The Oldest Existing Italianate
Architecture in the United States
In 1966, the Blandwood Mansion in Greensboro, NC Was Saved
From The Wrecking Ball - It's Where the Civil War Ended in North Carolina!
by Billy Ingram
On a morning in 1966, bulldozers were poised to raze a bloated antediluvian structure leaking and collapsing on a prime block of downtown Greensboro real estate, perched on a hill in one of the last residential neighborhoods surviving in the shadow of the Jefferson Standard Life Insurance Building. For almost 70 years, this compound served as a lonely outpost for The Keeley Institute, a live-in rehabilitation center where drunks and drug addicts were promised, ‘That New Freedom’ after weeks of four times daily injections of bichloride of gold laced with alcohol, strychnine, apomorphine, and willow bark.
With downtown bursting at the seams an expansion of businesses to the west was a natural. Kroger had their eye on the lot the Keeley Institute was deteriorating on so a crew was dispatched to clear the land. And they would have had Anita Schenck and her mother Mary Lyon Caine not stood between the heavy machinery and that sacred place steeped in ceremony, where the Civil War came to an end in North Carolina, a once stately manor they knew as Blandwood.
Virginia Zenke had a nagging suspicion Blandwood Mansion’s architect had to have been someone of prominence, as a trend-setting decorator of the sixties she had an acute eye for style. Perhaps if a pedigree could be proven there might be more of an interest in saving the estate. Peering from black-framed round glasses, pencil protruding from her thick dark hair, she poured through books and reference materials attempting to solve the mystery of who designed Blandwood.
That moment of Zen(ke) came in 1966, when Virginia discovered the architect was none other than Alexander Jackson Davis. America’s leading designer of country houses, known locally for our gentrified State Capitol and, at UNC, the playfully austere facades of Old East & Old West dormitories and the four columned roman splendor that is the Playmakers Theatre. All lavished in the Italianate and Greek Revival genres he was famous for. His designs for Blandwood are stored at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
This was a home like no other in America, reminiscent of a Tuscan villa featuring two large parlors with garden view bay windows on either side of an imposing three-story tower made inviting by 3 enormous archways that circumambient the front porch. Completed in 1846, it’s the oldest building on an original foundation in the city, one of the first towered Italianate villas in the nation and the earliest surviving example.
With Blandwood’s important historical lineage confirmed, the ladies who lunched became the ladies who launched. Bulldozer stoppin’ grandma Mary Lyon Leak Caine called to order the first meeting of the Greensboro Preservation Society on Oct 31, 1966 to foster, “a respect and reverence for the past by preserving landmarks in Greensboro including streets, public buildings, churches, houses, parks, trees or any existing examples of culturally, historical and architectural value to the city, state and nation.” No budget, only a zeal to identify cultural touchstones that needed safeguarding. They quickly came to the realization, however, if Blandwood was to be saved, they’d have to do it themselves.
First efforts were strictly DIY. Green Thumb Garden Club members came wielding pruning shears, along with Greensboro Jaycees and Thomas Tree Service tidied up the one block area, unearthing varieties of Ginko, Japanese Varnish, Linden, box elder, white pines, oaks, maples and mulberry trees. On March 13, 1967, the state’s First Lady Mrs. Dan K. Moore was given a tour of dilapidated Blandwood before a luncheon was held at the home of Otto Zenke a block away.
Modernist architect Edward Lowenstein, known for the Greensboro Public Library (1964) and YMCA (1971) buildings as well as homes in Irving Park and Starmount, was enlisted to oversee one of the first modern-age adapted reuses of an American historic property.
Seemingly forgotten on the part of the public was any knowledge of the historical significance attached to this former residence of Governor John Motley Morehead. The only governor of the state to hail from Greensboro proper, Morehead was an early champion of the railroad when that wasn't an obvious gambit and a fierce proponent of public education, a system that included the disabled, women, and slaves, a concept many considered blasphemous.
“The Father of Modern North Carolina” had one eye focused firmly on the future. In 1854, as first president of the North Carolina Railroad, he undertook an aggressive expansion of what he called “the tree of life” connecting every corner of the state to the wider world. As a result, a delicate ‘City of Flowers’ morphed into the ‘Gate City,’ defined by a robust rail system that, not coincidentally, utilized Greensboro as its hub.
As talk of succession grew louder in 1861, Morehead was a Peace Convention delegate hoping to avoid war with the north. After hostilities broke out he served in the Confederate Congress and entertained officers as they marched headstrong to Richmond; then again when they returned in retreat. At war’s end, Greensboro served as a decommissioning depot with Union officials occupying all of the nicest homes. Morehead’s daughter, Letitia Morehead Walker, referred to Blandwood’s 1865 houseguest Major General Jacob Dolson Cox as, “A most courteous and elegant man” that nonetheless forced her to witness what for her was a macabre sight, a triumphant parade of occupying forces.
After John Motley Morehead passed away in 1866, his daughter Emma Victoria and husband General Julius A. Gray became lord and lady of the manor, he being the commander-in-chief of North Carolina’s repelling forces during the War of 1812. When the British invaders heard Gray’s regiment was in their path they decided to come to terms rather than face this fearsome foe. Gray initiated the successful effort to preserve the site of the Battle of Guilford Court House, saved Greensboro College, and founded the Greater Greensboro Chamber of Commerce. Gray died in 1891, his service held at West Market Methodist Church. Five years later Blandwood was deeded to the Keeley Institute.
Guilford College bought the property in 1965 and, along with Arnold Schiffman, they put forth a proposal to save the estate. Former mayor Robert Frazier had appealed to legislators for years, but this shady lady was not an obvious candidate for a long term relationship, her very uniqueness a turn-off. No white column décolletage or proper Southern brickwork? Besides, wasn't that the joint shooting up addicts with weird serums?
“Home wasn’t built in a day.” — Jane Sherwood Ace
On April 17, 1968 HUD allocated over $100,000 to put the ladies within sight of their financial goal, the rest followed quickly. A week later, after Boy Scouts cleaned and pruned, the Greensboro Women’s Club hosted an open house at Blandwood for the public.
Joyous sounds of celebration have been ringing from the south lawn since 1970 when Blandwood Carriage House became a location of distinction for weddings and receptions, a state of the art facility that has as its backdrop an ancient beauty where past and present coexist harmonically. Live music, dancing, children’s laughter, business leaders congregating, a bride and groom’s exhilarating first hours as a married couple. A living testament to those ladies in white gloves and pearls who drew a line in the sands of time, to battles won against prevailing winds on a field of devastating losses.
- - - - An excerpt from a story in his first book of (mostly) Greensboro history, Hamburger², Billy Ingram’s new book about the Gate City is entitledEYE on GSO available where books are sold or burned.
