February calendar of events

Posted on Feb 01, 2017 by David Arneke

February 2017 calendar of eventsRecurring on Tuesdays

  • In*Spire Meditation group
    Tuesdays, noon, Presbyterian Church of the Covenant, 501 South Mendenhall Street, in the Sanctuary. The meditation period is less than an hour and is open to the public.
  • Noon at the ‘Spoon
    Second Tuesday each month, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Spring Garden Street at Tate Street, a 20-minute exploration of a new exhibition.

UNCG event calendars

February

  • Friday February 3
    Recycling and bulk trash will be collected along with the weekly garbage and yard waste pickup.

8 p.m. University Performing Arts Series — Bill T. Jones and Arnie Zane Company. UNCG Auditorium.

  • Thursday February 16
    7:30 p.m., UNCG Theatre: Antigone, Taylor Theatre, Tate Street. Feb. 16: Pay-what-you-can preview. Play runs Feb. 16-19 and 22-26.
  • Friday February 17
    Recycling and bulk trash will be collected along with the weekly garbage and yard waste pickup.
  • Monday February 20
    7 p.m. — College Hill Neighborhood Association board meeting. Elections of 2017 officers and board members will be held.
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CHNA board election to be held Monday February 20

Posted on Jan 29, 2017 by David Arneke

College Hill Historic District sign at Tate and Market streetsThe College Hill Neighborhood Association will hold its annual election for officers and board of directors on Monday, February 20, at 7 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of the Presbyterian Church of the Covenant, 501 South Mendenhall Street. Anyone interested in running can inform the board by sending an email or by letting us know at the meeting.

All members of the neighborhood association are eligible to run. Membership is open to all College Hill residents and property owners.

The board develops and implements the College Hill Neighborhood Plan in collaboration with the city Planning Department. It also directs the allocation of the historic district’s municipal service district funds. Current projects include selling the neighborhood association’s small lot on South Mendenhall Street and a developing a plan to slow traffic on South Mendenhall Street through upgrades to the roadway, intersections, signage and markings.

The neighborhood board reviews applications for certificates of appropriateness from property owners in the historic district and advises the Greensboro Historic Preservation Commission. The association manages the neighborhood’s Neighborhood Watch program and is a member of the Greensboro Neighborhood Congress.

The board meets monthly on the Monday before the last Wednesday at 7 p.m. at the Presbyterian Church of the Covenant. The meeting dates are determined by the monthly meeting of the Historic Preservation Commission, which meets on the last Wednesday of the month.

The neighborhood association’s current officers and directors are:

Officers

  • President: James Keith
  • Vice President: David Arneke
  • Secretary: Amanda Keith
  • Treasurer: Arlen Nicolls

Board Members

  • Eric Crouse
  • Dan Curry
  • Lynn Gagnier
  • Virginia Haskett
  • Dave Hemm
  • Clara Kelly
  • Lyddan Pawlowski
Posted in College Hill Neighborhood Association, Elections, Mendenhall Street, Municipal Service District, Neighborhood Watch, Presbyterian Church of the Covenant | Leave a comment

Sewer rehabilitation work coming; beginning date uncertain

Posted on Jan 27, 2017 by David Arneke

Door-hanger that was distributed in December in re upcoming sewer rehabilitation workIf you received a door-hanger like this one in the past month, you’ve probably noticed that sewer rehabilitation work did not begin within 48 hours. But it will, eventually.

Robbie Bald, a civil engineer for the City of Greensboro, says work has been delayed (they’re on the other side of UNCG in the area of Mayflower Drive and West Market Street) and he can’t give a specific date for beginning in College Hill.

When contractor KRG Utility does come, the work will go one block at a time, likely taking a week or two per block. College Hill’s sewer lines date back to the 1920s and ’30s. While many such lines around the city are leaking, it’s rainwater leaking into the lines that’s the problem, not sewage leaking out. Adding rain to sewage unnecessarily increases the load at the city’s water treatment plants.

Bald characterizes the work as “fairly non-invasive.” Streets will be dug up, but work will extend into yards only where necessary.

Posted in City Government | 1 Comment

WAM: New exhibition and talk by photographer Lucinda Devlin

Posted on Jan 24, 2017 by David Arneke
Photograph of a vast expanse of wheat in a field

Lucinda Devlin, Wheat Field, SD, 2008, from the series Field Culture

The Weatherspoon Art Museum will open a new exhibition, “Lucinda Devlin: Sightlines,” Friday with a talk by artist and a reception.

From the Weatherspoon:

“Lucinda Devlin’s photographs serve as social commentaries on timely and socially relevant issues such as personal rights, the death penalty, and agribusiness. An internationally recognized American photographer who now lives in Greensboro, Devlin began her career in the 1970s during the genesis of color photography in America. At the time, she took up not only color photography, but also the artistic approach that she continues to this day, one that emphasizes an objective or neutral point of view. Devlin also discovered her preferred subject matter: psychologically charged spaces absent of any human figures yet nonetheless signaling contemporary public and private life.”

Devlin has produced eight series of photographs. Her first, Pleasure Ground, featured images of thematic hotel rooms. Her best known series, The Omega Suites, shows images of sterile execution chambers and related apparatus. Others explore the meaning of place at such sites as zoos and amusement parks, tanning salons and health spas, and hospitals and funeral homes, among others.

The exhibition features 83 photographs chosen from all eight of Devlin’s series. It will be on display in the Weatherspoon’s main McDowell Gallery through April 23.

Posted in UNCG, UNCG College of Visual and Performing Arts, Weatherspoon Art Museum | Tagged | Leave a comment

“College Hill Bungalow Represents Inspiring History,” a post from the Preservation Greensboro blog

Posted on Jan 23, 2017 by David Arneke
View of the house from the street

The Booker-Benton House, 1110 West McGee Street

Benjamin Briggs of Preservation Greensboro recently wrote about the Booker-Benton House at 1110 West McGee Street, a home with a remarkable history.

“The Booker-Benton House is a rare surviving structure built by an African American family at the height of the Jim Crow Era, in the midst of the historically white College Hill neighborhood. …

“The 1100 block of West McGee Street was an African American enclave within a largely white neighborhood. … After the Civil War, African-American citizens sought to avoid high costs of land by living in the area alongside and behind the white-owned homes of South Mendenhall Street.  Some of these early residents purchased land from Cyrus P. Mendenhall, once mayor of the city and a Quaker. Others rented their homes.”

Click here to read the full post.

Posted in Historic Preservation, McGee Street, Preservation Greensboro | Tagged | Leave a comment

College Hill real estate update: Very little for sale right now; also, Tate Street is about to get another pizza-and-subs place

Posted on Jan 18, 2017 by David Arneke
house seen from the street

126 South Mendenhall Street is now under contract. The asking price is $399,900.

After a flurry of late fall/early winter activity, College Hill has unusually few houses or condos for sale. Only two single-family, owner-occupied houses are on the market — the beautiful 126 South Mendenhall, under contract at an asking price of $399,900, and the deteriorating 210 South Mendenhall, for which a foreclosure auction is scheduled for February 28. The listing for 306 South Mendenhall was recently removed after almost a year and a half, most recently at $345,000.

The house at 500 South Mendenhall, which is divided into apartments, was taken off the market in November after being for sale for more than 18 months. The asking price dropped from $309,900 to $275,500 in that time.

Two single-unit rental houses are for sale — 912 Spring Garden and 909 Walker Avenue, which is under contract. There are only three condos available, two at Wafco Mills and one Wafco townhouse. By my count, five condos and townhouses in College Hill were sold in 2015, and six others were listed but taken off the market without sales.

Tate Street changes

The Subway on Tate Street closed this month after grinding out low-end sub sandwiches for more than 25 years. If you’re looking for a sub on Tate Street, you’re down to only four choices now, I think. For the moment, anyway …

Also, the short-lived Munchiez closed in December in the longtime Indian restaurant location. A new restaurant is already moving in, Sam’s Oven and Grill, which has a location on Groometown Road. Its menu includes pizza and subs. …

For what it’s worth, the Cottage Inn pizza chain says it’s still coming to Tate Street, although almost no renovation work has been done at the old Thai Garden location since it was gutted last summer. They’ll open in the spring, they say. … Next door, the future Insomnia Cookies location at least has a sign up now. They don’t seem to be in any hurry, either, but some upfit work has been done there.

Loose leaf collection

The city says it has vacuumed up just about all of the leaves it’s going to take from College Hill. Its online map that tracks the progress of loose leaf collection shows College Hill as almost complete. The city says it’ll be finished citywide by January 27.

If you see a pile of leaves at the curb anywhere in the neighborhood, call 373-CITY or use the SeeClickFix app or website and tell them where they need to come back to. … Note that the map shows Edgar Street as a private street, again demonstrating the city’s inconsistent approach to taking responsibility for the alley.

Posted in Businesses, Edgar Street, Mendenhall Street, Real Estate, Spring Garden Street, Tate Street, Wafco Mills, Walker Avenue | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Calendar of Events, December 2016: Happy Holidays!

Posted on Nov 30, 2016 by David Arneke
Clendar of Events, December 2016

Click to go to the calendar page.

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Architectural Salvage sale: 50% off sinks, mantels and lights

Posted on Nov 29, 2016 by David Arneke

ASG sale flyer: 50% off sinke, mantels, light fixtures

Posted in Historic Preservation, Preservation Greensboro | Leave a comment

Posted on Nov 09, 2016 by David Arneke
November calendar of events. Click below for details.

Events in College Hill and nearby this month. Click here to go to the Calendar page.

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Troy Bumpas Inn is hosting its final guests this weekend

Posted on Oct 29, 2016 by David Arneke
Troy Bumpass house with its grand Doric columns

The Greek Revival landmark at 114 South Mendenhall Street

The Troy Bumpas Inn’s last guests will have breakfast Sunday morning, and then the longtime b&b will close for good. Owners Judy and Larry Horn will sell the house next week to a couple who will live in it as a home only, not a business.

Larry Horn says he and Judy wanted to have more flexibility in their lives, particularly to visit three grandchildren born in the last year and a half in Chicago, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. They’ve bought a home in the nearby Lake Daniel neighborhood.

“We’ve been happy with it,” Larry said of the inn. “The business has been fine.”

He says the new owners are moving to Greensboro from out of state and have owned a historic home previously.

The house, which is actually known as the Bumpass-Troy House, is a Greensboro landmark, one of two remaining antebellum homes in College Hill. Built in 1847-48, it was originally the home of the Rev. Sidney Bumpass, a trustee of then-new Greensboro College, and his wife, Frances. Daughter Eugenia Bumpass Troy expanded the house in 1911 and began taking in boarders. It remained in the family through Eugenia’s children nieces [see correction in the comment below] until 1975, when it was bequeathed to Greensboro College.

The college quickly sold the house, and it endured years of decay as apartments. In 1991, Preservation Greensboro helped save the house from destruction, buying it and placing preservation easements on the property. The easements require consultation with the organization on major renovations, interior and exterior. Those easements remain with the deed in perpetuity.

Gwen and Charles Brown bought the house in 1992 and made it into a bed and breakfast. John and Andrea Wimmer bought the house and business in 2004. They sold it to Larry and Judy in 2011.

The Bumpass-Troy house was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977. It also has been designated a Guilford County landmark property.

Posted in Businesses, Mendenhall Street | Tagged | 1 Comment