A. L. or Arnold Lincoln (“Link”) Boykin (September 14, 1872-March 31, 1943), an African-American native of Sampson County, moved to Sanford as a young man and became one of the community’s leading builders in a career that extended from the 1890s into the 1930s and encompassed a wide range of building types in Sanford and beyond. One of numerous black builders who translated his artisan and personal skills into a contracting business, he is considered one of Sanford’s most prolific builders and its leading African-American businessman of the early twentieth century. This account comes primarily from J. Daniel Pezzoni, The History and Architecture of Lee County, North Carolina (1995), supplemented by information provided by Greg Stoch of Sanford (email, January 25, 2019).

Boykin was the son of Arnold and Elyza Boykins (Boykin) of Sampson County. In his youth he found employment constructing Seaboard Air Line railroad facilities and lived for a time in the Moore County town of Cameron. By 1895 he moved to the burgeoning railroad town of Sanford in present Lee County (then in Moore County), where he purchased a lot beside the railroad line south of the downtown. In 1895, too, he wed Lula T. McIver of Jonesboro, N. C. (marriage bond; also identified as Leila Street, son A. Lincoln Boykin’s death certificate).

Boykin’s residency in Sanford corresponded with a period of growth in both industry and transportation, including railroads in the late 19th and early 20th century and construction of national highway U. S. 1 through the town and county in the 1920s.

Boykin formed an association with (white) developer John D. McIver, who employed him for several projects, probably including speculative housing in Sanford’s African-American neighborhoods. By 1910 Boykin had joined with John Toomer, a fellow African-American, in the firm of Boykin and Toomer, which advertised in the Feb. 25, 1910, issue of the Sanford Express as “contractors and builders.” The United States census of 1910 listed Boykin as a mulatto carpenter born about 1872, a homeowner, and a head of household living in West Sanford on Blue Field Street with his wife Lula and their children Hattie and Edward (Arnold Edward, 1900-1966). Diversifying his interests, Boykin joined with two other local men to found the Phillips-Boykin Drug Company in the 1910s, which was located at the corner of Pearl and South Moore streets; by this time Pearl Street had become the commercial and institutional center of Sanford’s African-American community. By 1930, the census listed A. Lincoln Boykin and his wife Leila residing on Wall Street in West Sanford, with their grown children living with them. A. Lincoln Boykin was listed as a contractor and son Arnold E. as a carpenter.

A. L. Boykin (sometimes with Toomer and with a growing cadre of employees) constructed or executed the carpentry work on a substantial number of buildings in Sanford. In addition to his son, he reportedly employed as many as fifty carpenters and brick masons, of whom the Goldston brothers, Coley Hooker, A. E. Quick, Henry Robinson, and Guilford Smith have been identified.

Some of Boykin’s building projects were for African-American individuals or institutions, such as the Fair Promise A. M. E. Zion Parsonage (1912) and Fair Promise A. M. E. Zion Church (1923-1924)—his home church. In 1927 he built the W. B. Wicker School , a one-story brick facility originally known as the Lee County Training School, which was designed by architect Herbert B. Hunter and had financial support from the Rosenwald Fund and assistance from prominent local architect L. M. Thompson. It was named for longtime principal W. B. Wicker in 1954. Boykin also built his own family residence, which like several other prominent African American buildings, stood on Wall Street.

Boykin also built many houses for Sanford’s white residents. These include several in the Rosemount and McIver Park neighborhoods in the 1920s such as the Heins House and the Isaacson House, He built the 2-story weather-boarded and wood-shingled S. L. Long House in 1922 at 220 N. Gulf Street for a railroad engineer and the nearly identical James A. and Susie B. Overton House at 323 N. Vance Street in 1924. Directly reflecting the importance of travel to and through Sanford was Mediterranean-influenced brick tourist home he built for Ida Coulter at 503 Sunset Drive about 1926.

Boykin was also evidently involved in the construction of such major projects as the Planters Tobacco Warehouse (1925, no longer standing) and the Sanford Post Office (1936-1937), the latter a Federally funded project that employed many workmen.

In about 1930 A. L.’s son Arnold Edward Boykin joined his father in the business. Arnold Edward had studied in the architectural engineering program at MIT in the 1920s and brought new expertise to the firm. The younger man operated the firm for several more years.

Beyond Sanford, Boykin and especially A. L. Boykin and Son reportedly erected residences and commercial buildings in Chatham, Cumberland, Durham, and Harnett counties. Of these, the Regal Theater in Durham is well known, and others may be identified with further research.

On October 23, 1931, The Pilot newspaper of Vass, N. C., carried a detailed and laudatory account of A. L. Boykin and Son’s efficient operation on a “New Colored School Building” in Pinehurst by “Colored Contractors Doing Good Work with Men of Own Race Exclusively.” Boykin’s son was “the man on top of the wall hustling roof timber to the top of the structure.” There was a sign posted saying, “Do not talk to the workmen.” The firm had been the low bidder, and the job appeared to be well done and likely to come in under the bid. “Considerable comment is heard concerning this job, for it is no doubt the most ambitious that has been undertaken in this section by exclusively colored labor.” “Every man on the job was moving, and it is doubtful if any job in this section has been carried on with less lost motion, less time for aimless talk, or less time to turn around.” The writer predicted that “if it is carried through with the efficiency that it seems, apparently the new school house will be something of a monumental [sic] evidence of the [progress] colored folks are making in the Sandhills.” http://newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073968/1931-10-23/ed-1/seq-4/ocr/

After his death at age 70, Arnold Lincoln Boykin was buried at the Star of Hope Baptist Cemetery in Sanford. In 2016 (see Sanford Herald, April 1, 2016), the third of several downtown Sanford murals of important local figures and events was completed. It depicts prominent black educator W. B. Wicker and Arnold Lincoln Boykin.

• J. Daniel Pezzoni, The History and Architecture of Lee County, North Carolina (1995)
• “Nice Sum Spent for Buildings,” The Sanford express (Sanford, N.C.), Jan. 5, 1923, https://newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn89071020/1923-01-05/ed-1/seq-1/.