After my grandfather, Otto Haas, lost his two movie theaters, big house in Dilworth, and most of his money, he moved the family to a small farm on Park Rd. It lay about a quarter mile outside the Charlotte city limits between farms on which the future Rev. Bill Graham and the future Rt. Rev. Bishop John Spong grew up.
Now, of course, it is well within the city limits, just north of Park Road Shopping center and St. Ann's Catholic School.
My uncle, Steve Haas, and his wife, Bobbi, live there.
None of the several acres around the house has been sold. The acre or so surrounding the house is now mowed; the old swimming pool filled in and the horse barns behind the house have long since collapsed into dust. The woods are still a tangle behind the house, an oasis of wild in a very urban area. Uncle Steve estimates he keeps feeding 17 raccoons and feral cats.
I lived there a few years as a small child. Then, the grounds were overgrown and the house more rustic. I recall it was painted white then. The big magnolias persist, though. My grandmother, Lorena Haas, went outside with a shotgun, so the story goes, when the electric and phone companies wanted to chop some down to run wires along the road.
This photo was taken on a visit in the summer of 2008. The front porch is exactly as I remember it as a kid, except for the yellow paint.
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