Ask SAM: Where was ‘The Patio’? – Winston-Salem Journal

Q: Back many years ago, Piedmont Airlines would hold a local summer picnic for employees and their families at a place called The Patio. There was a large swimming pool, picnic tables, etc., and of course a large patio. Where in the heck in Winston-Salem was this located, and is it still there? Ive asked several retirees of Piedmont, and no one seems to remember.

Answer: The reader is referring to the Patio at Dor-Ker, off Peace Haven Road at Hearthside Drive, the present location of the Peace Haven pool and tennis courts, said local historian Fam Brownlee, who works in the North Carolina Room of the Forsyth County Public Librarys downtown location. The concrete patio, designed as a dance floor, is still there for the moment.

The property was originally developed in the 1920s by C.A. Jones as Peace Haven Park, a commercial swimming, fishing, dancing sort of roadhouse place. It had a spring-fed Olympic-sized swimming pool and a spring-fed fishing pond separated by the concrete dance floor and was a popular hangout until the Great Depression began. It was acquired in the 1930s by Jacqueline Dorminy and a partner, who operated it as a summer day camp for boys and girls and also, on some weekends, as an outdoor dance club, Dancing Under the Stars.

Brownlee described it as a very classy setup, with a live band and midnight breakfast. It was sold to a developer in 1960.

Ms Dorminy, of course, was a well known dancer and actress who is quite famous to several generations of locals as a teacher of dancing (and manners), he added.

Q: I have heard that Hobby Lobby and Harbor Freight Tools are coming to Mount Airy. Do you know if this is true?

Answer: WRS Inc. Real Estate Investments, a South Carolina-based company that is renovating Mayberry Mall, announced earlier this month that it had leased 50,000 square feet of retail space in the mall to Hobby Lobby Stores Inc., at the northern end of the mall, formerly the location of a Kmart.

As for Harbor Freight Tools, some issues with easements on the planned location have delayed that, but we are still working on it, said Dean Bray, co-owner of Bray Properties of Mount Airy, which is working on the project.

A spokeswoman for Harbor Freight said it would be open in the fall, but would not be on Rockford Street as was originally announced.

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Ask SAM: Where was 'The Patio'? - Winston-Salem Journal