Preserve Mecklenburg



The J. Wilson Alexander Tenant House Will Be Moved To A New Location And Restored.




Preserve Mecklenburg (PMI) and the developer of the Alexander Farms Community in Cornelius received approval from the Cornelius Town Board at its meeting on May 16th to proceed with a preservation plan for the J. Wilson Alexander Farm Tenant House (c. 1900).  The plan calls for the house to be moved to a grove of trees at the intersection of West Catawba Avenue and Westmoreland Road. The tenant house will be restored and become the centerpiece of an historical display.  PMI will hold an easement on the structure to assure that it will be maintained and preserved in perpetuity.  Work on the move will begin in August, and the move should occur by the end of the month.

The Alexander Farm Tenant House is a rare survivor of the cotton economy that was predominant in Mecklenburg County until the mid-twentieth century. Preserving the tenant house will enable future generations to understand a way of life that was once widespread but has now virtually vanished.  Planting and harvesting cotton was labor intensive.  The tenant farmers who labored in the fields were essential to a cotton farmer's success.  They lived in houses like the Alexander Farm Tenant House.  Their lives need to be remembered.  Approximately 75% of tenant farmers and sharecroppers were African American.  About 25% were Whites.


James Wilson Alexander (1887-1972)​​

J. Wilson Alexander belonged to a family who had farmed in North Mecklenburg since the American Revolutionary War.  In addition to being a highly successful cotton farmer, Alexander was a community leader in the Cornelius area and beyond.  J. Wilson Alexander was a member of the Mecklenburg County School Board.  He was a Trustee of  North Carolina A&T.  He served one term in the North Carolina General Assembly.  J. Wilson Alexander played a significant role in bringing rural electrification to North Mecklenburg and increasing the number of paved roads.

It was the growing of cotton that took most of J. Wilson Alexander's time and energy.   Intelligent and resourceful,  J. W. Alexander improved the economic standing of his family by harvesting lots of cotton and hauling it to Cornelius to be ginned.  In 1929, he received the award for producing more cotton per acre than any farmer in North Carolina.  His family remembers James Wilson Alexander with great respect and affection.


Cotton farming was hard work.  J. Wilson Alexander and his family did not sit idly by and watch the field hands pick the crop.  They toiled in the hot sun too.  But the tenant farm families labored long hours, and their living conditions were far inferior to those enjoyed by J. Wilson Alexander and his family.  But at least the tenants had a home and received a wage.

The Alexander Farm Tenant House had several tenants over the years. John Norman and his wife Carrie lived in the Alexander Farm Tenant House in the late 1930s and early 1940s.  Among their children was Gaither Norman, who married John Lee Potts, who also worked on the Alexander Farm.  Gaither and John Potts occupied the tenant house in the years following World War Two.  They sometimes used the surname "Knox."

John Norman

​View of the Caldwell Presbyterian Church Cemetery From The Intersection of Brown Mill Rd. and Highway 73.  Gaither Norman Potts Is Buried Here.

Gaither and John Lee Potts were most likely in their late teens or early twenties when they became the primary residents of the Alexander Farm Tenant House. Gaither was a homemaker.  She also helped with cooking and cleaning at the Alexander farmhouse. John was a farmhand.  John and Gaither interacted daily with members of the Alexander family. Their relationship was personal, not just business-like.  

J. Wilson Alexander never had more than a handful of tenants.  Unlike larger farms, where discipline was harsh and less personalized, regulations on places like the Alexander Farm were more informal and flexible.  "We treated the tenants almost like family," remembers one of J. W. Alexander's granddaughters.

A particularly dramatic event occurred in January 1946.  One of J. W. Alexander's sons was working with John Potts harvesting the corn crop when one of the son's arms got caught in the corn shredder.  The son would have lost his entire arm and maybe perished if John had not rushed to the son's aid.  Such events strengthen emotional bonds.

Cotton harvests declined steadily in Meckenburg County in the 1950s, and never recovered.  Tenants began to seek employment away from the farms but continued to reside in  the tenant houses.  Gaither became a cook at local restaurants, and John worked in a sawmill.  They remained in the Alexander Farm Tenant House.  Gaither died in 1988. Gaither Potts is buried in the Caldwell Presbyterian Church Cemetery on Brown Mill Road.  John died in 1992.


Gaither Louise Norman Potts  (1925-1988)​​

John Lee Potts (1924-1992)

The Plaque on the left marks the grave of Gaither Norman Potts.  The Marker on the right was reserved for John Lee Potts.  John is buried instead in the Catawba Presbyterian Cemetery on McCoy Road in Huntersville.

This is the headstone of the grave of John Norman Sr., the father of Gaither Norman Potts.  It is located in the Caldwell Presbyterian Church Cemetery.​

The Alexander Farm Tenant House will be moved to this wooded parcel just east of the intersection of Westmoreland Road and West Catawba Avenue in Cornelius.  It will face the intersection.   Look carefully.  You can see the stakes outlining the spot where the house will sit.​

    Contact Person:  Dan Morrill​
     danmorrill2@gmail.com
     cell:  704-574-3861