Medianera is a Spanish word used to describe a wall shared by two buildings. In Barcelona it is frequently used to describe a wall of a building that retains characteristics or artifacts of an adjacent building that has been torn down. One of the most easily noticed is the one off of Wilmington Street, as seen above.
Amid the bustling pubs, coffee houses, sushi bars and high-end restaurants downtown, a forgotten piece of Raleigh’s culinary history sits shuttered and forlorn on Wilmington Street. The long-closed Raleigh Sandwich Shop is a relic from an era when family-run grills, luncheonettes and diners were the mainstays of downtown eateries. These small, unpretentious lunch counters were commonplace downtown well into the 1960s. Nowadays only a handful (if that many) are still around.
Tucked away in the woods behind a nondescript building on Raleigh’s busy Oberlin Road is a long-forgotten chunk of inside the beltline real estate. I am speaking of the old Oberlin Village Cemetery. Few people are aware of its existence now, but this weedy three-acre graveyard entangled with ivy is the final resting place for many former residents of a once-thriving African-American Community known as Oberlin.
At one point in time, St. Agnes Hospital was the only place in Raleigh for African-Americans to get healthcare. The former hospital holds a wealth of Raleigh history, but is also as the location of several sad events related to segregation and other artifacts of the Jim Crow era.
The bar pictured above has been forgotten and abandoned for some time. It is very easy to miss if you aren’t looking for it, but is located directly beneath Mitch’s Tavern. It was purchased by Mitch some time ago, and has sat idle ever since. I’ve heard from various friends that have worked for him over the years that he bought it simply to prevent any sort of competition near his business. Many have also speculated that he is simply not ambitious enough to do anything with it.
Can anyone shed light on this particular place’s history?
Our friends over at New Raleigh beat us to it today, but I wanted to follow up on my previous post about this building.
As you can see the old Gibbons Service building has been cleaned out and gutted in anticipation of a future lease. As a reader pointed out, the most recent occupant of this building was TAO Automotive
, now located on Capital Boulevard.
This is the second abandoned beauty salon that’s made this blog.
This part of East Martin Street will be going through a renovation before too long. I don’t have any direct knowledge of future plans, but this particular structure lies on the edge of a row of brand new houses towards a slightly less upscale part of Raleigh. If you go to this part of town at night, you can expect to see the RPD in a car nearby, and possibly following you and running your license plate. They have had a presence in this area pretty consistently–at least the few times I’ve ventured down it at night.
Pictured above is what remains of Dorsett Drive on the Dorothea Dix campus. I haven’t been to this area in a few years now, and it’s quite different than I remember it. The difference being piles of rubble where abandoned houses once stood. I’ve heard that these houses were home to staff of the hospital, but I do not know for sure.
Anyone have the story of this place? Did red street signs once designate roads in Raleigh, or was it limited to Dorothea Dix?
For more photos, check out the N&O gallery of Dorothea Dix Hospital.
If you are not a new reader of this blog, you may have noticed that I have a fondness for railroad related items. Raleigh has a rich history with railroading, and it shows in some of the artifacts around town.
I can’t say that I know the purpose of this dilapidated structure. My guess is that it was a direct route in to the warehouse to the last building on West Martin St..
