Madison Dry Goods and Country Store

Madison Dry Goods and Country Store is a longtime community landmark in downtown Madison, NC — a working country store on the ground floor and an unusual local-history museum upstairs, all inside a 1908 building with a remarkable past. It’s the kind of place where you can browse quality casual and outdoor apparel, shop for local goods, and find a meaningful gift, then climb the stairs into one of the more storied rooms in Rockingham County.

Founded by Richard and Kathy Miller in 1998, the store has been a downtown Madison anchor for decades. On any visit you can sink into a rocking chair with a glass-bottle soda from the old Coke box, play a game of checkers, and strike up a conversation with the folks behind the counter, who are always glad to share the building’s history. It’s dog-friendly, has outdoor seating, and sits about 30 minutes from Greensboro, Winston-Salem, and Martinsville, making it an easy day trip.

Be sure to check out the pictures below to get a feel for Madison Dry Goods and Country Store before you go — or to relive the visit after.

The Store and the 1908 Building

The store itself is a proper old-fashioned country store with a lot more going on than the name might suggest. It specializes in quality branded apparel for the casual and outdoor enthusiast — good brands at fair prices — alongside local goods like jams, honey, pickles, ground cornmeal, old-timey candies, and Wisconsin cheese curds, plus a solid selection of gifts. It’s the sort of place where you can outfit yourself for the outdoors, pick up something made nearby, and find a present all in one stop. Much of the appeal of a visit comes from the conversations that happen across the counter, where the story of the building is always close at hand.

The building is a character in its own right. Constructed in 1908, the structure at 104 West Murphy Street has worn many hats over the decades — it served as a hotel, as the Penn Hardware Store, and, upstairs, as the T.B. Knight Funeral Parlor. A remarkable relic of those earlier lives survives: the building’s original elevator, which once served the hardware store and funeral parlor, is still in working order. That layering of history under one roof is a big part of what makes the store more than just a place to shop.

Briggs Family Kitchen & Bakery

Sharing the ground floor is Briggs Family Kitchen & Bakery, a sit-down hot bar and bakery operating right inside Madison Dry Goods. It serves home-cooked Southern comfort food from a rotating menu — the kind of meat-and-vegetable, mac-and-cheese, and Salisbury-steak lunch fare that pairs perfectly with an old country store — along with baked goods, and it handles small catering orders as well. Seating is in vintage booths and at the counter, keeping with the building’s throwback character.

We haven’t had the chance to eat at Briggs ourselves yet — it’s on our list for a future visit — but it’s a well-regarded part of the Madison Dry Goods experience and worth knowing about before you go. The kitchen keeps its own limited hours, generally Wednesday through Saturday, 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., so time your visit accordingly if a meal is part of the plan.

The Upstairs Museum and the Lawson Family Tragedy

The second floor is what draws visitors from well beyond Madison. Store founder Richard Miller spent years assembling a free museum that traces the history of the building and the town — and, most notably, memorializes the Lawson Family Tragedy, one of the most somber chapters in North Carolina history.

On Christmas Day in 1929, Stokes County farmer Charlie Lawson killed his wife and six of his seven children at their home in nearby Germanton before taking his own life; the family’s lone survivor was a son who had been sent away on an errand. In the aftermath, the victims were brought to the T.B. Knight Funeral Parlor on this building’s upper floor to be prepared for burial. The upstairs museum occupies those former funeral-parlor rooms, staged as they might have looked in 1929, with period embalming equipment, newspaper clippings, and artifacts that tell the story with care rather than sensationalism.

That history has given the building a lasting reputation for paranormal activity — enough that in 2022 it was featured on the Netflix series 28 Days Haunted, which filmed a multi-week investigation on site. Whether or not you come for the ghost stories, the museum is a genuinely worthwhile stop: a free, thoughtfully curated look at a piece of local history you won’t find told anywhere else.

Good to Know

• Location: 104 West Murphy Street, Madison, NC 27025 (downtown Madison)
• The building: Constructed in 1908; former hotel, Penn Hardware Store, and T.B. Knight Funeral Parlor, with the original elevator still working
• Founded: Richard and Kathy Miller opened Madison Dry Goods in 1998
• The store: Quality branded casual and outdoor apparel at fair prices, plus local goods (jams, honey, pickles, cornmeal, candies, cheese curds) and a good selection of gifts; rocking chairs, glass-bottle sodas, and checkers
• Briggs Family Kitchen & Bakery: A sit-down hot bar and bakery inside the store, serving home-cooked Southern comfort food and baked goods; generally open Wednesday–Saturday, 11:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m. (we haven’t tried it yet ourselves)
• Upstairs museum: A free museum covering the building’s and Madison’s history, including the 1929 Lawson Family Tragedy, in the former funeral-parlor rooms
• On screen: Featured on Netflix’s 28 Days Haunted (2022)
• Good to know: Dog-friendly, with outdoor seating
• Getting there: About 30 minutes from Greensboro, Winston-Salem, and Martinsville
• Best for: Shoppers, local-history and true-crime enthusiasts, the paranormally curious, and anyone who enjoys a good conversation with the folks behind the counter
• Pair with: The rest of the Madison attractions and the town of Madison; the historic 1919 town clock a few blocks away in downtown Madison; or more of Rockingham County

A Madison Highlight

Madison Dry Goods and Country Store is several experiences stacked into one storefront, and each is worth your time. There’s a genuine country store — quality apparel, local goods and gifts, rocking chairs, cold sodas, and a game of checkers. There’s Briggs Family Kitchen & Bakery for a sit-down, home-cooked lunch. And upstairs is one of the more unusual local-history museums in North Carolina, set in the former funeral parlor and centered on the 1929 Lawson Family Tragedy.

The history is what makes it memorable, and the store has long been known for the hospitality of its staff. Richard and Kathy Miller, who founded the store and built the upstairs museum, did as much as anyone to make it the Madison institution it is today — and a visit still carries that same welcoming, story-rich spirit.

Set right in the heart of downtown Madison and an easy drive from the Triad, it’s one of the most distinctive stops in Rockingham County — equal parts shopping trip, hot lunch, history lesson, and, if you’re inclined to believe the stories, ghost tour. Whatever brings you in, plan to stay a while.

---

---

Website

Madison Dry Goods Facebook

Briggs Family Kitchen & Bakery Facebook

---

Location

---

Social Media

---

---