1001 CORPORATE DR.

2017 (hmw preservation)

Text from Orange County survey performed by hmw Preservation 2017

”The two-story farmhouse features a brick exterior laid in a 5-1 common bond and a hipped roof covered in patterned slate with three interior corbelled brick chimneys. It is three bays wide and double-pile with a projecting, two-story, hip-roofed wing on the right (west) elevation. The asymmetrical façade features vinyl windows and an entrance on the right end of the façade has a six-panel door with eight-light sidelights and a three-part transom. A second entrance on the north elevation of the west wing is a nine-light-over-two-panel door with a five-light transom. Both entrances are sheltered by a hip-roofed porch that extends across the façade and wraps around the east and west elevations. The porch is supported by grouped square columns on a terra cotta floor. An accessible brick ramp is on the east elevation of the house and leads to the main porch. An original one-story kitchen wing at the left rear (southeast) has a hipped slate roof and paired vinyl casement windows on the south elevation. A later, frame, truncated-hip-roofed wing on its east elevation has and asphalt-shingled roof, board-and-batten sheathing, vinyl casement windows, and an inset porch supported by a square column. At the right rear (southwest) is a shallow brick bay with a large, gabled, frame wing with vinyl siding and windows and an asphalt-shingled roof.

The interior of the house appears to be largely intact with the original floor plan configuration retained on the first floor. The interior features wood floors, six-panel doors, an intact central stairway and a 1950s kitchen.

Once a large farm, the property has been subdivided and the farmhouse now contains offices. The house’s expansive front lawn is dotted with several mature oaks; a small parking lot sits to the east of the house accessed by a driveway. Perhaps the only evidence of its agricultural past is the extant large gambrel-roofed barn sited to the rear of the house. Directly to the south (rear) of the house is an ornamental garden complete with brick pathways, pergolas, boxwoods, and flowering trees. A paved drive separates the garden from the other buildings to the south, which include patient hospice facilities, the frame barn, and a meditation building.

The early history of the property is unclear, however, county tax records date the property to 1922. The property was obtained by Duke University, through the will of a University faculty member, in the 1980s and has changed hands a number of times since 1987. The eleven acres at the center of the property, including the historic farmhouse, is currently operated as a hospice facility and is surrounded by modern office-park development.”