Just a little history: What happened to the WF Hotel?

Who built what, who lived where and what happened to that building are questions being asked by a few people in Wake Forest these days, people trying to trace the construction and ownership of the Taylor-Purefoy-Swett house on South Avenue.

And a different detective entered the questioning this week. Charles Hart of Australia came to town to trace the college hotel because the hotel helped put several family members, including his mother, through Wake Forest College.

It begins with a young couple. Pinkney and Minnie Middleton married in 1909 and began married life on a small farm in Rutherford County. During the next 15 years they had six children, and Charles Hart is the son of the oldest daughter, Maxine.

During the Depression, Pinkney and Minnie lost all their savings they had set aside to help with their children’s education and then in 1930 they had to sell the farm. They settled on a farm near Gilkey, still in Rutherford County. Pinkney thought he had to give up all hope of seeing his children attend college, beginning with the oldest son, Darrell, who later wrote down what happened next.

“In the spring of 1931, Doctor O.E. Sams, Vice President of Mars Hill College (in Madison County next to the Tennessee line), came to our house to talk with my father and me about my entering Mars Hill in the fall. It was sad to see the disappointment on Dad’s face when he said, ‘I don’t see how it can be done,’ Doctor Sams replied, ‘I think there is a way.’ Then he wrote out a program which put me through Junior College, a scholarship for tuition and a work program which provided my room and board in the dormitory. When I graduated from Mars Hill, I entered Wake Forest College. In the spring of the next year, my father had a heart attack. He would work no more and it was apparent that I would have to return home and help care for the family.

“I went to the Dean of the College and told him of my problem. He said, ‘Let’s see if we can’t work something out.’ Then he pointed out that just off the campus were two large buildings which belonged to the College. One was an older residence and the other, about one half block away had been used as a student boarding house. If my parents would move into the residence and operate the boarding house for students able to afford only a moderate cost for meals, the college would charge them no rent. Needless to say, my parents were ecstatic with the opportunity and moved without delay.”

Pinkney Middleton died in 1941 with the knowledge that all his living children – one son died young – had either graduated from Wake Forest or were still studying there. Minnie continued to run the boarding house until she retired.

From the picture with this narrative it is clear the boarding house began as the College Hotel, which was built around 1850 by James S. Purefoy, a college trustee, after a request from the other trustees that he do so to provide a place for students’ families to stay for commencement and other events. Purefoy also built a large general store next door, the only one in the small village, which his wife ran. The hotel and store stood across from the south side of the campus, probably on today’s South Avenue between South Main Street and South College Street.

The amazingly clear picture with the narrative shows a large four-story building from an angle at a corner. There is a full basement with windows on all sides, doors on the ends. A staircase on the end leads to a full-length roofed and pillared porch with a smaller porch on the back. There is a full second story and an attic with end windows and dormers.

We have a student account of the buildings in the village in 1866 which says the James Purefoy family was living in the hotel at that time. In 1853 Purefoy sold his first house that was built in Forestville in 1853 and still stands. At some point – the when is the mystery – he bought the property of Alexander Hamilton Taylor which later became the home of Dr. William Poteat after he married into the Purefoy family.

We will leave aside the questions about Purefoy and the Taylor house – we know it involves a probate court in 1872 and a deed in 1873 – to focus on the hotel/boarding house.

Could this building have been moved to West Owen Avenue and turned into a dormitory for college? When? And when was it torn down? Was it called the Colonial Inn at some point? Do you have any answers or pictures? Does anyone remember Minnie Middleton who died in 1983 at 95?