Century Old College Hill Home Sold for Restoration

The Carrie and Charles Angle House commands one of College Hill’s busiest streets, but the vacant structure has provided a gloomy entrance to the historic neighborhood since a June 2011 fire. Beginning today, a new owner will turn the neighborhood’s worst house into a show house as work commences to restore the historic home’s shine.

Located at 919 Spring Garden Street, the home is an excellent example of an American Foursquare with Colonial Revival features. The house sports diamond pane windows, bay windows, attenuated columns, and clapboard siding reminiscent of early American homes.

Carrie Lee Finney and her husband Charles Joel Angle were the first occupants of the house after it was constructed in 1907, and the couple remained in the house until their deaths in 1942 – a remarkable 35 year span in ownership! Their daughter Mary Ruth inherited the property. She was an alumna of UNCG, and served as a school librarian. At some point in the id-twentieth century, the large home was converted to apartments as investment property.

In 1999 the property was acquired by members of College Place United Methodist Church, and ownership transitioned to the church in 2008. The church utilized the apartment house for income until the fire damaged much of the rear of the structure. In order to provide an alternative course to demolition, the Preservation Greensboro Development Fund partnered with the College Hill Neighborhood Association and the City of Greensboro to acquire the property and market the project to a homeowner.

The home will be purchased by Susan and Judge Richard W. Stone, who will restore the residence for use as their family home. A large addition to the rear that accommodated apartments will be removed, and the house will be “right-sized” for single family use. In addition, a thorough rehabilitation will solve structural issues, rewire electrical needs, install new HVAC, plumbing, as well as bathrooms and a kitchen. Features important to the architectural history of the house including the diamond glass windows, the wrap-around porch, the wood siding and the slate roof will be restored and maintained.

The public-private partnership that saved the house from demolition is innovative for Greensboro. The Preservation Greensboro Development Fund purchased an option to acquire the house in April 2012, and the College Hill Neighborhood Association approved use of their Municipal Service District tax funds to purchase the house from the Methodist Church in October 2013. The private investment now being made by the Stones is crucial to the entire project moving forward. The partnership is pioneering because of the commitment made by the neighborhood to secure the future of the home. The alternative to preservation in this case would certainly have been a grass lot.

The College Hill neighborhood is enjoying renewed interest as downtown becomes more popular and UNCG expands. Tate Street is now a city hotspot for café culture, and several restaurants have opened featuring ethnic and alternative foods. Nearby cultural institutions such as the Weatherspoon Art Museum and Aycock Auditorium round-out the neighborhood as one of the most urban in North Carolina.

The house is a contributing structure in the College Hill Historic District (Local) and the National Register Historic District. The project will likely be one of the last in Greensboro to utilize the North Carolina Historic Preservation State Tax Credits before they expire on the last day of 2014. In addition, the house will also carry a preservation easement that will monitored by Preservation Greensboro and will disallow multi-family use of the property. The design-build firm A408 has been selected as the contractor. Work begins Wednesday, September 10th.