300 block of S. Wilmington St., 1926. The four storefronts seen left to right are the same ones seen in the photo below. They were built in the late 1870s. (Image courtesy N.C. Division of Archives and History)

300 block of S. Wilmington St., 2009. (Image credit: John Morris)

Nowadays the first two blocks of Wilmington St. are undegoing a resurgence and rehabilitation, while the 300 block remains gloomy and virtually deserted.
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Mr. and Mrs. Thomas stand in front of their grocery store, The Thrifty Food Market, in 1972.

A few weeks ago I attended a First Friday event at Rebus Works, a small art gallery in Boylan Heights. As I walked through the crowded room inspecting the artwork, glass of wine in hand, my footsteps across the creaky, worn wood floors started to echo in my ears. The chit-chat of the crowd seemed to fade away, and my mind began to drift back to a time that existed more than 35 years ago when the gallery space was occupied by a neighborhood grocery called The Thrifty Food Market. It was a simpler, different sort of time.

Mr. and Mrs. Thomas had owned and operated the little grocery store at the western terminus of the Martin St. viaduct since 1937. I lived in Boylan Heights for several years in the early 1970s and got to know the Thomases well. They were a kindly older couple whom I always thought of back then as the grandparents of Boylan Heights. In those days I lived with a group of friends in a house that many of our neighbors regarded with disdain as a “hippie house.” But not the Thomases. They took a liking to us, — well, actually, there was no one they didn’t like — and we certainly liked them.
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Remembering the Old Meredith Building

Located across Blount Street from the historic Richard B. Haywood house is a sprawling, 4-acre state government surface parking lot. I can tell you, though, one of Raleigh’s most exuberant and impressive 19th century structures once occupied this site. I am speaking of course, of the main building of the erstwhile Baptist Female University, now known as Meredith College. The four-story, many-gabled and turreted, solid brick Chatauesque, Queen Anne-styled building was designed by Raleigh’s enigmatic 19th century architect Adolphus Gustavus Bauer. After its completion in 1899, Meredith College occupied this site for the next quarter century. Over this time the College added 4-story Faircloth Hall, and annexed four adjacent residences to accommodate the growth of its student body. Even so, the 1899 main building itself continued to preside majestically over the 100 block of North Blount Street.
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