Dilworth Airplane Bungalow
(ca. 1925)
The area’s only example of the Airplane Bungalow subtype of the Craftsman architectural style is a unique artifact for Charlotte’s first streetcar suburb.
2144 Park Rd, Charlotte, NC 28203
The Dilworth Airplane Bungalow, built in 1925 for Walter Holmes Beardsley (1879-1936) and his wife Leila Nichols Beardsley (1894-1984), is the only local example of the Airplane Bungalow style built during the Craftsman Period (1905-1930). The Airplane Bungalow style is itself a rare subtype of the Craftsman architectural style most common on the Pacific Coast, particularly California. The Beardsleys’ Asian-influenced Airplane Bungalow was inspired by the elaborate “Ultimate Bungalows” designed by California brothers Charles Sumner Greene and Henry Mather Greene, credited as the creators of the Craftsman movement. In addition to the uniqueness of the design, the house’s extensive stonework is also rare for the Dilworth community where stonework was common but limited to minor features such as chimneys and porches.
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A native of Memphis, Tennessee, Walter Beardsley operated Gans & Beardsley, a Wall Street-based New York cotton firm, with his brother-in-law Fredrick H. Gans in the early 1900s. In 1907, the two partners opened a Charlotte branch on East Fourth Street to conduct a cotton brokerage business with the Carolina Mills. Walter moved to Charlotte in August of that year to manage the new location. A Charlotte resident for the rest of his life, he continued in the cotton business for many years. Although Gans & Beardsley dissolved in 1909, Walter assumed full responsibility of the firm and ran the Charlotte office under the same name. He pursued other business opportunities, including co-ownership of the DesChamps Merchandise Brokerage Business (renamed Boykin & Company) with J. M. Boykin, an assistant manager position in the Charlotte office of the Memphis-based Newburger Cotton Company, and founding shareholder of the Marcia Yarn Mills in Lincoln County, North Carolina. In later years, Walter became involved in the auto industry as a traveling salesman for Pyramid Motor Company and its White Star oil products, a manager of the dealer organization for the Carolina Distributing Company (distributors of Rainer trucks), and President and Manager of Piedmont Specialty Company. After the stock market crash, he found work as an inspector at Ford Motor Company.
A longtime bachelor, Walter married Leila Nichols in 1924. Construction of the Dilworth Airplane Bungalow began shortly thereafter. The Airplane Bungalow subtype of the Craftsman style earned its name because its characteristic low-pitched roofs resemble the wings of an airplane while the pop-up second story and its continuous banks of windows provide sweeping panoramic views of the surroundings, much like the cockpit of an aircraft. Common in California during the 1910s and 1920s, the Airplane Bungalow was rarely built in other parts of the country. It is unclear how the Beardsleys may have become familiar with this style of architecture.
The Beardsleys never had any children, and Walter passed away in 1936. Leila owned the home until 1972. A stenographer for the cotton merchants L. C. Withers & Company at the time of her marriage, Leila held various secretarial positions during her life, most notably a 42-year stint as the church secretary at Pritchard Memorial Baptist Church.