Tornado Building after rehabilitation. Photo courtesy of the Richmond County Daily Journal.

The Tornado Building Antique Vehicle Museum and the restoration of the historic 1892 replica of the Tornado steam locomotive have received a 2014 Gertrude S. Carraway Award of Merit from Preservation North Carolina. The award was presented on October 10, during Preservation North Carolina's annual conference, in recognition of the extensive renovation work led by the Winston-Salem firm of architect David E. Gall. The project was completed in October 2009.

 

The Gertrude S. Carraway Awards of Merit are named in honor of the late Dr. Gertrude S. Carraway, a noted New Bern historian and preservationist. The awards recognize individuals or organizations that have demonstrated a genuine commitment to historic preservation through extraordinary leadership, research, philanthropy, promotion and significant participation in preservation. A maximum of 12 awards are given each year and have been presented since 1974.  

 

 

North Carolinian Claudia Stack's newest documentary, Carrie Mae: An American Life, premiered November 16th in Wilmington. Carrie Mae Sharpless Newkirk was born into a sharecropping family in 1923, attended and taught in Rosenwald schools, and went on to become one of the first African American teachers in southeastern North Carolina to integrate a white faculty. Ms. Stack's first documentary about Rosenwald Schools, Under the Kudzu, was a favorite at the 2012 National Rosenwald Schools Conference.

 

Mountain Lodge. Photo courtesy of Hendersonville Lightning.

Historic Flat Rock Inc. bought the property in a sale approved in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Columbia, South Carolina, and then sold the house to Julien and Lori Smythe. The Smythes plan to spend close to $1 million to stabilize and preserve the house. Julien Smythe, whose family has been vacationing in Flat Rock since the early twentieth century, feels a strong connection to the community and its history. Click here to learn more about the house and the Smythes' rehabilitation plans for the property.  

The cabin in the Oteen area of Asheville where Thomas Wolfe spent the summer of 1937 attempting to write away from his admiring fans is now a park owned by Asheville and a locally-designated landmark; however, it is in dire need of stabilization and repairs.  

 

Documentary photo of the Oteen cabin where Thomas Wolfe spent the summer of 1937. Photo courtesy of the Asheville Citizen-Times.

Years of poorly planned and constructed alterations followed by neglect have led to the building's dangerous condition, which Jack Thomson, executive director The Preservation Society of Asheville and Buncombe County, describes as critical. City workers have recently completed temporary stabilization work and removed some of the later, unsympathetic additions that have compromised the building. "Genius," a movie starring Jude Law as Wolfe, is scheduled for a 2015 release and it is hope renewed interest in the author will mean renewed interest in the cabin. A future purpose for the cabin remains undetermined, however. Click here to learn more about the cabin and Wolfe's summer of 1937.

Last year a hidden drawing of what may have been a marker for a colonial fort was found on John White's 1585 map showing the coast of North Carolina. Drawn with "invisible ink" and covered with a piece of paper, this may indicate where the members of the 'Lost Colony' went when they left the Roanoke Colony. Researchers have now used magnetometers and ground-penetrating radar (GPR) in the location shown on the map and believe they may have found soil disturbances that indicate the presence of ditches in straight lines, which differs from the pattern of those dug by Native Americans, as well as indications of the presence of wooden structures. Is this the final home of the "Lost Colony?" Click here to read more about the science and the researchers' findings.

 

 

Town Creek Indian Mound State Historic Site (Town Creek Indian Mound listed in the National Register in 1966) has been has been excavated many times, but a student dig led last summer by Tony Boudreaux, an instructor of archaeology at East Carolina University, has revealed new information that turns the previous interpretation of the site on its head. According to site manager Rich Thompson, "Early on, the interpretation of the site was strictly as a ceremonial center, inhabited by maybe two or three priests year-round. Then once a year during . . . a green corn celebration, people from around would be invited in." Boudreaux's work shows that the land at Town Creek State Historic Site has been occupied, on and off, since the Ice Age, and that for a long time the site wasn't a set-apart, sacred center, but a busy, thriving community. Boudreaux's mapping of the soil stains shows too many buildings for the site to have been mostly vacant and items such as the charred corncob show the site was full of everyday life. Click here to read more about the site's newly discovered history and the on-going research at the site. Click here to plan your visit to Town Creek Indian Mound State Historic Site.

 

In 2016, the United States will celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the National Historic Preservation Act - "Preservation50." The NHPA has helped to save millions of buildings, monuments, and landscapes that tell the powerful stories of our shared history, our struggles as well as our triumphs.  

 

Planning for Preservation50 is underway. A critical first step is securing feedback on proposed goals, objectives, and programs from a broad spectrum of the American public.

 

Find the survey at www.preservation50.org (see link in banner at upper right corner).   

 

The tagline of Preservation50 is "Our Legacy, Our Future." Activities in 2016 will examine and celebrate 50 years of the NHPA's impacts on our communities, and plan for a stronger and more diverse preservation movement for the next 50 years.

 

Several federal agencies and national preservation organizations have helped to draft the proposed agenda for Preservation50, including the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, the National Park Service, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and the National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers, among others.  

 

Archived issues are on our website.