FEATURE PAGE
January 15, 2026

This vast expense of open space is the "front door" to the farm off Devil's Racetrack Road. It already has elements suitable for picnicking.

A quick visual tour of Rose Dairy farm
 
The Google map shown below is highlighted by the cleared farmland at the entrance to the Rose Dairy tract. Devil's Racetrack Road is seen at the bottom. On the left is I-95 and the US 701 interchange near Four Oaks. The woods at the top extend beyond what's shown here – all the way to Black Creek and the Neuse River.





Adrian O'Neal (right) and Austin Cross of the county's Parks and Open Space staff stand in front of a vacant dwelling that will soon house the department's offices.


Here's one of several barns and shelters that are likely to be saved for public activities. Nearby is pasture land where horses have been kept in the past and could accommodate visiting horseback riders in days to come.


The property has a vast network of trails that lead deep into the woods where wetlands can be explored. Mr. O'Neal said the trails were used over the years by horseback riders and hunters. Some of those trails as well as newly cut pathways could be suitable for bicycling or hiking, he said.


A vacant cabin with outdoor deck is another possibility for conversion into a public gathering space. It's located next to a potential fishing pond shown below.




This is the restored plantation house built in the mid 1800s by a David Smith and sold in 1939 to H.V. (Herschel) Rose, landowner and long-time Clerk of Johnston Superior Court who bequeathed the house and adjacent farm to his daughter (the late Edith Powell Rose Wilkins), according to The Historic Architecture of Johnston County, North Carolina (published in 2016 by Keep Johnston County Beautiful). The house and its lot is not part of the huge tract purchased by the Triangle Land Conservancy and remains in private hands at this time. Heirs of the Rose family transferred the adjacent 300-acre farm and woodlands to TLC.

Seminars on historic preservation here this month

Preservation Johnston County, Inc., is sponsoring two historic-preservation seminars this month in the Johnston County Museum at 329 E. Market Street.  

 

Next Tuesday, January 20 at 7 p.m. Jeff Adolphsen from the State Historic Preservation Office will speak about historic rehabilitation tax credits, how to determine if a building is historic, how to apply for historic designation, and the U.S. Secretary of the Interior’s standards for rehabilitation of historic buildings.

On Thursday, January 29 at 7 p.m. Cathleen Turner from Preservation NC will talk about the work of her organization in protecting historic properties through legal covenants and easements. PNC has also rescued endangered historic properties by purchasing them and finding purchasers willing and able to invest in rehabilitating them.

The seminars, made possible by a grant from the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, are free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served.


Preservation Johnston County is a non-profit organization formed in 2023. Its Board of Directors is made up of individuals who are passionate about preserving and protecting Johnston County’s treasured historic buildings, sites, and abandoned cemeteries. For more information, contact Board Chairman Todd Johnson at 919-720-8605.

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