The old wooden house blanketed in a coat of pale blue paint might seem like just another structure, but this quaint, two-story home on Carroll Street in Durham is far from ordinary.

The building is the childhood home of Pauli Murray — the influential human rights activist, legal scholar, feminist, author, poet, Episcopal priest, labor organizer and former Durham resident.

Built by her grandparents in 1898, the building has gone through over a decade of renovation to establish its current position as the Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice, which officially opened on September 7, 2024.

The Center had functioned before to provide experiences virtually or on its grounds outside, but now the inside of the home has been activated for use.

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In the 20th century, holding all of the titles Pauli Murray did as a multiracial Black and LGBTQ+ community member was no small feat.

Murray’s work across various social movements cemented them as an important figure in civil rights and activism in the 20th century. They founded the National Organization for Women, fought to help public school desegregation and contributed to increased rights for LGBTQ+ individuals.

“Pauli did so much across the course of their nearly 75 years of life,” Angela Thorpe, Executive Director of The Pauli Murray Center said. “You know, Pauli was expansive and Pauli was certainly a worker.”

These efforts have been celebrated in various ways, but the people of Durham wanted to further this commemoration by using Murray’s childhood home to bring her stories of the past to life and educate the future generation of leaders.

With the newly renovated home, the Center can now provide an opportunity for educators, students and groups to engage with Murray’s work and legacy. It can now also mount programs, projects and experiences aligned with Murray to move contemporary social justice work forward.

The Center has recently partnered with the North Carolina Bar Foundation to bring attorneys and law students into the home to provide pro-bono legal services to members of the LGBTQ+ community through name and gender-marker change clinics.

“But again, that is history and social justice if you know Pauli’s work,” Thorpe said.

The Center has been a long time in the making, with the 19th-century home needing years of extensive restoration work.

In 2011, the home was saved from being demolished. Over the next decade and a half, restoration efforts commenced, including the renovation of the exterior of the home from 2015 to 2016 and the installation of an educational exhibit on the lawn in 2019.

These lengthy efforts were important to those who helped to save it partially because of its location in Durham.

Murray’s home is the oldest original structure in the West End area of Durham, which is historically Black and working class.

“It is one way that we will help preserve the historical integrity of the West End neighborhood,” Thorpe said.

Many of those who helped with these preservations are board members at the Center, which is composed mainly of individuals from the Triangle area — ranging from a UNC-Chapel Hill professor to an employee at the Duke University Chapel to Pauli Murray’s niece — all individuals who share a passion for social justice.

“The Pauli Murray Center will be a core foundation of what the rich history of the West End is,” Rosita Stevens-Holsey, Murray’s niece, said.

Stevens-Holsey has dedicated her life’s work to preserving Murray’s memory and uplifting her story.

She always grew up knowing Murray as “Aunt Pauli,”, but it wasn’t until eight years ago when she attended a church-related memoriam in honor of Murray and met Barbara Lau, the director of the Pauli Murray Project at the Duke Humans Rights Center, that Holsey learned how much of an impact Murray made on the world.

Murray had many landmark accomplishments and fought to preserve the rights of those who weren’t as fortunate, and now Stevens-Holsey wants to preserve those efforts of her Aunt.

“I think she could be such an inspiration to others who see herself in her,” she said.

The Center has already secured its place in history with its designation as a National Historic Landmark, only the 39th in the state of North Carolina. Now with its recent opening to the public, the Center will not only serve to bring increased education to individuals in the Durham area but also further celebrate the trailblazing life of Pauli Murray.

“Being in the space where Pauli’s earliest ideas were shaped makes the work all the more profound and all the more resonant,” Thorpe said. “So I want to invite people to come into our space. Every person who sets foot into Pauli Murray’s childhood home leaves inspired to do something to move social change work forward in their community and that is transformative.”