When Professor Frederick Koch first had an opportunity to buy the rustic, shingle-sided house at the corner of Glenburnie and Rosemary streets, he probably jumped at the chance.

Standing in the front yard of this picturesque Chapel Hill dwelling, built in 1913, Koch likely envisioned it as the perfect base for his ambitions. There he pursued a long career in which he brought the dramatic arts to North Carolinians and presented North Carolina's story to the world.

Koch began teaching dramatic arts at the University of North Dakota where he organized a theater group called the Dakota Playmakers. Recruited by University President Edward Kidder Graham in 1918, Koch took a position at UNC and soon founded another small repertory group, calling them the Carolina Playmakers, and moved into the newly renovated library and campus museum now known as Playmakers Theatre in 1923.

As Koch began to walk daily to the campus from his Glenburnie Street home, he became increasingly fascinated with his new environment and this region. Called "Prof Koch" by affectionate students, he found inspiration in their colorful stories and others he heard from across the state. The legends, superstitions, customs, and tales of the "common people" took root in Koch's imagination. He spent hours in his Craftsman-style bungalow writing about historic situations and the local landscape, giving birth to the wave of popular "folk plays."

With funds from the Depression-era Works Progress Administration, Koch partnered new North Carolinian writers, such as Paul Green and Thomas Wolfe, with out-of-state professionals, such as Betty Smith and Richard Wright. In 1940 the WPA constructed Forest Theatre at the edge of Battle Park. Koch's plays on Tarheel life, hailed as the quintessential "America's Folk Theatre," brought local dramatic presentations to parts of the state where public art was rarely seen. Among these productions were "The Lost Colony," still performed in Manteo every summer, and "The Last of the Lowries," which tells the story of controversial Lumbee outlaw-hero, Henry Berry Lowry.

The Holmes-Koch House is a beautiful example of the early-20th century, shingle-sided bungalow. State Forrester John S. Holmes, may have been influenced by the Craftsman style homes in Biltmore Village near Asheville when he built his house. The exceptional renovation in 2008 by Edward Smith and Diane Ecklandof Shadetree Construction earned them both a Preservation Award and a coveted historic plaque from the Preservation Society.

The Preservation Society is honored to include his home on Glenburnie Street as one of our stops on this year's Holiday House Tour. Visitors on the house tour will explore halls and rooms that once echoed with great, dramatic voices that have brought North Carolina's rich heritage to the world's stage.