The Homestead

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The Farmhouse

The farmhouse at Duke Homestead, a plain vernacular house with hints of Greek Revival influence, was constructed in 1852 by Washington Duke.  The two-story frame building originally contained only four rooms, two on either side of a central chimney.  A small structure at the rear of the house served as a kitchen.  The interior walls of the home were fashioned of hand-dressed, heart-pine boards--a feature typical of North Carolina farmhouses of the mid-1800s.  The furnishings and household items on display are representative of those which were in use in farmhouses of the region during the mid-nineteenth century.

Beneath the house is a root cellar which served as a cool storage place during hot summer months for the family's stock of fruits, vegetables, and other foods.  A well house, smokehouse, and grape arbors are close by the house.

Washington Duke's original 1852 homestead.