Mordecai Place Historic District
Why it's listed
Northeast of downtown Raleigh, this district covers roughly fifteen blocks of small-lot streets lined with frame and brick houses built between about 1916 and 1947. It has 181 contributing buildings and one contributing object, about three quarters of its resources. Craftsman bungalows are the most common type, alongside Cape Cods, Foursquares, I-houses and revival styles including Georgian, Colonial, Tudor, Dutch Colonial, Spanish Mission and Italian Renaissance. The largest houses stand near the Mordecai House, a plantation house of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries that now operates as a museum within Mordecai Historic Park. Most of the neighborhood grew after the plantation lands were subdivided in 1922, and the district also keeps the 1924 Barbee School and Pilot Baptist Church, remnants of the Pilot Mill village. Large oaks, dense tree cover and carefully tended gardens give the area a character recalling the 1920s, its main growth period, and show how neighborhoods looked before modern suburban tract development.
Significance in brief: The district is presented as an excellent example of a pre-suburban-tract neighborhood, with a wide range of early twentieth-century house types on small lots, shaded streets and a pedestrian scale. Its main growth came after the 1922 subdivision of the Mordecai plantation lands. It also includes the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth century Mordecai House and surviving pieces of the Pilot Mill village.
Machine-generated summary. This summary was generated by a language model from the official nomination document and has not been reviewed line by line by an editor. It may contain errors. Check the source document before relying on any detail. Source: nomination document (PDF) · National Archives catalog entry. NRHP reference 97001668, listed February 4, 1998. Summary generated October 2026 (model claude-sonnet-5-5, prompt v1.0-2026-10-29, confidence medium).
Key facts
| Address | Roughly bounded by N. Blount St., Courtland Dr., Old Wake Forest Rd. and Mordecai Dr., Raleigh |
|---|---|
| County | Wake County |
| Listed | February 4, 1998 |
| Reference number | 97001668 |
| Resource type | District |
| Architect / builder | James S. Salter (attributed, two Georgian Revival houses); Rose and Linthicam Architects (Boushall House, 1912); Christopher G. Sayre (Barbee School, 1924) |
| Architectural style | Bungalow/Craftsman, Colonial Revival, Tudor Revival, Classical Revival, Georgian Revival, Spanish Revival, Italian Renaissance Revival, Minimal Traditional |
| Areas of significance | Community Planning and Development, Architecture |
| Level of significance | Local |
| Status (as stated in the nomination) | Largely intact residential neighborhood still in use; the former school is now a neighborhood center, the church still operates, and the Mordecai House is a house museum. The mill housing was razed in 1981. |
| Acreage | 95 |
| Coordinates | 35.79479, -78.63146 (NPS GIS) |
What listing means for this property
This is a historic district. Buildings within its boundary are either contributing (they add to the district's significance) or non-contributing. Owners of contributing income-producing buildings can claim the 20% federal rehabilitation tax credit; homeowners should look at state credits. National Register districts impose no design review by themselves; a local historic district ordinance, if one exists, does (the difference explained).
General information, not legal or tax advice. Rules change; confirm with your State Historic Preservation Office or a qualified adviser.
Sources and further reading
- National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places database (snapshot May 2026), reference 97001668.
- Nomination form (PDF, National Archives) — catalog entry
- Wikipedia article (used for cross-checking only; text not reproduced here)
- Wikidata Q17022694
- This listing as JSON
Last updated October 2026. Found an error? See the editorial policy for how to report it.