What makes it unusual in NC history
North Carolina has grand estates. What Devotion has is completeness: a hydroelectric dam and powerhouse, a mill house, a dairy barn with stone silo, a poultry barn, a slaughter house and cheese factory, a trout hatchery, machine shops, a movie theatre, a general store with post office and fuel pumps, an Olympic-grade stone skeet and trap field, miles of estate road, and Long Creek Lodge itself — most of it still standing, most of it still in use.
It was built in the 1930s and 1940s of American chestnut and river rock by local craftsmen, in the middle of the Depression, on land assembled acre by acre.
Private, and remaining so
Devotion is privately owned and not open to the public. There are no tours, no public fishing or hunting, no events, and no admittance without written permission from the family. The gate sign has said as much since the 1930s.
This site exists so the estate's history is available to researchers, historians, and neighbors without visits to the property itself.