1617 Fayetteville St- Dyer-Smith House

"Residence of Mr. John A. Dyer" from Milestones Along the Color Line, 1922

From the Preservation Durham Historic Plaque Application: 

This two-story gable-front-and-wing house is one bay wide, and is attached to a two-story gable-roofed ell. This is a wood frame home that has since been covered in vinyl. There is a gable-roofed canted bay on the north facade. All windows on the structure are one-over-one. The original awnings, carport, wrap-around porch, and chimney have since been removed. 

The original owner of 1617 Fayetteville was John A. Dyer, a secretary/accountant/clerk for the People’s Building and Loan Association. He lived in the property from the early 1920s until he died in 1932. The home is featured in Milestones Along the Color Line: A Souvenir of Durham, N.C., Showing the Progress of Race, written by Oliver B. Quick. Milestones Along The Color Line was a pamphlet published in 1922 as a way to document some of the Black-owned properties in Durham.

“This little book presents views showing property owned and controlled exclusively by Negroes in the city of Durham, N.C. It is not a complete collection. There are other institutions and homes in the city equally as deserving of place in this book but lack of space prevents their showing. We have selected these as evidence of the progress being made by our race group in this section of the South.”

The home is listed as the “Residence of Mr. J.A. Dyer,” and is one of 27 pictured residences. 

The home was then owned by numerous different individuals who did not live in the property. William Joyner Smith, Jr., and Louise Holland Smith rented the property from 1933 until William died in 1974. William’s parents, William Smith Sr. and Lucreasy Teal Smith, lived next door at 1619 Fayetteville St, which was also a neighborhood grocery store. 

William’s sister, Christine Smith Peacock, also lived in 1617 Fayetteville with her husband, Otis Peacock. Christine passed away in 1946, and Otis remarried to Valeria Thompson in 1949. Otis died in 1977, and Valeria moved to a home on Athens Avenue shortly thereafter. 

Sources: 

Oliver B. Quick, “Milestones Along the Color Line: A Souvenir of Durham, N.C., Showing the Progress of Race,” 1922, https://archive.org/details/milestonesalongc00quic/mode/2up.

Previous Entries: 

Like many of the dates in MATCL, Dyer doesn't actually appear at this address until the mid 1920s. He is listed in the 1930 CD as sec-treas, Peoples Building & Loan Assoc.

The house's basic form was still intact in the 1950s. It was remuddled in a truly awful way since that time.

04.08.12