{"nrhp_refnum":"75001292","name":"Rock House","other_names":["Martin,John,House"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"N of King on SR 1186","address_restricted":false,"city":"King","county":"Stokes County","state":"NC","lat":36.40479723400006,"lon":-80.36186562799998,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1975-10-01","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Military","Politics/Government","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-story fieldstone ruin on a ridge overlooking the Sauratown Mountain range near King and Flat Rock in Stokes County, North Carolina, believed to be the late eighteenth-century house of Col. John Martin.","why_significant":"The ruin is thought to be the remains of one of the area's grandest early houses, built for John Martin, a wealthy landowner, militia colonel and holder of state and county offices. The nomination cites his Revolutionary War service, his political roles and his large library and landholdings. It also notes that much of the ownership story rests on local tradition.","narrative":"Rising from a ridge crest above the Sauratown Mountains in Stokes County, this two-story fieldstone ruin is known locally as the Rock House. Tradition ties it to Col. John Martin, who bought 400 acres in 1787 and went on to hold nearly 9,000 acres in the county. The three-bay, rectangular main block has a high raised basement, end chimneys, a central porch of quarried stone and a later rear wing. The roof, floors and trim are gone, though a stone partition suggests a hall-and-parlor plan. Martin served as a Revolutionary War lieutenant, a militia colonel, a county magistrate and a legislator in 1798 and 1799. His estate included at least forty-one enslaved people and more than eighty books. The house is regarded as one of the area's grandest early dwellings. Local accounts say it was ruined by fire or storm in 1897, but this could not be confirmed. Plans called for stabilizing the ruin within a small nature park.","period_of_significance":"1700-1799","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":null,"criteria":[],"status_note":"Ruin, unoccupied; roof and interior finishes are gone, and the ruin was to be stabilized as the centerpiece of a four-acre nature park.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:58:56.615458-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/84/7222/47722284/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_NC/75001292.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/75001292/60a75b6f1a-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/75001292/60a75b6f1a-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"MarmadukePercy","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Detail_interior_Rock_House_Stokes_County_North_Carolina.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">MarmadukePercy</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:Detail_interior_Rock_House_Stokes_County_North_Carolina.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/47722284","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_House_(King,_North_Carolina)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q19946027"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/north-carolina/stokes-county/rock-house-75001292/"}