West Main Street

Campus Drive / Free Expression Bridge

Long a free-wheeling canvas for the Duke student community, the "free expression bridge" was dominated by self-promotion by earnest interest groups and Greek groups - but occasionally attracted some artistic expression or humorous graffiti. In 2013, the state DOT replaced the actual bridge carrying Main Street over Campus Drive, including the...

The Wright Corner / Main And Corcoran - Sw

One of the earliest mixed-purpose office buildings in Durham, Richard Wright's "Wright's Corner" survived in modified form until 1961.

Liggett And Myers New Cigarette Factory

--- The site just to the west of the first Duke Factory was Washington Duke's first in-town home. (Durham Historic Inventory) In 1884, Duke built a new brick factory, just to the east of his house and original factory. In 1888, he built a new house, which he called Fairview. Looking west, with the old factory building to the right. The steeple of...

First Federal / Southbank Building

1974 The First Federal Savings building was constructed in 1974 on a city block that had been razed via urban renewal. This block was built up over the course of the early 20th century, evolving from an 'accessory industrial' and residential area to a retail area during the 1920s. Remnants of the residential form are still evident in the picture...

The Geer Building

The northeast corner of Main and Corcoran Street has seen its share of building drama. For much of the 20th century, it was the location of one of the buildings on my Top Five list of How-Could-They-Have-Torn-That-Down buidings in Durham: the Geer building.

118 W. Main St.

One of the buildings demolished along the north side of Main Street to make way for the towering new One City Center - read more about the evolution of this lot on the page for the Brodie Duke Building which stood at 118 W. Main before the catastrophic 1914 fire. Stores housed in this building included Van Straaten's clothing store in the postwar...

120 West Main Street

The two buildings at 120 and 122 West Main St., immediately to the east of the Geer Building, were constructed in the late 1910s, replacing earlier buildings that had been destroyed by the fire of 1914. Above, a picture of the north side of the 100 block of West Main St. looking northeast. It was taken a few years after the rebuilding of the block...

122 West Main Street

The two buildings at 120 and 122 West Main St., immediately to the east of the Geer Building, were constructed in the late 1910s, replacing earlier buildings that had been destroyed by the fire of 1914. Above, a picture of the north side of the 100 block of West Main St. looking northeast. It was taken a few years after the rebuilding of the block...

114 West Main Street

(Courtesy Durham County Library) 114 West Main St. was the initial home of the Rawls_Knight department store. Like all of the buildings profiled thus far on the north side of West Main St., it was built in the mid-late 1910s, after the fire of 1914. The picture above was taken sometime during the late 1920s or early 1930s.

1107 West Main St.

1107 West Main, 03.16.08 (G. Kueber) 11.11.2019 (G. Kueber)