NORTH CAROLINA

Alexander County

• Vashti Octagon house. James Storey McLain was born in 1802 near Vashti, Alexander County, NC, USA. Story learned to farm and attended the York Institute a Methodist academy near his home. He married Jane Emaline Stevenson and had eight children. The census of 1850 shows their farm valued at $1,500. It was inherited by Jane Emaline and was the beginning of the McLain estate which was later divided. He lived in a house circa 1850 built along an octagonal shape and it was known locally as the Roundhouse. May students of the York Institute boarded there.
  
  Source: Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered September, 2013.

Carteret County

• Swansboro. Octagon house. The Hill-Jones house. Built about 1855. Located at 301 Masonic Avenue.

  The Octagon House known as Swansboro was completed circa 1856, built by a plantation owner named Edward Hillon the old family property.

  Hill abandoned it during the Civil War . The house and plantation were occupied by Union soldiers and they were rough on the home and land. All the furniture in the house, even the rugs on the floor, were and burned or destroyed and the livestock slaughtered. The troops marched on after a few weeks and luckily they didn't burn down the home.

  When Edward died in the 1870's his daughter, Mary E. Hill inherited - she was married to Robert H. Jones. They eventually had seven children. Robert died in 1884, and Mary married the plantation foreman, Mr. K. M. Bell. After Mary's death the octagonal home was passed down to John Sherwood Jones... the only child to outlive their mother. Ownership of the property went to his only son, John Robert Jones & Lois Anne Baily Jones.

  In 1999 John and Lois Jones gave the home and 60 acres of property to the Masonic group of North Carolina.to be used as children's camp, a Masonic Convention Center, and a retirement community.

  Renovated around 1900, and again in 1950, and yet again in about 2004. To what extent is not clear. The house is apparently very substantially built, by Solomon White Davis, who was both a mariner and a planter, and is still basically in very sound condition. Like many houses of the 1850s time frame, the very finest hardwoods were easily available, inexpensive, and used for everything.
  
  The original owners, the Hills, apparently owned a great deal of land in the Cedar Point area in the 1850s. Most recently owned by the Jones', the house and 60 acres of land have been donated to the Masons. The house is being renovated. It is not clear that this means restored. Characteristic of octagon houses in the Fowler period ( 1848 to 1865 ), there are usually no original floor plans or design documents.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  The photograph at the left, top row, was probably taken in the 1950s. The one in the right, top row, shows the house before the most recent renovation.
  
  Sources: R. Kline; "More About Octagons," Carl F. Schmidt; Dale Travis. Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered: September, 2002.
  Updated: March, 2003.
  Updated: June, 2004.
  Updated: December, 2006.
  Updated: May, 2009.
  Updated: July, 2009.
  Updated: February, 2012
  Updated: February, 2013
  Updated: September, 2013
  Updated: October, 2013
  Updated: September, 2014
  Updated: January, 2015

Cherokee County.

• Topton. Octagon house. As of about 1975 it was being used as a store.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  
  
  Source: R. Kline.
  Entered: September, 2002.
  Updated: September, 2011

Haywood County.

• Clyde / Lake Junaluska Octagon house. Built c1895. Gone. Located at U S Highway 19/Carolina Blvd, Haywood County Dr. W. K. Cranford, professor at Duke University, was presumed to have built a 3-story octagon house with 17 rooms between Clyde and Lake Janaluska. Recent info states his wife resided there while ill with tuberculosis but no mention of them owning it. A 2 tiered porch extended around the entire structure with a roof top platform—all removed early on. Alterations were made and vinyl siding added before it was razed after 2001.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  
  
  Sources: R. Kline. Ellen Puerzer. "Mountain Gables A History of Haywood County Architecuture" by Duane Oliver.
  Entered: September, 2002.
  Updated: November, 2013
• Lake Junaluska A partial octagon house was built in the area by C E Weatherby Sr and his wife Nyda Hicks in 1913.It still stands at 335 Atkins Loop. He was the leader of the North Carolina Conference. It was the first home in the Methodist religious community that founded the town. He gave the town an area for a park in 1922 and it was named after him. Currently the house is owned by Virginia McNair.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  2013

  
  
  Source: Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered November, 2013.

Hyde County

• Bluff Point . Octagon lighthouse building. Built in 1891. Gull Shoal Light.
  
  Source: Ron Livingston
  Entered: March, 2002
• Engelhard, in the Lake Landing Historic District. Octagon house. Sparrow House (also called the Ink Bottle house), built 1857 by Dr. William T. Sparrow. Said to be one of only two octagon houses built in North Carolina in the 19-th century. Located at 30885 US 264.
  
  GPS coordinates: 35.484582 -76.051699
  
  Photograph & Location.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  		1978 - before restoration started.

  
  
  Brief article.
  
  Sources: R. Kline. Dale Travis and Mark Minasi provide a contemporary photographs.
  Entered: June, 2001.
  Updated: November, 2005.
  Updated: June, 2010
  Updated: December, 2013
  Updated: February, 2019

Madison County

• Hot Springs Octagon house. The Octagon House, built in the late 1890's is 2 minutes away from Magnolia Inn and sits on 3 acres overlooking Spring Creek. It has 3 bedrooms, a den, 3 baths, a kitchen, a living room and dining room. In the 1970s it was purchased by Bill & Betty Price, and they decided to open their "Octagon House and Spring Creek Chalet" as a vacation rental. The Price Family partnered with the Mountain Magnolia Inn. Recently underwent restoration. Now used as a bed and breakfast.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  
  
  Sources: Sandy Semans. Ellen Puerzer. Leslie E. Parker.
  Entered: June, 2001.
  Updated: April, 2004.
  Updated: July, 2007.
  Updated: February, 2012
  Updated: February, 2013
  Updated: October, 2013

Mecklenburg County

• Charlotte A hexagon house stood at 912 W. 5th Street (near Irwin Ave) in Charlotte.
  
  It was designed by Harriet Abigail Irwin 1828-1897 She reportedly built a couple hex houses but none are standing. Several websites on this woman mistakenly show the Swanboro/Cedar Point NC octagon house as her hexagon. So hopefully, we can set the online record straight about her house.
  
  Reportedly the first woman architect to patent plans on her hexagon house August 24, 1869. (She was the sister of Mrs Stonewall Jackson.) . "Her model home in Charlotte's Fourth Ward - two stories with central tower, mansard roof and arched porch,traditional verandah was torn down in 1960's."
  
  GPS coordinates: 35.235424, -80.851144
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  Patent 1	Patent 2	Patent 3
  Women architects 1	Women architects 2	Women architects 3
  	1911

  
  
  Source: Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered October, 2013.
  Updated: November, 2013
  Updated: May, 2017

Polk County

• Tryon Octagon house.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  1902

  
  
  Source: Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered: October, 2020.

Rowan County

• Rockwell The Harr-Hopkins octagon house. Built between 1903 and 1906 by a Rev. Harr, from Tennessee, who copied it from another house in the area. Razed in 1964.
  
  

  Left click on the image below for a larger version.

  

  
  
  Sources: R. Kline. Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered: September, 2002.
  Updated August, 2009

Tyrrell County.

• Albemarle Sound. Hexagon lighthouse building. Built in 1880. Laurel Point Light. The lighthouse database lists the structure as "destroyed."
  Photograph and history.
  Sources: Ron Livingston; Dale Travis.
  Entered: March, 2002.
  Updated: March, 2003.

Wilkes County

• North Wilkesboro In the 1910s Reuben and Nancy Roberts Caudill, their seven children and Nancy’s mother, Emily Bryan Roberts, had moved to town the the octagonal house there.located on 6th st just off Main.  The family remained there for years,. Marilyn Payne, museum board member, is trying to learn more about the unusually-shaped home, including who built it and who owned it after the Caudills.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  
  
  Source: Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered: September, 2020.

Wilson County

• Wilson Octagon house. A round house was erected by Oliver Nestus Freeman the son of a former slave in the 1940s. Today it is a museum. 1202 Nash St E. He was a stonemason & built it himself ;and much of the property shows his creations.
  
  

  Left click on the images below for larger versions.

  
  
  Source: Ellen Puerzer.
  Entered: January, 2016.
  Updated: September, 2020