The Richland County Conservation Commission awarded our Hollywood-Rose Hill Neighborhood Association two grants, one in 2017 the other 2019, to research and document historic homes (defined as homes older than 50 years).  Additional homes have been added since the end of grant funding with home owners paying the entire costs. As of October 2024 there were 128 homes as well as Rose Hill Presbyterian Church researched with bronze plaques placed on the exterior usually near the front entrance.

 Several sources of house plans were identified as well as other information relevant to research. Those resources were:

Leila Ross Wilburn Pattern books 

Aladdin Kit homes (Central Michigan Univ.)

Kit Houses (general reference)

LaFaye and LaFaye (architects)

J. Carroll Johnson (architect)

A 2023 color guide was printed, adding to those plaques documented for the 2017 grant to provide a Walking Tour of participating homes.  Download a PDF version of the guide here. An accompanying map of those homes can be downloaded here. Additional printed copies of the guide (if available) can be requested by emailing hollywoodrosehillpres@gmail.com. NOTE: This printed and PDF guide does not include 9 homes added in 2024. Those will be added in future printings.

AUDIO INTERVIEWS: HRH History and Recollections 

Chuck Lesser (Fulton) gives a historical overview of the neighborhood (6:57)

Chuck Lesser gives an overview of historic preservation (2:23)

Chuck Lesser discusses bungalows & his house and street names (3:56)

John Dawson (former resident) talks about 102 Southwood Dr. (9:50)

Bond Nickles (Maplewood) on HRH and their neighbors (0:16)

Bond Nickles on Mrs. Johnson (106 year old neighbor) (0:14)

Bond Nickles on discovering a buried fuel tank (0:39)

Danny Owens (Maplewood) talks about the history of their house (1:07)

Scott Gwara (S. Edisto) moving into their home in 1994 (0:58) 

Scott Gwara on modifications to their home (1:37) 

Scott Gwara on the window glass in the house (0:39) 

Scott Gwara on some unusual decor in the house (1:10) 

Scott Gwara on an HGTV visit (0:46)

Scott Gwara on the history of their back porch (0:38)

Scott Gwara: observations on tree species in HRH (0:53)

Lyn Hensel (Hollywood) on her early experiences in HRH (1:45)

Lyn Hensel on the first owner (a realtor and builder) (0:45)

Lyn Hensel on sawhorse 'reindeers' (1:35)

Lyn Hensel on her guest house ('servants quarters') (0:48)

Lyn Hensel on entertaining on Hollywood (0:22)

Lyn Hensel on an escaped convict in HRH (0:53)

Lyn Hensel on an escaped goat (0:57)

Cappy & Chris Boswell (Maplewood) share various thoughts (3:44)

Rose Hill Presby. Church-Rev. Max Rogland - A Sense of Community (2:17)

Rose Hill Presby. Church- Joy Smith - A Long Connection to HRH (1:40)

Rose Hill Presby. Church-Rev. Max Rogland - Reflecting on HRH (0:55)

Rose Hill Presby. Church-Joy Smith - HRH and the church through the years (2:10)

Rose Hill Presby. Church-Rev. Max Rogland - Discovering Some Blueprints (2:38)

Rose Hill Presby. Church-Rev. Max Rogland - History of the Church Bell (5:38)

                                          INTERACTIVE MAP (demo)

The link below launches a map that displays selected homes (i.e. not all 84) and some of their historical research information. This map will include all participating homes by July 2020. To get started, when the site opens in a new tab, simply click on a white downward-pointing arrow. On subsequent pages you will see gray "left" and "right" arrows (e.g.  < and >).  Use these to step through the information. 

Interactive map of selected Hollywood-Rose Hill participating homes

An Overview of the History of Development in Hollywood-Rose Hill

The Rose Hill and Hollywood developments were the first suburbs south of Lower Street (now Heyward Street), the original 1786 lower boundary of the city of Columbia.  Rose Hill, whose initial development began in 1914, was followed by Hollywood a decade later in 1924.  A street car line added in 1915 that ran down the center of Saluda Avenue to Lower Street promoted this new growth.  Despite initial appeals to different markets, the two developments came to have much in common long before they formed a single neighborhood association in 1981.  All but five of the 108 historic houses documented by two generous grants to the Hollywood-Rose Hill Neighborhood Association by the Richland County Conservation Commission were built in the 1920s and 1930s.  The construction dates, architects, kit houses, and builders listed on the bronze plaques placed on the houses reveal commonalities as well as differences in what is now considered a single community.  The project also placed a plaque on the only church in the neighborhood, Rose Hill Presbyterian Church, designed by the architect James B. Urquhart and built in 1921 by J. T. Dabbs on South Saluda next to where he built his own home. 

Much of the land on which these two suburbs were built had long been owned by Abram Stork, whose house on Lower (Heyward) Street was demolished for the construction of William and Mary Court.  By 1902, Stork built the Rose Hill Greenhouses as part of his extensive horticultural business; these grounds are where the South Saluda Apartments and Hollywood Park now stand.  Sometimes promoted as a bungalow community, Rose Hill initially aimed at a middle-class audience and was incorporated into the city in 1926.  In addition to bungalows, Rose Hill also boasts kit houses that were shipped from the Aladdin factory in Wilmington, North Carolina.   The house history research has documented seven of these houses: 215, 219, 235, 219, 235, and 243 South Edisto and 200, 206, and 218 South Saluda. 

All four houses built in 1919 marked by this project are in Rose Hill.  Duncan Clinch Heyward, who had been the last of the great rice planters and was governor of South Carolina from 1903 to 1907, lived in a bungalow constructed in 1919 after he became a businessman and moved to Columbia.  Heyward lived at 101 South Edisto from 1927-1933 and thus was a resident when Lower Street, the other street that forms that corner lot, was renamed in his honor in 1931. 

Another of the 1919 houses, 127 South Edisto, is one of two in Rose Hill that were built by contractors as their own residences.  Luther Bagnal built 127 South Edisto in 1919; several Bagnal-Nettles incorporations (including the Ideal Home Co.) built a number of homes in both Rose Hill and Hollywood.  J. T. Dabbs, another prominent contractor, built 301 South Saluda in 1921.  Larger than their neighbors, these two contractor-built houses also had special features.  301 South Saluda, on a double lot, has pocket doors between several of its rooms.  The one home documented by this project that postdates the 1930s, 303 South Saluda, was built as a duplex in 1940 but has been converted to a single-family residence.

South Gregg Street is the dividing line between the Rose Hill and Hollywood developments, with Rose Hill to the east and Hollywood to the west.  The streets and houses in the two neighborhoods also face different directions.  The streets in Hollywood, which were paved with concrete in 1924 by the United Development Company, run east-west (except for Southwood) and the houses face north and south.  The streets in Rose Hill were not initially paved and most run north-south with the houses facing east and west. 

It was the roaring 1920’s and the Hollywood neighborhood’s streets and name reflected it’s upscale development.  In March 1925, the Holly Realty Company marked the first anniversary of Hollywood by boasting of 16 architect-designed homes completed or under construction.  The company also advertised one of their homes (1728 Hollywood) as “Castle Charming.”  This project has documented nine homes by the Columbia architect J. Carroll Johnson, including his own home at 102 Southwood.  The Johnson family lived only briefly at the home, before moving to Gibbes Court in 1929.  Johnson declared bankruptcy in 1930.  The other homes by J. Carroll Johnson marked by this project are 1625, 1632, 1707, 1722, 1727 Hollywood; 211 Southwood; and 103, 224 South Gregg.  The project also documented one house by the Columbia architectural firm Lafaye and Lafaye, which was completed in 1925 (1705 Hollywood) and another by the architect James B. Urquhart (1731 Heyward Street). 

The economic difficulties of the Great Depression came early to South Carolina and doubtless were a factor in scaled back ambitions for the completion of Hollywood.  Larger lots and homes still filled two more southern streets in the development (Crestwood and Maplewood) beyond the initial Hollywood Drive, but none of the homes documented by the project on those streets are unique architect designs.  Plans ordered from published pattern books are doubtless the origin of numerous homes in both developments but have been difficult to establish during this project.  One exception is the large home at 1717 Crestwood, which was built in 1928 using plan No. 51 in Georgia architect Leila Ross Wilburn’s pattern book “Homes in Good Taste.”  Hollywood was incorporated into the City in 1927.

By 1927-1928, the southern end of Hollywood on Pinewood Drive and Fulton Street was being developed with bungalows by the Bagnal-Nettles Lumber Co. and its successor the Ideal Home Company.   Smaller homes also marked the area of the neighborhood to the west between Pickens Street and the University of South Carolina athletic fields. 

Contact:

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