield any information about how J. E. Perkinson, who sold the property in 1924, came into possession of it. Nor did I find out why I found his brother's name on a book cover in the attic.

For now, I will have to guess that the house was built in the mid 1880s. Perhaps building permits can be found. I, personally, won't have time to do anymore research at the courthouse until this summer. I might be able to get someone to be a proxy for me, but I don't know. The house still has many stories to tell, and I hope to one day be able to recant them all.

Researching an Old House: The Quest for Answers

"To truly preserve history, you have to know the history. To know the history, you have to read the history. You can clean up an old house or building and call it preserved but without the knowledge of the past, you've done nothing but fix an old building." -- Me

In the quest for information about an old house, you are often left with more questions than answers. Some may be easily answered with a little digging, and others may require spending hours on end reading hand-written documents from hundreds of years ago. I found the latter out the hard way.

Last Friday, I finally got my opportunity to go to the Pittysylvania County Courthouse to research Ms. Gott's house. There, I was certain, would be a deed mentioning the selling of that particular parcel or more importantly, the selling of the land with a dwelling. After two and a half hours, I uncovered nothing more than a handful of documents referencing deeds that were recording in the Danville Courthouse. Deeds did exist in the county deed books, luckily, but most mentioned that a more detailed reference could be found in Danville. I didn't walk away entirely empty handed, though. I was left with the location of a map, a vague story about how the area was subdivided, and a name: W. P. Robinson. It wasn't what I had hoped, though.

So, rather dejectedly, I closed the windows and sunroof on my car, and then got into Mr. Gott's truck and headed back into Danville. The next three and a half hours would lead me to some marginally useful information that may hold the key to unlocking the history of 275 Carolina Avenue.