Live Wire: What's the story behind the Oval Ballroom at Heritage Square in Fayetteville?

Akira Kyles, The Fayetteville Observer
·2 min read
Dogwood Trail sign with the Sanford House at Heritage Square in the background. Fayetteville's historic district is one of the first areas in the city to be developed in the 1700s. In the 1800s, the Heritage Square neighborhood was home to a notorious crime that made headlines across the state.
Dogwood Trail sign with the Sanford House at Heritage Square in the background. Fayetteville's historic district is one of the first areas in the city to be developed in the 1700s. In the 1800s, the Heritage Square neighborhood was home to a notorious crime that made headlines across the state.

Q: What is the story of the Oval ballroom at Heritage Square? - L.L.

A: The Oval Ballroom at Heritage Square is an architectural gem here in Fayetteville. The structure, a designated local landmark, dates as early as 1818, according to Bruce Daws, director of the Fayetteville History Museum.

The elongated octagonal ballroom wasn't always a stand-alone building but was attached to a Gillespie Street home, known as the Halliday Williams House, that no longer exists.

When the Halliday Williams house was razed, the Women's Club relocated the portion known as the Oval Ballroom to Heritage Square on Dick Street, according to Daws.

More: Live Wire: The Fayetteville Observer's popular column is back to answer your questions

The Oval Ballroom was restored as a stand-alone building in the 20th Century. It was the work of photographer Francis Benjamin Johnson that helped with the restoration, according to Heidi Bleazey, historic properties coordinator at the museum.

Johnson took interior photographs of the ballroom and an exterior photograph of the Halliday Williams House when the Oval Ballroom was still attached.

The room is also well known due to the Ann Simpson murder in 1849. Simpson poisoned her husband Alexander C. Simpson with arsenic.

According to Bleazey, the couple was living in the Halliday Williams House, and he was poisoned in the Oval Ballroom, which was the dining room.

Ann was acquitted at trial for her husband's murder.

The murder has been connected to rumors of the ballroom being haunted.

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Staff writer Akira Kyles can be reached at akyles@gannett.com.

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This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Live Wire: What is the story of the Oval Ballroom at Heritage Square?