111 North Dillard Street

35.992862, -78.895362

111
North Dillard Street
Durham
NC
Year built
1900s
Year demolished
1970s
Architectural style
Queen Anne Victorian
Construction type
Frame
Neighborhood
Downtown East
Use
Residence
Rooming House
Building Type
Residential
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Looking west from Dillard St., 1905
(Courtesy Duke Archives)

Among the large houses built along East Main, Liberty and Dillard Sts. during the 1890s, the TJ Lambe house at 111 N. Dillard St. (pictured above) was one of the more impressive. Thomas J. Lambe owned a clothing store, located at the northeast corner of Mangum and Main Sts.

Duke Homecoming parade, 1930s, with 111 N. Dillard in the background. (Courtesy Duke Yearlook.)

By the 1920s, as I've previously mentioned, commercial succession had begun along the East Main corridor. Likely the most significant change to the district was the demolition of the WW Fuller house and construction of the Union Bus Terminal in 1942.

By 1944, the TJ Lambe house had become a rooming house.


Above, looking northwest up N. Dillard St. from near East Main, 1944. There is a "Colonial Rooms" sign in front of the former TJ Lambe house. (Courtesy Durham County Library - 1945 Geography of Durham dissertation)

These houses were still around in the 1960s, and showing some signs of deferred maintenance.


111 N. Dillard, looking northeast, 1966. (Durham County Library - urban renewal photo)

These houses were torn down during the late 1960s via urban renewal. Likely during the 1970s or 1980s, Durham County built a social services building at this location. Urban Ministries. Urban Ministries, which had been established on adjacent land in 1985 as a joint operation between several churches that acted as a landlord for local non-profits, expanded to take over this building. The center became the home of two merged homeless shelters during the 1990s, and the facility expanded again in 2000-2001.



Their street frontage along Dillard is the popular style in East Downtown - Fortressian with a hint of Bunkeresque Revival. (Photo by Gary Kueber)

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Comments

Submitted by Phil (not verified) on Thu, 9/6/2007 - 4:59am

Wow, I had no idea about the history of that corner. Thanks for sharing.

I was the Urban Ministries of Durham chair in 2001 when we broke ground on an expansion of the shelter building (the one at the corner). Speaking then, I dreamed of a future when we wouldn't need the shelter, when we could knock the building down and replace them with a park. Maybe someday...

Submitted by Phil (not verified) on Thu, 9/6/2007 - 5:02am

p.s.

Prior to its use as a shelter, the building at the corner was a Social Security office. It's currently owned by Durham (I can't recall whether county or city), and leased to Urban Ministries of Durham at essentially nil cost. The Lincoln Community Health Center is another tenant within that building.

The other Urban Ministries of Durham building sits on land owned by St. Philip's Episcopal church, leased to UMD for nil.

Submitted by Christopher (not verified) on Thu, 2/25/2010 - 2:03pm

Yet another "what the HELL were they thinking" Urban Renewal story. Even though Somerset Villa didn't see 1930, even though the Fuller house was lost in 1942, 218 in 1952 and the Parrish house in 1957...there was still so much left. All taken by the city's wrecking ball, with the exception of 2 houses saved by the actions of a few people. I can almost imagine what the street could look like today.

But it's really too depressing.

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