Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 20, 1990 TAG: 9005200270
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: F6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: George & Rosalie Leposky
DATELINE: WILMINGTON, N.C. LENGTH: Long
Thirty miles from the coast, on an isolated bluff punctuating the river's east bank, the skyline of Wilmington, N.C., overlooks a cypress swamp on the opposite shore.
For a city of 60,000 people, Wilmington is a surprisingly well-kept secret. We found it by accident one day while shunpiking along the Coastal Highway (U.S. 17) on a trip from Virginia to Florida. Most travelers take Interstate 95, more than 70 miles inland, never giving Wilmington a thought. That has been the city's plight - and blessing - throughout the 20th Century.
Being off the beaten track has slowed Wilmington's growth, helping to preserve close to 200 historic buildings in its downtown commercial district and several gracious inner-city residential neighborhoods. For visitors, this means leisurely sightseeing and shopping in a friendly, uncrowded setting.
Wilmingtonians have mixed feelings about a new 123-mile stretch of Interstate 40 from Raleigh to Wilmington that will open this fall. They eagerly anticipate more business, but they worry that the new road will diminish their cherished sense of seclusion.
Founded in the 1730s, Wilmington was North Carolina's largest city until 1910. The river forms a sheltered harbor for the state's largest port, where modern tankers and container ships have replaced the schooners of yesteryear.
Wilmington was the last Civil War stronghold of Confederate blockade runners. After the war, commerce resumed and a fleet of shallow-draft paddlewheel steamboats chugged 90 miles up the Cape Fear River to Fayetteville. Recalling that era, Capt. Carl Mashburn offers narrated sightseeing cruises and dinner cruises aboard his modern 87-foot paddlewheeler Henrietta II from April to December. Contact Cape Fear Riverboats, Inc., P.O. Box 1881, Wilmington, N.C. 28402. Phone (919)343-1611.
Near the Henrietta II's dock at the foot of Market Street, you can catch a river taxi to the U.S.S. North Carolina, a World War II battleship permanently moored in a slip across from downtown Wilmington. Nicknamed "The Showboat," she was commissioned in 1941 and fought 57 battles in the Pacific. You can tour her bridge, gun turrets, engine room and living quarters. Open daily 8 a.m. to sunset, admission $5 adults, $2.50 children 6-11, under 6 free. At 9 nightly, June-Labor Day, a sound-and-light show portrays the mighty ship's exploits; admission $3.50 adults, $1.75 children 6-11, under 6 free.
Wilmington also was a major rail center, headquarters of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad from 1840 to 1960. When the railroad moved to Jacksonville, Fla., it gave its downtown real estate to the city, which demolished most of the buildings. Three former railroad structures remain: an office building which became the police station; a freight warehouse incorporated into the city's convention center; and a freight office built in 1876 and expanded in 1900, which is now the Wilmington Railroad Museum.
The museum's displays include baggage and mail carts; an actual ticket counter with a rack of old timetables and tickets; lamp lighters, oil cans and other tools; uniforms; and railroad publications such as Florida resort brochures, menus, operating manuals, and passes. Flanking the museum are ACL 250, a Baldwin steam locomotive built in 1910, and a 1968 Seaboard Coast Line red caboose. On request, you can climb into the engine's cab and roam the interior of the caboose.
Museum hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 1 to 5 p.m. Sunday. Admission is free. For information, contact Melissa Ellis, director, Wilmington Railroad Museum Foundation, 501 Nutt St., Wilmington, N.C. 23401. Phone (919)763-2634.
From the Railroad Museum, a river walk extends eight blocks south along Water Street. At the Cotton Exchange, in the 300 block of North Water Street, specialty shops and restaurants occupy 10 adjoining warehouses dating from the 19th and early 20th Centuries.
Chandler's Wharf, another shopping complex at the river walk's south end, includes an attractive mall in a former warehouse, a jewelry store in the 1838 Wilmington Iron Works building, and two good restaurants: Elijah's, with a dockside oyster bar; and The Pilot House, featuring continental-style regional cuisine. Also downtown, near second and Princess Streets, you'll find a cluster of inexpensive breakfast-and-lunch restaurants popular with the locals.
Two house museums in the historic district are open for tours 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday. The Burgwin-Wright House, a two-story Georgian-style frame dwelling, was built in 1770 atop the ballast-stone cells of an old city jail. In 1781, Lord Charles Cornwallis and his staff commandeered the house for two weeks before marching off to the final battle of the Revolutionary War at Yorktown, Va. Free admission. Contact Burgwin-Wright House and Garden, 224 Market St., Wilmington, N.C. 28401. Phone (919)762-0570.
Two blocks south at 126 S. Third St. is the 1852 home of banker and drygoods merchant Zebulon Latimer and his wife, Elizabeth. Most of the Latimer family's furnishings remain in the home, which the Lower Cape Fear Historical Society acquired in 1963. Admission $3 adults, $1 children, $2 students and senior citizens. Contact the Lower Cape Fear Historical Society, P.O. Box 813, Wilmington, N.C. 28402. Phone (919)762-0492.
Just outside the historic district, the New Hanover County Museum of the Lower Cape Fear occupies a National Guard Armory built by the Works Progress Administration in 1936. A new 40,000-square-foot addition will open in stages during 1990 and 1991. The most interesting displays are a 17-by-20-foot model of Wilmington's Civil War-era waterfront; information on the merchant ships which ran the federal blockade to bring supplies from The Bahamas and even Bermuda to Confederate ports; and a mockup of a 1925 trolley car with a seven-minute slide show depicting a ride to the Lumina Pavilion on nearby Wrightsville Beach. Admission is free. Open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 2 to 5 p.m. Sunday. Contact the New Hanover County Museum, 814 Market St., Wilmington, N.C. 28401. Phone (919) 341-4350.
Last March, Wilmington's performing-arts community celebrated the reopening of Thalian Hall, an Italianate theater built in 1858 in conjunction with Wilmington's city hall. It was closed for two years for major renovations and construction of a new entrance lobby and backstage facilities.
Thalian Hall's architect, John Montague Trimble, designed some 40 theaters and concert halls. "This is the only one remaining," says D. Anthony Rivenbark, Thalian Hall's executive director. "In its heyday, Thalian Hall hosted such celebrities as William Jennings Bryan, Buffalo Bill, Lillian Russell, John Philip Sousa, Booker T. Washington and Oscar Wilde."
As part of the renovation, half of the theater's original backdrop, in storage since 1939, has been unfurled for display on the back wall of the main parquet lobby. It was painted by William Russell Smith, a romantic realist of the Philadelphia School. The new entrance lobby features a 43-foot-tall, 250-pound painted aluminum sculpture by New York artist Dorothy Gillespie. To obtain a schedule of events or arrange an architectural tour, contact Thalian Hall Center Box Office, P.O. Box 371, Wilmington, N.C. 28402. Phone (919)763-3398.
The performing arts in Wilmington also include country music. The Yellow Rose Saloon features appearances by country stars, plus two-step lessons and live square-dancing. Open 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. Tuesday-Saturday. To get on the saloon's mailing list, write to 5025 Market St., Wilmington, N.C. 28405, or phone 1(800)225-7666 (answered at the adjoining Green Tree Inn) or (919)791-2001.
In 1984, Wilmington became an eastern outpost of Hollywood when Dino De Laurentiis brought DEG Film Studios to town. Since then, over 30 full-length feature films have been shot in the area, including King Kong Lives and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The 32-acre complex, with seven sound stages, is now North Carolina Film Studios, Inc. "There are no plans to establish a studio tour because we're a working studio," says Kent Swaim, general manager, "but visitors are welcome to eat in the Studio Cafe, which is decorated with artifacts from the films made here." Breakfast is served 7 to 10:30 a.m.; lunch begins at 11:30 a.m. The studio is three miles northwest of downtown Wilmington at 1223 N. 23rd St. Phone (919) 343-3708.
For lodging information and a free guide map, contact the Cape Fear Coast Convention & Visitors Bureau, 24 N. Third St., Wilmington, N.C. 28401. Phone 1 (800) 222-4757 (Eastern U.S.), 1 (800) 922-7117 (N.C.), (919) 341-4030. You're welcome to visit the bureau's offices in a landmark building, the restored 1892 New Hanover County Courthouse.
by CNB