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Description (2.2.1)

Transportation Outbuildings (2.2.1.2)

Outbuildings related to transportation purposes--carriage houses, stables, and garages--are far more numerous than domestic outbuildings. Most shelters that were originally built for carriages were later adapted for automobiles, like the similar shed-roofed buildings at 323 and 504 West Fearing Street, each of which also incorporates a storage room. Few stables remain in the city; a combination stable and shed erected between 1914 and 1923 at 104 Bell Street is the most intact example. This structure is covered with vertical siding and the deep front overhang of the gable roof shelters the façade.

Garages are the most numerous outbuildings in Elizabeth City, and were built after the 1910s in a variety of sizes and styles. The vast majority are of frame construction with wood siding, although several garages from the 1920s and 1930s are of brick construction, particularly it the associated dwelling also is brick. While the simplest garages are shed- or gable-roof buildings large enough to shelter only one automobile, others, such as the garage (1930s) behind the Trueblood-Hurdle House at 701 Raleigh Street consist of a central gable-front shelter flanked on each side by storage sheds.

Many garages are finished to complement the style of the residence. Examples, seen in all of the styles that were popular in Elizabeth City, are most prevalent along West Church and West Main streets and in the Riverside area. An unusually intact Colonial Revival example--complete with original folding doors having decorative X-shaped braces--is the garage at the Turner-Nixon House (500 West Church Street, ca. 1924), on which the pedimented front gable echoes the house's pediments. The two-car hipped-roof garage behind the Charles O. Robinson House (201 East Main Street, 1914) repeats the foliated modillions of the monumental Neo-Classical Revival style residence. Craftsman Bungalow style garages are especially numerous and varied in finish. The two-story, gable-front, two-car garage with triangular eave brackets behind the Henry W. Sanders House (1011 West Church Street. ca. 1923) repeats the house's form, as does the garage of the W. Ben Goodwin House (1105 West Church Street, 1923). The Goodwin garage has rectangular eaves brackets and shaped rafter ends like the house. Among Tudor Revival examples, the garage of the Wyatt R. Aydlett House (607 Agawam Street, 1935) copies the wood shingle finish of the dwelling.