Tempie Perry Williamson House
An elegant yet compact plantation house in the Louisburg Historic District, the Tempie Perry Williamson House was originally part of an expansive 90-acre plantation known as the Fox Swamp Tract. Today, the house retains its historic grandeur, privacy and prominence overlooking Cedar Street, and is a comfortable walk to the heart of downtown just a few blocks away.
Its remaining 1.7-acre historic landscape features mature magnolias, hollies, oaks, pecans, and crepe myrtles, and is accentuated with an original sunken alley (pronounced ‘al-aye’) lined with English boxwoods.
Restoration of the home has been completed by Dean Alan Ruedrich, owner of Ruedrich Restorations and winner of the prestigious Robert E. Stipe award, the highest honor presented to working professionals who demonstrate an outstanding commitment to preservation in the state. Ruedrich, who was head of endangered properties for Preservation North Carolina in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and again served as regional director of endangered properties from 2005-2008, was attracted to Franklin County for its rural character, plethora of historic houses, and close proximity to Raleigh and Durham.
401 Cedar Street
Louisburg, NC 27529
$229,000
Contact Paul Setliff, Re/Max City Centre, to schedule an appointment to see the Williamson House at
Paul@PaulSetliff.com or 919-637-7129
decorated with gold leaf - are the same. Faux painting techniques were used to make the heart pine doors look like oak and rosewood, and the baseboards are marbleized. One hundred and fifty-three years after construction, the unbled heart pine siding, shutters, and porch posts are in perfect condition. “Kept painted, this wood will last another 150 years at least,” says Ruedrich. Unbled pine is timber harvested from trees not already tapped for its resin, a raw material used for making naval stores such as turpentine and pitch.
While the Tempie Perry Williamson House is a window into pre-civil war North Carolina, two other structures on the property provide insight into the century before it, and the century after. Not long after purchasing the property, Ruedrich adopted and moved in an eighteenth-century orphan. The Georgian-style Hawkins Law Academy was built in 1790 and was originally located north of Louisburg in the community of Ingleside. “It was ready to meet its maker”, according to Ruedrich, who had the building moved on a flatbed trailer, its roof disassembled to clear power lines. “We scooped up the old granite stones and had a mason from Warren County relay the foundation and chimney”.
The property also features a one-room building from the early
The county is a historic preservationist’s dream. Not only does Preservation North Carolina hold easements on over two-dozen houses in the county, thirty-seven are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. “It’s amazing to us that all of these houses have not just survived, but have thrived,” says Ruedrich’s wife Cynthia Satterfield, a historic preservationist and conservationist who is a fundraiser for the Eno River Association in Durham. A bi-annual countywide historic homes tour was hosted by the local preservation society in May.
“The restoration of this house has been a great adventure,” says Ruedrich. “It’s amazing what an old building will tell you if you know how to listen.” Mason P.W. Motley signed several bricks in the foundation before they were fired and still just wet clay. Motley was the son-in-law of Gamaliel Jones, the architect and builder of the Main Building at Louisburg College as well as prominent houses throughout the area. “Not long after we started work, we also found a brick with the date 1858 scrawled into it,” says Ruedrich. “You’re rarely that lucky”.
A grand central hallway and thirteen-foot ceilings provide a feeling of spaciousness throughout the house. Aside from being fully restored and modernized, the woodwork and other interior features have been little altered. No two of the house’s five mantels – originally
twentieth century that was built as a ticket booth for the Franklin County Fair. “The rides, concessions, they were all right around here,” says Satterfield. “Everyone in town came.” Today, the Craftsman-style building makes a perfect garden shed.
The Perry family had the largest land holdings in Franklin County before the civil war. Among Tempie Perry Williamson’s slaves was John Williamson, who after the war became a prominent black legislator and founder of the Raleigh Banner and Raleigh Gazette. The Williamson House is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is also in the Louisburg National Register Historic District.
Ruedrich and Satterfield enjoy coffee on the front porch of the house every morning in good weather. “This is Southern Living at its best,” they say. Louisburg is located 32 miles north of Raleigh and 40 miles east of Durham.
