For over 65 years, members of the Harvie family lived in this Victorian-era dwelling built in 1873 for Dr. Lewis Edwin Harvie.  This VMI First classman, called to drill recruits for the Confederacy, was captured at Gettysburg and held prisoner for two years.  In 1871, after obtaining his medical degree from the Medical College of Virginia, Dr. Harvie left his native Powhatan County to establish his medical practice in Danville - at the urging of a cousin who had relocated here as well.

Dr. Harvie's two-story dwelling accommodated not only family living quarters, but also his medical offices on the left side of the basement.  Here he maintained his practice for 45 years.  After his death in 1918 his widow, the former Martha Rutherfoord, continued to reside here until her death in 1936.  Mrs. Harvie's will authorized John B. Harvie, one of the couple's ten children, to sell the property; in 1938 it was purchased by Sue Nora Moseley, the next-door neighbor at 968 Main Street.  Thereafter, at least some members of the Harvie family remained here until 1941, when Mrs. Moseley sold the house - minus a portion of the original 100-foot lot - to George R. Norris.

Norris, a native of South Carolina, retained one of the city's premier architects, J. Bryant Heard, to give the mid-Victorian, I-house a serene Neo-classical Revival "make-over," adding rear and side wings for a total of 17 rooms.  Richmond landscape architect Kenneth Higgins, a protege of landscape master Charles Gillette, designed the azalea-boxwood rear garden.  The house remained in the family for nearly three decades, until Mr. Norris' death.  In 1970 the couple's only child Grace Litzenberg conveyed the property to the present owner, Bill Haynsworth.

The Haynsworths are well known in the community for their family business OfficePlus, formerly Haynsworth's.  Currently, Bill Haynsworth's residence is being offered for sale, in expectation of continuing the 135-plus-year stewardship tradition evidenced by a succession of caring owners.  Descendant of those owners reside in the community today-notably, Edwin J. Harvie, Jr., like his grandfather and namesake, a respected Danville M.D.; and Grace Norris Litzenberg, daughter of George and Elizabeth Rucker Norris who refurbished the house on the eve of the Second World War.  Another results of that careful renovation was the charming garden gazebo adapted from the side porch columns formerly on the Moseley-Wiseman house next door.