When M.G. Waters’ daughter Ella was getting married in the 1940s, he had a house built for her and her new husband, Carl E. Pfau. Legend has it, the lumber company owner was noticeably absent from his everyday business during that time — and for a very specific reason.

“He was handpicking every board or every stick in the house because it was a present to her,” said Steve Gravely.

Gravely and wife Martha are part owners of that house, just a few doors down from their own in the waterfront neighborhood of North Shores. It’s a wood frame, stick built, circa 1948 traditional riverfront cottage, with a few twists. Built on the land that was once home to the Pamlico Shipyard — a 1943 blurb in the Washington Daily News has the Pamlico Shipyard launching a DPC (Defense Plant Corporation)-202, a wooden oil barge commissioned for the war effort — the remnants of the shipyard’s old wharf remain just off the bulkhead.

“That’s why you see those old pilings out there,” Gravely said. “When the tide blows out you find old spikes, ship artifacts.”

Long the riverside home of Joseph P. and Emily Bryan Tunstall, for many decades it was the gathering place for family, for grandchildren learning to sail and fish off the 175 feet of bulkheaded waterfront. Emily Tunstall was known as an excellent cook; her cakes and fudge were renowned. The kitchen at 104 Northwest Avenue reflects the spirit of a cook who likes her space: plenty of countertop, plenty of cabinets and plenty of standing room for those who simply can’t stay out of the kitchen while there’s cooking going on.

But space is everywhere in this house: a 25-foot-6-inch by 17-foot-11-inch living room with a wall of original sliding glass doors once opened to a screened-in porch, enclosed during a renovation years ago; an outdoor patio was transformed into a sunroom with three walls of floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the lawn, sky and river between; the master bedroom comes with a sitting room also looking over the Pamlico; a den is paneled in the wood handpicked by M.C. Waters himself. It’s 3,415 square feet of house, all of oriented toward a southern exposure and the river flowing by. Even a bathroom shared by two other bedrooms is geared toward river life — it has an entrance of its own.

“That’s what my grandmother always had it for — for when we came in from the river and we were wet,” said Abbott Tunstall.

Tunstall has always known this home as his grandparents’ place; they bought it about the same time he was born. As the listing agent with The Rich Company, he knows it better than pretty much anyone: he spent childhood exploring the enormous attic with cedar closet, hiding out in the apartment over the detached garage.

Tunstall is the first to tell potential buyers that this house needs work. But underneath the carpet in each room are pristine pine floors; the bones of the house are just fine; and the lot is more like its own peninsula. It’s a place with a clear view of sunsets every day of the year.

“The lot is what you’re buying. The rest just comes on top of it,” Tunstall said.

But the rest is a piece of Washington’s history — built on the site of a shipyard that was part of the war effort, by the dedication of a father for a daughter, apparent in the master craftsmanship seen throughout.

“That’s why I’d hate to see it torn down and (someone build) something new on it,” Gravely said.

For more information about the house at 104 Northwest Avenue, call Abbott Tunstall at 252-902-9570.