705 Gimghoul Road

Text

CORIDEN WADSWORTH AND MARY LYONS HOUSE
1936
Two-story, brick Colonial Revival, central door with sidelights, pedimented entrance portico, eight-over-eight sash windows, exterior end brick chimney and lunette windows in the gables. Built for Coriden Wadsworth Lyons, UNC professor of romance languages, and his wife Mary by contractor Barber (Barbour), from a design by Durham architect George Hackney.

The front of the house remains largely unaltered from the 1993 survey. The right bay of the house is recessed slightly and the house has a slate roof. The six-panel wood door, centered on the façade, has four-light-over-one-panel sidelights and is sheltered by a pedimented portico supported by paired square columns. A two-story, gabled wing at the right rear (northeast) may be original to the house, but is not visible in the 1993 survey photos. It has a one-story, shed-roofed porch on its east elevation that is supported by columns and wraps around the rear elevation. A frame addition at the left rear (northwest), barely visible in the 1993 survey photos, has been removed and a new, two-story, gabled ell constructed in its place. An uncovered terrace at the rear of this two-story gabled ell has a garage at the basement level. A two-story, shed-roofed wing at the center of the rear of the building connects the two rear gables. County tax records date the building to 1932 though the house does not appear on the 1932 Sanborn map.

In the 2013 survey, this was deemed a Contributing Building.

SOURCE: M. Ruth Little, National Register of Historic Places Nomination: Gimghoul Neighborhood Historic District, Orange County, OR0709 (Raleigh, NC: North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office, 2013, via HPOWEB, accessed 8 Jan. 2020), courtesy of the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office; Heather Wagner Slane, 2013 Survey Update (NCSHPO HPOWEB 2.0, accessed 10 Jan. 2020); courtesy of the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office.