The community of Historic Oberlin Village in Raleigh, North Carolina has a story to tell: one of accomplishment, pride, and overcoming incredible obstacles. Founded by African American freedmen and freedwomen around 1870, they created an independent town that consisted of twelve blocks with almost 1,000 residents who were carpenters, brick masons, and seamstresses once enslaved by some of Raleigh’s most prominent white families. Due to the effects of the Great Depression, urban renewal, and now development and gentrification, Oberlin Village is disappearing. Out of several hundred structures, fewer than 90 remain. “These homes are highly visible and symbolic,” said Myrick Howard, president of Preservation North Carolina (PNC). “Hardly a day goes by where you are not losing another one or another one.”

Over the past 35 years, PNC has moved its headquarters offices four times in order to save highly endangered landmarks in Raleigh. PNC saw an opportunity to not only tell the community’s story, but to engage with and invest in it by moving their headquarters to two Oberlin Village houses prominently located on one of Raleigh’s busiest streets.

The houses—the Rev. Plummer T. Hall House (built in 1877) and the Graves-Fields House (built in 1885)—are two of only five Oberlin structures listed in the National Register. Threatened by development, both houses had to be relocated, and so PNC purchased them from the Raleigh Historic Development Commission. Sitting too close to the road, the Hall House had to be moved back on its lot, and the Graves-Fields House was moved about 200 feet from the opposite side of Oberlin Baptist Church, which they would like to include in programming related to the houses and community.

Restoring the houses and preparing for the move had its challenges and surprises. They discovered the Graves-Fields House was built in two phases, with the newer front section built on top of the earlier framing. Both parts had to be separated for the move and new front and back walls had to be constructed. They also had numerous cases where the houses were not constructed to code as they were built with whatever materials were on hand, such as porch posts, chair rails, and floor boards. “This is a project that has broken all of the rules. The many peculiarities of the original construction will now be part of the story,” said Howard. “Without the buildings, the history goes away. These buildings open doors about history that no one would know.”

PNC wants to honor the houses’ owners and the community by working with their Oberlin Village neighbors to tell their story through programming and collaborations. PNC would also like to create an exhibit about African American builders and architects in North Carolina, inspired by Willis Graves, who was a brick mason. “It adds a tremendous amount of pride and value when we talk about who built these buildings,” said Howard. “It brings pride and engagement where there is a connection.” A symposium was held in the Fall of 2019 at Shaw University—where all of the Graves children attended—and PNC would like to make a continuing effort to have programming dealing with race, class and gender. Local groups, such as Friends of Oberlin Village, Shaw University, Oberlin Baptist Church, and an Oberlin Village initiative group have been involved, as well as descendants of the Graves, Fields and Hall families.

The Graves, Fields, and Hall families were well-regarded members of the community, counting among them educators, ministers, civil rights attorneys, businesspersons, journalists and philanthropists. For many of the Graves family descendants, it was the first time that they had seen the house since the family left it in the 1930s when the Graves’ children migrated North.