204 N. Dillard St.

The house at 204 N. Dillard St. is called the "Stone-Hackney-Markham House" in the Durham architectural inventory, which I think is an error. I'll call it the "Hackney-Markham House" and explain.

The east side of downtown to Dillard St. was built out by the 1880s with 1- and 2-story houses that were minimally decorated. As Durham's tobacco industry continued to grow, so did the wealth of merchants and manufacturers. They began to replace the earlier houses with larger, more ostentatious structures. The first of these on Dillard St. was the EJ Parrish house at 108 N. Dillard. If you look at the oldest picture of that house, you can see another house to its north that represents the earlier generation.

William Stone, who established the Stone and Ellis department store, lived at 204 N. Dillard St. during the 1890s. JA White next lived at the address around 1900.

Although the inventory puts the build date of this house coincident with William Stone, the Sanborn fire insurance maps clearly show that the unique outline of this structure is not present in 1898 - appearing for the first time on the 1902 maps. I speculate that the house may have been built by JA White.

Or it may have been built by Edward Hackney - who was mayor of Durham in the early 1880s, served as the Durham County Attorney, owned and edited The Durham Recorder and worked as an officer in his father-in-law's tobacco company - the Mallory Durham Cheroot Co, located on Parrish St. (Although I'm unsure exactly where this was, I think it must be related to the Hackney Block.

He only lived in 204 N Dillard St. until 1903, at which point it passed to his widow, and subsequently his daughter - who married Charles B. Markham.

Above, N. Dillard St., looking north. The porch of 204 N. Dillard is visible at the far right.

Charles Markham had a lifelong association with Duke - first as student, then as a mathematics professor, and finally as treasurer of the university.

During the 1910s, a second story was added to the primary wing off the front of the house.

This property - the land, that is - took on an unusual shape during the 1920s - until that time, Liberty St. extended only as far east as N. Dillard. Beyond that point, the land dropped off rather precipitously. (In keeping with the historical economics of housing distribution, small low-income houses occupied these low-lands right behind the large houses.) During the 1920s, the city extended Liberty,which it curved in order to link it with Lottie St., which paralleled Holloway a bit to the east, beyond the lowest point east of Dillard. This left 204 N. Dillard with an arcing southern property line, so that the property comes to a point on the eastern end.

In 1947-48, architect Charles Hackney (descendant of Edward Hackney) designed a kitchen renovation for the house - the blueprints from this were with the house in 2005.

Three of the children of Charles Markham and his wife continued to live in the house after their parents were deceased - two daughters and one son. The son, Charles "Charlie" Markham, Jr. was an attorney in New York and Durham and a law professor.

The Hackney-Markham house, looking northeast, 1964.

Below, a difficult to read front-view of the house, 1964.

While the Urban Renewal-ists originally intended to take and demolish every structure in this neighborhood east to the railroad tracks, Charlie Markham helped mobilize the neighborhood to fight the demolition of structures between Dillard and the tracks. Evidently this modification passed the city council by 1 vote. However, the neighborhood on the other 3 corners of Dillard and Liberty was demolished. During the late 1960s or early 1970s, 210 N. Dillard and 212 N. Dillard were also demolished, leaving this house and 206 N. Dillard next door (also owned by the Markhams during this time) as the lonely remainder of the old neighborhood on Dillard.

204 N. Dillard, 1960s

The front of 204 N. Dillard, mid-1970s.

Close-up, undated, but likely 1970s

The northeast view, from Liberty, mid-1970s. This also shows the old servant's quarters/guest house/garage outbuilding behind the house, later demolished.

204 and 206 N. Dillard, looking northeast, 1970s.

Charlie Markham became mayor of Durham in 1981 - 100 years after his grandfather - making him the second mayor of Durham to live in this house. I don't know much about his term as mayor, although it seems that the first wave of downtown redevelopment - Brightleaf Square, the Civic Center - got started under his watch. Jim Wise has also noted in the past that he is "forever tied" to the 'big pickle' (or choose your own epithet) out on Chapel Hill Blvd. - although I don't know how.

Also under his watch was the conversion of the Durham Hosiery Mills No. 1 to Section 8 housing using HUD funding. This caused trouble later, as I noted at that post, when it turned out that HUD had not recommended the project, but the Secretary of HUD overruled - and he and Charlie Markham were part of the same New York law firm.

Charlie left office in 1985, and continued to practice law in Durham. He and his two sisters continued to live in the house through their deaths. In 2000, Charlie fought once again for Cleveland-Holloway with other members of the neighborhood, unsuccessfully attempting to prevent the expansion of the homeless shelter because of the overconcentration of social services in Cleveland-Holloway.

~1990

~1990

Charlie left the house in 2005 - moving to a rest home, and the house was sold to new owner-occupant Keelee MacPhee. Having been inside this house, I can say that the amazing thing about it is that, for better and for worse, aside from a kitchen renovation in the 1940s, almost nothing had been altered in this house in 100 years.

204 N. Dillard St., 2006.

204 N. Dillard St. from the street, 2006.

After little exterior change since the house changed hands in 2005, the house is undergoing a full renovation as of 2011, which includes a new addition onto the rear of the house.

06.19.12

The house received a Pyne Preservation Award in 2012

2012 - Courtesy Preservation Durham

2012 - Courtesy Preservation Durham