Happy Friday!
Edward Dilworth Latta, along with D. A. Tompkins, was one of those responsible for Charlotte's transformation from a modest commercial center into a prosperous industrial hub. The archetype of the post-Civil War New South industrialist, Latta first came to Charlotte from New York in 1876 to open the E. D. Latta Brothers Men's Clothing Store. Convinced that the city held much more promise, Latta and some partners formed the Charlotte Consolidated Construction Company in 1890. The next year Latta contracted with the Edison Electric Company to construct an electric streetcar system, which revolutionized transportation in the city and led to Latta's development of the Dilworth suburb. Latta himself built one of the neighborhood's first grand mansions, this Neoclassical Revival-style house at 600 East Boulevard, seen here in 1902.
Latta continued to have a major impact on the city's future until disagreements with his business partners over the construction of the Hotel Charlotte downtown led him to relocate to Asheville, North Carolina, in 1923. At the time of his death two years later he still owned over thirty properties in the city, and his name is immortalized all over Charlotte. After he left town, the house on East Boulevard was purchased by another prominent local businessman, construction magnate James Addison Jones. In 1950 the site was sold to the parishioners of Charlotte's large Greek Orthodox community, and the Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral was constructed beside the home in 1954. The house and the church coexisted for a while, but the house was torn down in 1967 to make room for a Hellenic Community Center.
Until next week!
Chris.
Email me at chris@704shop.com if you have interesting Charlotte facts you’d like to share or just to provide feedback!
Information taken from:
Charlotte Then and Now, Brandon Lunsford, 2013.
“We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and the future.” – Frederick Douglass