Victorian Designed Homes Built in Brevard

Waightstill Avery Gash was a son of Leander and Margaret Gash, making him a great-great grandson of Waightstill Avery.  Avery had been a lawyer and an officer in the North Carolina militia during the American Revolution. 

Waightstill Gash was well educated, studied law under Col. W.W. Jones and was admitted to the bar in 1881.  He was a prominent attorney and businessman in Brevard for many years.

On June 16, 1897 Gash married Elise Walker, a widow from Georgetown, South Carolina.  The couple built a home on Gaston Street in Brevard where they lived with Mrs. Gash’s two daughters.

The W.A. and Eliza Gash House once stood on S. Gaston St. across from
the Library amphitheater.

The late Victorian style home was distinctive with a tall side gable roof and a recessed Gothic arch surrounding the upper half-story northeast window.  A polygonal tower with pyramidal roof and a wrap porch with chamfered posts and delicate sawn brackets adorned the front.

Waightstill and Eliza Gash died within four months of each other in 1906.  Mrs. Gash’s daughters owned the home until 1920 when they sold it to the editor of the Brevard News.  It was later owned by the Wauchope family for many years.

The house was located next door to Brevard’s upper grades elementary school which opened in 1948.  That building is today the Community Services building which serves numerous county offices, including Cooperative Extension, the Health Department, Building and Permitting and the Planning Department.

There were a handful of houses, similar in style and size built along South Gaston Street from Jordan to Maple between 1900 and 1940.   The Waters House, located across from the Baptist church, was also late Victorian with some Queen Anne style details.  Another large two-story home, on the corner of Gaston and Jordan, served as the Moore Funeral Home from the 1938 until 1978.

The only one of these houses that remains is a bungalow, built in the late 1930s, on the corner of Gaston and Maple.  It currently serves as the Transylvania County Family Resource Center.

Photographs and information for this column are provided by the Rowell Bosse North Carolina Room, Transylvania County Library. Visit the NC Room during regular library hours (Monday-Friday) to learn more about our history and see additional photographs. For more information, comments, or suggestions contact Marcy at marcy.thompson@transylvaniacounty.org or 828-884-1820.