Vineville [†] is a largely residential area located on a low plateau in the gently rolling fall-line terrain about a mile and a half northwest of downtown Macon, The area encompasses about 525 acres of land and includes more than 700 properties. It displays a heritage that began in the early-nineteenth century as a community of large agrarian estates and slowly evolved during the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries into a compact, homogeneous suburb. Houses in this area date from the 1830s to the 1930s and range in size from large mansions to modest cottages. Early-nineteenth-century styles and types like the Plantation Plain are present, but late-nineteenth-century Victorian, tum-of-the-century Neoclassical, and early-twentieth-century Bungalow and Period houses predominate. These houses generally stand on long, narrow, rectangular lots, altough a few larger tracts remain intact along Vineville Avenue. Front yards are landscaped informally with trees, shrubbery, and lawn. Streets form an irregular grid on either side of the elongated S-curve of Vineville Avenue, the central thoroughfare in the district. Many of the streets are lined with curbs, sidewalks, and shade trees. Several churches, a school, a small neighborhood commercial center and a small park accompany the houses in Vineville.
The history of Vineville closely parallels the history of the settlement and development of the City of Macon, Macon's development as a city began in earnest In 1823, and the city grew rapidly through the decade on its roughly gridded urban plan. From this small city, the Forsyth Road meandered to the northwest over a plateau covered with pine trees to the town of Forsyth in Monroe County. Settlers purchased large land holdings on either side of the Forsyth Road because of the level, elevated and well-drained land, and the ready availability of fresh water. As the large estate holdings were purchased and settled, the "charming hamlet of Vineville" began.
Vineville developed and expanded as a community throughout the decades of the 1830s and 1840s. The construction of Cotton Avenue and Georgia Avenue in 1831-1835 established important links between the Forsyth Road and the City of Macon. Residents of the Vineville community donated much of the $25,000 needed to fund this construction, thereby reflecting the status of the community at this time. The cotton markets in Macon drew much of their product from the counties lying to the northwest, making the Forsyth Road an important transportation line between the grower and the cotton agent. Macon 1 s population by 1837 had increased to 4,000 as a result, while Vineville boasted 500 residents among 40 families. The late 1830s saw a great deal of growth in the cotton markets to the northwest of Macon, spurring the construction of the Monroe Railroad from Macon to Forsyth along the present Central of Georgia right-of-way, which was completed in December of 1838.
The "Vineville's historic district incorporates in its entirety the "Vineville Avenue Area," which was determined eligible for the National Register in 1975 (see Section 6). The 1975 Request for Determination of Eligibility included "properties on both sides of Vineville Avenue from Forsyth and Hardeman streets to Pio Nono Avenue, including 2607 Vineville Avenue and 111 and 114 Buford Place;" the Request for Determination of Eligibility also noted that "this area is part of a larger historic district which the State Historic Preservation Officer intends to nominate at some time in the future." This "Vineville" nomination represents that "larger historic district."
† Adapted from: Vineville, nomination document, 1980, National Register of Historic Places, npgallery.nps.gov, accessed August, 2021.
