R. R. (Robert Rutledge, “Rutt”) Gaddis (January 2, 1887-August 19, 1984) was a Haywood County, N. C. builder notable for his skill in river-rock and log construction, an important component of the rustic character of western North Carolina’s architecture including Haywood County. This narrative derives primarily from the author’s interview with R. R. Gaddis in Canton on May 15, 1981 and provides a rare first-hand account of the work of one of the numerous and generally anonymous builders of the region’s characteristic rustic architecture.

Born in Waynesville in Haywood County to Joseph and Martha Evans Gaddis, R. R. Gaddis was about twenty years old when the Champion Fibre Company pulp mill opened in Canton beside the Pigeon River. Drawn by the region’s vast forests and the water of the Pigeon River, the paper manufacturing operation was to become a major industry of western North Carolina. Gaddis got a job with the company as a foreman in the wood yard, supervising the unloading of timber from railroad cars. After a short time, in 1909 he moved to Newport News, Virginia, to work in the shipyards.

Gaddis returned to Haywood County some years later and took work at Lake Junaluska on the construction of the Junaluska (later Lambuth) Inn and the Terrace Inn. It was during this time that Gaddis developed his building skills. When the inns were completed, he began to work on his own, building river-rock walls and subsequently river-rock houses in the Lake Junaluska community. His source for the smooth, round, varicolored stone known as “river rock” was “up river” on the Pigeon River in the south end of the county.

By 1920 Gaddis had returned to Canton, where his reputation for careful stonework kept him constantly engaged. He soon acquired skills in domestic log construction as well, which increased his popularity. For prospective clients, especially newcomers, Gaddis’s houses had a rustic look that seemed appropriate to the small mountain town and provided an effective contrast to the severe, rectilinear designs of Canton’s industrial and commercial architecture.

Among the rock buildings that Gaddis constructed in Canton are the Wiley Johnson Office, the Carl Sprinkle House, and the James and Dutch Wells House. He also built the Old Bell Tavern from components of nineteenth-century log dwellings, and he constructed dwellings of unhewn, saddle-notched logs for Doug Walker on the Dutch Cove Road and for Jack Chapman in the Thickety community.

Reuben B. Robertson, general manager of the Champion mill, hired Gaddis to construct two dwellings, Sit’n’Whittle and Seldom Seen, at his rural retreat at Lake Logan. In these cases, Gaddis worked according to the designs of architect William W. Dodge, Jr. of Biltmore Forest near Asheville. These cottages were part of a complex developed by Robertson by removing a played-out logging village in a valley on the Pigeon River and damming the stream to form Lake Logan; there he created a family compound that included a lodge and cabins, some of them moved from other sites. A number of the log buildings were constructed of native chestnut timber. Lake Logan is now an Episcopal retreat center. Gaddis also built a third camp for Robertson at Timbertop, near Newfound Gap, which no longer stands.

In 1907 R. R. Gaddis married Marietta (Etta) Deaver (1890-1974), a daughter of Mary Heatherly and V. C. Deaver; the groom was 20 years old, the bride 18. They had several children and continued to live in Canton. In the 1920 and 1940 United States Census records, R. R. was listed as a Rock Mason, while many of the family’s neighbors were employed by the paper mill. R. R. died at age 97 and was interred in the Crawford-Ray Memorial Gardens at Clyde, Haywood County, N. C., where his wife was also buried. His obituary in the Asheville Citizen-Times of August 21, 1984, reported that he had four surviving daughters (Frances Reese of Canton, Henrietta Lunsford, Lucinda Ballard, and Conchita York), a son, R. Wallace Gaddis of Canton, seven grandchildren, and a great-great granddaughter. He was identified as a lifelong resident of Haywood County, a retired builder, and a member of Canton Central United Methodist Church.

Randy Cotton, The Built Environment of Haywood County, North Carolina (1983) at https://files.nc.gov/ncdcr/historic-preservation-office/survey-and-national-register/surveyreports/HaywoodCountySurvey-1983.pdf

Camille Wells, interview with R. R. Gaddis, Canton, N. C., May 15, 1981.

Find A Grave.com

Camille Wells, The Architecture of Our Home Town (1985)