Sitting unobtrusively on West Front Street in Burlington is a remarkably intact house form that was popular in Burlington, typical of the industrial and textile mill villages of the 1880s.

The Henry Tarpley House is a traditional vernacular triple-A one-story, one-room-deep cottage with corbelled chimney caps. The rectangular residence features a pressed tin gable roof, original weatherboard siding, simple interior and exterior moldings, and interior brick chimneys. The turned porch posts are connected with lacy sawn work balustrades. It is evident that early on, additions were done to the back of the house.

Records show that Henry Tarpley sold land to General Trollinger who was buying up parcels to be used by the North Carolina Railroad for the coming 8th wonder of the world, the locomotive. Tarpley’s obituary noted that he was an “honest, upright man” who was “well respected by all that knew him.”

On the 1866 survey of Company Shops by John S. Turrentine, the house is shown on the east side of the small creek running through the district, in the approximate location where the house sits today.  Although this style of house became popular in the 1850s, the structure that exists today dates from the 1880s; thus, this structure may have been Tarpley’s house, with significant alterations, or the house may have been replaced at some point. In the early 1900s, a nearby adjacent street was named for Tarpley.

The house was purchased by a neighbor in 2003. At that time, the house was in disrepair. A complete restoration of the plumbing, electrical, bathroom, kitchen, and HVAC was performed, and a wall was added between the front entrance and bathroom. Subsequent owners added a deck to the back entry and fenced the backyard. The current owners purchased the house in 2014, and added period appropriate picture molding and repainted the interior. They named the house The Artisanery, after their vision of it becoming a place that fosters art, creativity, collaboration and appreciation.

Only minor alterations have been made to the interior of the house.  The Henry Tarpley House offers the unique opportunity to experience an intact example of a late 1800s mill house, much the way it might have looked 130 years ago (minus the plumbing, electrical and wifi of course!)