Four years after his death in 1949, L.M. Phelps prepared a survey of barber Austin N. Neal‘s four lots and three houses on Wainwright Avenue.

The 1922 Sanborn fire insurance map of Wilson gives a wider view of the area and shows the larger house on the corner and one of the shotgun houses.

Freeman Street and Wainwright Avenue no longer intersect. This stretch of Wainwright is now Hines Street, and Freeman Street is blocked off.

The Neal house is still standing, now numbered 1218 Hines Street S.E. In 1988, when the nomination form for the National Register of Historic Places was submitted, all three houses (and a newer fourth) were accounted for: #1212, built circa 1930, 1 story, shotgun with turned-post porch; #1214, built circa 1930 [per the Sunburn map, earlier], 1 story, shotgun with turned-post porch and Masonite veneer; and #1218, built circa 1913, 1 story, Queen Anne cottage with double-pile, hip-roofed form, front-facing wing, and turned-post porch.”

Here’s a side view of the house, showing the blocked end of Freeman Street.

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In the 1900 census of Freeman township, Franklin County: widower Austin Neal, 30, and children Bryant, 3, and Bertha, 1, plus brother Abram, 17, and sisters Tabitha, 19, and Bessie, 21.

In the 1912 Wilson city directory, Austin Neal was listed as a barber at 409 East Nash. His home address was “Wainwright av for Freeman.”

In the 1920 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 105 Wainwright, widowed barber Austin Neal, 42, with children Bryant, 21, also a barber, Daisy, 16, Annie, 13, Samuel, 7, and Ruth, 5.

In the 1930 census, Wilson, Wilson County: at 1214 Wainright Avenue, barber Austin Neal, 61, wife Lizzie, 38, servant for a private family, and son Samuel, 18, a hotel bell hop.

Austin N. Neal died 14 February 1949 at Mercy Hospital of terminal uremia. He was born 11 November 1878 in Franklinton, North Carolina, to Abron Neal and Louise Brodie. He was buried in Rountree cemetery. Mrs. Lizzie H. Neal was informant.

Plat map 1, box 114, Register of Deeds Office, Wilson; photos courtesy of Google Maps.