Photo by J. Sinclair

Cradled between two college campuses and adjacent to downtown, Greensboro’s College Hill neighborhood had, in many ways, fallen from grace by the early 1970s.

Once the bastion of the city’s most prominent families, College Hill was riddled with boarding houses and inhabited by the city’s homeless who sought refuge in the abandoned Wafco Mills building on West McGee Street. The neighborhood’s public image was plagued with violent crime, and the Tate Street shopping area had become a notorious gathering place for the 1960s counterculture movement.

At the time, “slum clearance” was the accepted method for a city to purge itself of such blighted neighborhoods. That was until 1974, when a seminal planning report titled The Summary Report: Toward a Better Community made a strong case that “older, historic neighborhoods were irreplaceable assets that provided the variety of housing choices that were an essential part of successful communities.”

Another report published about the same time — An Inventory of Historic Architecture, Greensboro, N.C. — identified a host of historic properties in the “West End” — a name used by local businesses to describe the area in and around College Hill at the turn of the century. Together, the documents set the stage for the neighborhood’s recovery by presenting

key recommendations like Historic District Zoning.

As federal funds for revitalization projects became available across the nation, Greensboro city planners selected College Hill for a comprehensive neighborhood-planning process because of its strategic location, the sizable number of historic properties in the district, and the fact that the neighborhood was eligible for federal assistance.

In 1978, the Greensboro City Council adopted the College Hill Concept Plan, allowing the city to acquire property through eminent domain. The College Hill Neighborhood Association was formed, and two years later, College Hill became Greensboro’s first local historic district.

Fast-forward nearly 30 years.

Today, it is no surprise to find some of the city’s leading stewards of local history and preservation living on “the Hill.” Take the historic Walker-Scarborough House. Built in 1845 by Governor John Motley Morehead for his daughter, Letitia, and her husband, William Walker, the home now belongs to the former director of the Greensboro Historical Museum.

At the opposite end of the district and College Hill’s architectural spectrum is the 1919 bungalow of J. Davenport — a board member of Preservation Greensboro and co-chair of Architectural Salvage of Greensboro, a nonprofit collaborative between the City of Greensboro and Preservation Greensboro.

Thanks to an enthusiasm for the past, it’s not surprising to find Davenport serving as the vice president of the College Hill Neighborhood Association — the local watchdog group that guards the architectural integrity of the community. Sandwiched between two growing institutions of higher learning, Davenport notes that College Hill has traditionally been the neighborhood of choice for both institutions in their need to satisfy an appetite for student housing.

Back home, the collector continues to save architectural pieces like windows and doors, a butler’s pantry from a neighborhood home, and an assortment of vintage and antique furniture. In the kitchen, old cabinets are incorporated into new design while a primitive factory worktable becomes an attractive island. These are the fruits of working in salvage and having an appreciation and eye for all things beautiful.

Today, College Hill stands as a shining example of perseverance in preservation with 27 historic houses restored, the historic Wafco Mill renovated, more than 100 homes rehabilitated, and neighborhood improvements that include decorative lighting and street name signs.

There has also been a restoration of the neighborhood’s reputation. Davenport shares the latest report on the neighborhood’s progress: College Hill is known now as “a pedestrian place with the amenities of convenience, architectural charm, human scale, and a sense of character.”

In short, it’s just a great place to live.