Facilities

Edgemont Park

Edgemont Park is located in East Central Durham. The park features a playground for ages 5-12. Edgemont Park also includes adult/teen outdoor fitness equipment.

Picnic Shelter

Visit the picnic shelter rentals page for complete details on renting the shelter at Edgemont Park.

Outdoor Fitness Equipment

Edgemont Park offers outdoor fitness equipment located near the playground. The equipment includes stationary strength building equipment including a sit up bench, pull up bars, push up bars, a lift station, and two core building platforms. The park also offers a recumbent bicycle and cross country ski machine for cardio workouts.

Park History

The Edgemont community was founded in the early years of the 20th century by Julian Carr as homes for the workers in the Golden Belt Manufacturing Company and the Durham Hosiery Mills. Carr build the Hosiery Mill to respond to increase orders for cotton hosiery from the U.S. Military. Carr included houses, mill buildings, churches, schools, and company owned general stores in this community, along with a park adjacent to the Mill. It was developed for the employees, with a ball field, a bandstand, and an open-air theater. Edgemont continued to grow into the 1930s, but the shutdown of the mill in 1934 radically changed the neighborhood.

Seeing the socioeconomic distress of the community after the mill closed, the campus church of Duke University and the Recreation Department renovated the old Knights of Pythias building into a community center. When that building burned in 1943, a new center was built at Elm Street and Angier Avenue. The center existed until the early 1980s, when it was torn down and became what is currently known as Edgemont Park. The Edgemont area is reviving, as the Hosiery Mill has been converted into housing for low-income seniors, and the Golden Belt Building now holds some City departments and some independent businesses.