Our Flashback Friday postcard feature this week shows a rare aerial view of Raleigh’s Cameron Court Apartments. Who would ever guess this 21st century urban residential oasis was once the epicenter of a vast antebellum estate.

Sorry to say, no message was written on the back of this week’s card. Just the mark:

‘A Natural Finish Card.’ Made by Gray & Thompson, Chapel Hill, N.C. Place Stamp Here.

Does the name ‘Cameron’ ring a bell? As in Cameron Village, Cameron Park, Cameron Park Apartments, Cameron St., etc.

When it was built in 1938, Cameron Court became Raleigh’s second ‘garden apartment’ development. The Boylan Apartments, located on a site just east of the Cameron estate, had been erected three years earlier.

A garden apartment complex consists of low-rise apartment buildings built with landscaped grounds surrounding them. The apartment buildings are often arranged around courtyards that are open at one end. A garden apartment has some characteristics of a townhouse: each apartment has its own building entrance, or just a few apartments share a small foyer or stairwell at each building entrance.

Garden apartments grew in popularity in Raleigh in the ensuing decade. Cameron Court, 1938, Grosvenor Gardens, next door,  was built in 1939, soon to be followed by the Raleigh Apartments on Peace St. in the early 1940s.

The Cameron Court Apartments were built on the site of the Duncan Cameron Estate. Judge Cameron was a wealthy landowner, farmer, and jurist. After his appointment as  president of the State Bank of North Carolina in 1829, he relocated a few years later to Raleigh from his plantation Fairntosh in what is now Durham County.  The Judge commissioned his Raleigh residence in 1835 from architect Thomas Wiatt, who designed it in an adaptive Greek Revival Style. The property can be easily seen on CN Drie’s 1872 Bird’s Eye View map of Raleigh. In an architectural redefinition of the mansion in 1902, the grandiose neo-classical portico was added by the wife of Duncan’s grandson, Bennehan Cameron.

The Duncan Cameron Estate originally included all of what is now Saint Mary’s School, Cameron Park, the Cameron Village shopping center, and beyond.  The archival view below shows the Cameron Mansion as seen from Hillsboro St. in the late 1930s, and offers a glimpse of its expansive grounds.

North Carolina State Archives photo.

Below is a closer view of the mansion showing its prominent 1902 neo-classical portico.

North Carolina State Archives photo.

I think a few of the massive oak trees seen in these pics still stand in the courtyard of the Cameron Court Apartments today.

“Flashback Friday” is a weekly feature of Goodnight, Raleigh! in which we showcase vintage postcards depicting our historic capital city. We hope you enjoy this week-end treat!