William Carter Bain (January 8, 1839- July 8, 1920) was a prolific and adaptable contractor who epitomized the energetic entrepreneurship of the post-Civil War well into the 20th century. Bain began as a small-town artisan, served in the Confederate army, and became a regional builder and manufacturer. Adapting successfully to changing times during a...

Berry Davidson (February 10, 1831-December 21, 1915), a millwright in the central Piedmont of North Carolina, left an unusually complete narrative of a career that extended from the 1840s until after 1900, a key period in the industrial development of the region. Depicting a rural millwright's mobility, versatility, and adaptability, his account illuminates the...

Alexander Jackson Davis (1803-1892), a leading American architect of the antebellum period, had an important series of commissions in North Carolina that were significant both in the development of the state and Davis's national practice. The monumental North Carolina State Capitol (1833-1840) was designed by the firm of Town and Davis, but his subsequent...

William Henley Deitrick (1895-1974) was a distinguished and prolific Raleigh architect for half a century, whose firm grew into one of the largest in the state, with projects from the coast to the mountains. Although he began his career in the Beaux Arts tradition and designed many buildings in revivalist styles over the years...

One of the first leaders in the state's early 20th century architectural profession, Charles Christian Hook (February 18, 1870 - September 17, 1938) moved to Charlotte as a young man in 1890 and practiced in the "Queen City" for the rest of his long career. He was Charlotte's first fulltime professional architect, and one...

Michael Joseph Vincent McInerney (March 18, 1877-March 3, 1963), architect and designer, was a Benedictine monk and Roman Catholic priest at Belmont Abbey in Gaston County, North Carolina. Beginning with his design for St. Leo Hall (1906) at the Abbey, he developed a nationally important architectural practice that encompassed scores of Catholic churches, schools...

Charles McMillen (1854-1911), an Irish-born architect, was one of many mobile architects who worked in cities across America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Active in Duluth in the 1880s and 1890s, he moved to Wilmington, North Carolina, after winning a competition to design the port city's Masonic Temple in 1898. He...

William Nichols (1780-December 12, 1853), an English-born house carpenter, architect, and engineer, worked in North Carolina from 1800 until 1827, during which time he planned and built some of the state's finest and most advanced buildings. The first resident architect in North Carolina since John Hawks, he was also the first North Carolina architect...

William Preston Rose (1870-1952), architect and contractor, designed and constructed many buildings large and small in eastern and central North Carolina. A native of Johnston County, he typified the fluidity of the building professions during his long career. He began as a carpenter, then emerged as a self-taught architect in the late 1890s. About...