{"nrhp_refnum":"08000292","name":"Ayers-Little Boarding House","other_names":["The Little Coffee Shop"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"121 Athens St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Carnesville","county":"Franklin County","state":"GA","lat":34.36932668800006,"lon":-83.23298683199994,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2008-04-16","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Commerce","Social History"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A frame one- and one-half-story house at 121 Athens Street, at the southeast corner of the courthouse square in Carnesville, Franklin County, Georgia. It was built c. 1840 as a house and tavern and later joined to an adjacent post office by a breezeway.","why_significant":"The nomination argues it is an excellent example of a late-19th- and early-20th-century boarding house, altered in the 1930s to hold a restaurant and more boarders. It was an important business on the courthouse square serving boarders and local residents. It also reflects women's history, since boarding houses were among the few businesses open to women, and Lizzie Little ran it until 1963.","narrative":"Standing at the southeast corner of the courthouse square in Carnesville, this sprawling frame house began around 1840 as a house and tavern. In 1860 Jeremiah Ayers bought it along with a neighboring post office and joined the two with a breezeway. After his death in 1885, his widow Louisa and daughter Lizzie began taking in boarders, and the family lived in the basement while renting out the rooms above. Lizzie later married Robert Leland Little. Around 1930 the couple renovated the house, dividing the attic into three dormer-lit bedrooms and moving the family coffee shop into the old post office wing. Boarders included doctors, lawyers, and teachers and students from the Tugaloo Institute. Lizzie Little ran the boarding house and coffee shop, and edited the Carnesville Herald, until her death in 1963. It is the last of the small historic businesses that once lined the square, and it illustrates how a boarding house could provide women with respectable work and housing.","period_of_significance":"1885-1963","architect_builder":"Unknown","architectural_style":"Other: Side-gable dwelling","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Current function is listed as a single dwelling; a family member resided in the house until 2007.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:42.816428-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_GA/08000292.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/08000292/6aeccb05a3-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/08000292/6aeccb05a3-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"BettyLDouglas","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ayers-Little_Boarding_House,_Carnesville,_GA.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">BettyLDouglas</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ayers-Little_Boarding_House,_Carnesville,_GA.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/93208031","wikipedia":null,"wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q134305065"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/georgia/franklin-county/ayers-little-boarding-house-08000292/"}