Architect’s Buildings Still Stand In Bristol

By Bud Phillips
Special to the Herald Courier
Published: July 26, 2008

Architects are a lucky breed.
While most people are memorialized by a small marker (all but lost among hundreds of others), architects leave many monuments that often occupy prominent sites here and there in areas where they worked.
Clarence P. Kearfott is among the most noted architects who have served in Bristol, and his “monuments” are many, not only here but in other areas as well.
Kearfott was born in 1884 at Martinsville, Henry County, Va. He was the son of Clarence P. and Rebecca Kartz Kearfott.
At the age of 19, he graduated from Virginia Tech with degrees in civil and mechanical engineering. For a short time, he was employed with the L&N Railroad and later with a railroad in Georgia.
Leaving this latter job, he moved to Roanoke, Va., where he began his career in architecture. This would prove to be his lifelong profession.
In 1906, Kearfott learned of an architect in Bristol who needed an assistant. He decided to move here and arrived on Tuesday, Jan. 1, 1907. Bristol would be his home for the next 70 years.
He was unmarried upon his arrival, so he took a single room in the Thomas J. Newman home at 411 Spencer. This house, the former Rev. Samuel Preston home, is still standing.
Soon after Kearfott became established in Bristol, he met Miss Johnnie May Hunter of Union Springs, Bullock County, Ala. They were married in November 1908.
At that time, Dr. J.F. Hicks and wife, who lived at 18 Fourth St. (site of the old Bristol Tennessee Fire Station), asked the young couple to occupy their palatial home while they (the Hicks) spent the winter in Florida.
When the Hicks returned the following spring, the Kearfotts moved to an apartment in the former River Walker house at 206 Johnson St. (now the Perry home). Their first child was born there.
Then later, they bought a charming little cottage at 114 Fifth. I remember this house well. I often walked by it when I lived at 518 Alabama St. As I recall, it was of frame construction with stuccoed outer walls.
During World War I, Kearfott began the construction of a new house at 454 Euclid Ave. It was finished in 1919, and there he spent the rest of his life.
Over the years, Kearfott was associated with several other architects with offices in various downtown buildings. His last office was on the second floor of the First Federal Savings and Loan Building at 112 Piedmont.
Because of severe eye problems, he was forced to retire in 1955. He then lived on for 22 years and died in his home in 1977. His wife lived on to age 99 and died in 1985. Both are buried in Mountain View Cemetery.
Kearfott is well memorialized in many yet-standing buildings in the city. One of his very first works here was the remodeling of the old David Ensor house into the John H. Caldwell home, now the Weaver Funeral Home. He made quite a transformation when he made the large but rather plain Ensor house into the grand mansion it is today.
Another early work was the First Baptist Church. One of his better-known buildings is the former Bristol Virginia High School on Piedmont.
Downtown, we find a monument to him in the form of the old Reynolds Arcade building, now called Executive Plaza. One of his monuments that is fast falling into ruin is the old Kings Mountain Memorial Hospital on West State Street. There are many more.
Residences designed by him include the Riley Stone mansion (now the Tiller home on Holston Avenue), the former Mary Hendrick home at 420 Sixth, and the Gaut home at 116 Solar St. (now the home of Dr. and Mrs. Clyde (Susan) Long).
There are several others, all a testimony to the fact that once a master architect labored among us.

BUD PHILLIPS is a local historian and author. He can be reached at (276) 466-6435.