M. T. Pope, M.D.

Both of his parents were free people of color, and in fact the
family may have been free as early as the eighteenth century. Manassa’s father, Jonas Elias Pope (1827- 1913) was a carpenter by trade, and owned a significant amount of land in
Northampton and Bertie Counties, some of which was rented to sharecroppers for the production of cotton.

Jonas Pope was a Quaker, and well-educated for the era. He was described as being of “bright yellow complexion,” indicating that he was of multi-racial heritage.
Nothing else is currently known about Manassa’s mother, though evidently she too was born free and was of multi-racial ancestry.

Manassa Pope came to Raleigh in 1874 to attend Shaw University, a college for Negro men established by a white minister, H. M. Tupper, in 1865. He finished his undergraduate education and then began study at the Leonard School
of Medicine at Shaw, the first four year medical college in the state of North Carolina (black or white).
Dr. Pope graduated in 1886

Manassa and Lydia Walden of Winton, North Carolina married in 1887. They moved to Henderson, North Carolina in 1888. Pope served there as assistant postmaster, a position achieved by political appointment, until they moved to
Charlotte in 1892.

In Charlotte Dr. Pope not only practiced medicine but was a very active businessman, helping to establish the Queen City
Drug Company, which in the 1890's grew to become one of that city's most successful Black businesses. He also created the People’s Benevolent Association (an insurance company).

Dr. Pope went on to serve in the North Carolina 3rd Regiment, an all-black unit during the era of the Spanish American War as an officer and a surgeon.

After he was discharged, in 1899, Dr. Pope sold his business in Charlotte and moved to Raleigh, NC where he built a home where he practiced medicine.

He first set up his medical practice on Fayetteville Street which is the city's main thoroughfare, but later moved his office to 13 E. Hargett Street.

About 1900, he began work on his home. Pope’s choice of a house site was not by chance. The burgeoning white supremacist movement had by then drawn racial lines around most of Raleigh’s neighborhoods. Though no written evidence survives, it seems clear that Dr. Pope built his house in the most prominent place he could--at the edge of what became known as the “Fourth Ward.”

The neighborhood included the homes of several other black doctors, dentists and lawyers, as well as churches and a small private hospital. The homes of many of these leading black citizens faced the rear yards of the white houses fronting Fayetteville Street.

Despite this environment, Pope built a fine residence. Amenities included a wide side hall with a stained-glass “petal” window and elegantly crafted staircase, sliding pocket doors, milled woodwork and copper-plated hardware.

The house was both wired for electricity and piped for gas. A call bell system remains in place from the years the family employed a maid. Later changes made by Dr. Pope included a sunporch over the front porch, and small examining room for his medical practice at the rear of the house.

In 1919, during the Jim Crow era, Dr. Pope capped his public career with a remarkable run for public office. Driven by rising assaults on the rights of African Americans, Pope and two others made formal bids for the City Council. Though defeated at the polls, the ticket dramatically brought out the black vote. Pope’s family was equally infused with a sense of service.

In 1907, Pope married Delia H. Phillips, an educator from a locally prominent African American family.
The couple raised two daughters at the Wilmington Street house, Evelyn and Ruth, both of whom went on to receive master’s degrees from Columbia University and became notable teachers.

Each moved back to the house upon retirement. Evelyn died there in 1995; Ruth died in October, 2000.

Source: https://cityofraleigh0drupal.blob.core.usgovcloudapi.net/...