The High Point Historic Preservation Society is seeking an agreement with Guilford County to preserve a historic farmstead at no cost to the county.The Hedgecock farmstead sits on a county-owned nature preserve. The preservation group has offered to maintain the 13-building complex and eventually open it for public events.
“The farm was established around 1900 when a fellow named Junius Hedgecock purchased the land on which the farm sits,” said Benjamin Briggs, president of Preservation Greensboro Incorporated. "He operated a family tobacco farm there. It has a great representation of what life was like in the Piedmont a hundred years ago and fifty years ago.”
The Guilford County Parks and Recreation Commission has approved the plan. The County Board of Commissioners will have the final decision.
Briggs said the Hedgecock homestead is a prime example of the mid-size tobacco farms that were once common in the Piedmont.
“We still have on the site the original tobacco curing barns,” Briggs said. "You can see how that took place in the buildings with heat being used to cure the leaves. We still have the fields on the site where the tobacco was grown. And we have the location of the pack house where the tobacco was packaged.”
The society hopes to open the farm for occasional Saturday visitations next spring.