Merrick Street

Merrick Street bears the name of John Merrick, an African American entrepreneur of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Besides founding N.C. Mutual Life Insurance Co., Merrick and his business associates developed much of the residential areas south of Hayti, collectively the Stokesdale Historic District. A southern section of present-day Merrick Street appears on a 1923 plat as Dwight Street, running from Dupree Street south into the North Carolina College (now NCCU) campus as far as Midway (later Brant) street. On a 1937 Sanborn map, the street bears its current name from Lawson Street north to Massey, where it dead-ends at Lincoln Hospital; on the north side of the hospital, Merrick reappears and continues north to Umstead. During urban renewal in the late 1960s, Merrick was extended from Umstead to its current configuration, looping through the former Fayette Place public-housing site to end at Grant Street.