RALEIGH - The Merrimon-Wynne house was built on the north end of downtown Raleigh around 1875 as the home of a judge and U.S. senator. Over the years, it has been a college dormitory, a college president's house and, most recently, state offices.

But to survive in a 21st-century city of high-rises and condos, the Merrimon-Wynne house had to move.

So on Saturday, the 4,800-square-foot house and one of its neighbors were slowly rolled from their lots on North Wilmington Street over a path of plywood and timbers across North Blount Street.

The homes are among several grand old houses that will be restored and sold along Blount and Person streets as part of a 21-acre urban renewal project called Blount Street Commons. In the end, eight of the houses will have been moved to make way for new townhouses, condos and retail space.

The Merrimon-Wynne house is the largest to be moved and, at 500,000 pounds, one of the heaviest. The home's white paint is peeling in spots, but its Victorian stature and distinctive wood trim shaped like gears, bolts and rivets remain intact.

Workers with Blake Moving Co. of Greensboro had spent weeks replacing the house's foundation with steel beams and sliding six sets of wheels with hydraulic jacks underneath them. They pulled the house using trucks with gears specially designed to pull tons of house.

The move went in fits and starts a few feet at a time, as crews worked under and ahead of the house to prepare for the next surge. When the trucks eased forward, the crowd of spectators suddenly grew quiet, their conversations replaced by the sounds of straining chains and cables and the crunch of wheels on plywood.

Lindsay Sewell of Raleigh came out to watch with his 3-year-old son Grady, who was full of questions: When are they going to move it? What are they doing under there? Why did they stop?

Like others, Sewell was impressed with the choreography of it all.

"It looks like a lot more art than science," he said.

A National Geographic crew was also on hand to film the move for a cable television show called "Mega Moves." The crew has spent two months in Raleigh documenting the entire process -- "the science, engineering and drama," said director Mike Davidson, who wore a hard hat and reflective vest and shouldered a television camera.

"It's unique," Davidson said. "They're beautiful, historic homes, but it's rare on a moving project that you have this many at the same time."

Davidson said the Raleigh Mega Moves show should be ready to air on the National Geographic Channel by late November.

The Merrimon-Wynne house has long been used for state offices -- it still says "N.C. Council for Women" on the front door -- but at least one of the spectators remembered when it was a home.

Mary Lou Pressly's family lived in the house from the time she was a little girl in 1934 until the mid-1960s, during the time her father was president of Peace College. One of five children, she recalls having lots of room and a big yard to play in.

Pressly, now 79, said she had anticipated the move for some time, so it wasn't all that strange to see her old house up on wheels. "I would have been a little bit startled if I hadn't expected it," she said.

More importantly, Pressly said, she was happy to see the home saved.

"So many things around here have been torn down," she said.

Get $150+ in coupons in every Sunday N&O. Click here for convenient home delivery.