{"nrhp_refnum":"89002349","name":"Alum Spring","other_names":[],"category":"site","location":{"address":"SR 1211 1.6 mi. S of SR 1001","address_restricted":false,"city":"Catherine Lake","county":"Onslow County","state":"NC","lat":34.79757857300007,"lon":-77.56488199443962,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1990-01-31","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Entertainment/Recreation"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Alum Spring is a sulphur mineral spring with its surrounding grounds, about one mile south of the community of Catherine Lake in Onslow County, North Carolina. The site is a fifteen-acre tract and is counted as a single contributing resource.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the spring and its grounds are significant for entertainment and recreation, as the site of the county poorhouse in the post-Civil War period and the annual \"Big August\" picnic, a county-wide social gathering held there until 1933. It places the site within the statewide nineteenth-century popularity of mineral springs as picnic grounds and spas.","narrative":"A sulphur spring on a south-facing slope about a mile south of Catherine Lake in Onslow County, the spring flows at roughly 2,000 gallons per minute into a stream that runs 300 feet to a branch of Southwest Creek. The tract was patented to Matthew Brinson in 1761 and was reduced to about fifteen acres by 1839, when John Cook bought it. Through the late nineteenth century it was the site of the county poorhouse, and from then until 1933 it hosted the annual \"Big August\" picnic, when local families brought food and clothing for the poorhouse inmates. Crowds of three to four hundred were common at its largest, with carriages, wagons and later automobiles arriving from across the region. The spring is valued for its association with this long-running community gathering and for the mid-nineteenth-century accounts of its medicinal waters. Its archaeological remains, including buried handmade bricks, are also considered important.","period_of_significance":"ca. 1850-1933","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":null,"criteria":["A"],"status_note":"Closed to the general public at present; the site was less well maintained after the 1930s.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:11:42.724624-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/99/7182/47718299/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_NC/89002349.pdf"},"photo":null,"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/47718299","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alum_Spring","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q19460188"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/north-carolina/onslow-county/alum-spring-89002349/"}