{"nrhp_refnum":"86001631","name":"Walnut Hill Cotton Gin","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"NC 2509","address_restricted":false,"city":"Knightdale","county":"Wake County","state":"NC","lat":35.73304285200004,"lon":-78.45456274999998,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1986-08-14","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Industry","Agriculture","Historic - Non-Aboriginal","Engineering"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two and a half-story frame and granite-pier cotton gin house on the former Walnut Hill Plantation, on the north side of SR 2509 near Knightdale in eastern Wake County, North Carolina. It appears to have been built in the mid to late 1840s by planter Alonzo T. Mial.","why_significant":"The nomination argues it is one of a handful of intact antebellum gin houses surviving in North Carolina. It also keeps a significant collection of ginning equipment covering its whole operating life, from the late 1840s to the mid 1930s. It is tied to planter Alonzo T. Mial and his son Millard, and has potential archaeological remains, such as the wagon scale pit.","narrative":"Set alone in rural eastern Wake County, this cotton gin house was probably built in the mid to late 1840s by planter and commission merchant Alonzo T. Mial. The frame building rests on tall, dressed granite piers, and its three floors were arranged for each stage of ginning. A mule-powered drive room, gins, a press and storage areas sat under one roof. Inside survive five nineteenth-century gins, feeders, a condenser, a Munger suction system, and an early twentieth-century double-box press. Two 1920s-patent gins replaced the older stands. Outside are a steam engine and a small shed roofed with 1933 license plates. Mial and later his son Millard operated the gin, which also processed cotton for neighboring farms, until the mid 1930s. The property is considered significant because few antebellum gin houses remain in North Carolina, and this one keeps equipment from its entire working life. Buried features, including the wagon scale pit, may add further information.","period_of_significance":"c. 1845-c. 1935","architect_builder":"Unknown (apparently built by Alonzo T. Mial)","architectural_style":null,"criteria":["A","B","C","D"],"status_note":"Gin operation ceased within a few years after 1933. The building is in fair, altered condition, with a deteriorated roof area that leaks. The form lists it as unoccupied and says the main plantation house burned in 1973.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:57:51.035152-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/55/7224/47722455/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_NC/86001631.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/86001631/5adbeca0b5-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/86001631/5adbeca0b5-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Nicholas Oren Rawlings","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Walnut_Hill_Cotton_Gin.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Nicholas Oren Rawlings</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:Walnut_Hill_Cotton_Gin.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/47722455","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walnut_Hill_Cotton_Gin","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7963619"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/north-carolina/wake-county/walnut-hill-cotton-gin-86001631/"}