It started with a single-story fishing cottage on the high bank of Broad Creek in the 1950s. By the mid-1980s, the cottage grew by a story, adding on to create enough space for a growing family. In 2008, a two-car garage was added, along with a front porch. Four years later, the house reached skyward again, with a two-story great room above the original living room.

In 70 years, this once humble cottage has become a unique family home, one where holidays draw a crowd and the calm waters of Broad Creek provide ample opportunity for summer fun.

At 2,750 square feet, the home of David and Lisa Norwood boasts three bedrooms, three full baths, a kitchen with a wall of windows overlooking the creek and a screened-in porch to enjoy warm breezes. Completely separate from the house, the “Boat House,” added in 2016, is where David Norwood has his office, though the 150-square-foot space with a deck, loft and half bath is easily converted for guests

“This house accommodates a lot of family,” David Norwood said. “I loved having the family home for Fourth of July, Labor Day, Memorial Day.”

Modern though it may seem to the visitor, this home’s history and evolution over the years can be seen in architectural details framed in the past. And several stand out.

The Hilltop Lane entrance is notable for its round-top, 9-foot-tall, oak double doors studded with windows. A throwback in time, the doors were actually rescued by neighbor Bill McCotter in the 1970s, when a home on the St. Mary’s School campus in Raleigh was slated to be demolished. McCotter saved 20 doors and sold all but three, but when the Norwoods decided expansion was in order, he offered this pair up for task.

In the painted knotty-pine paneling of the living room and a kitchen wall, one can see the origins of the 1950s cottage. An enormous oversized-brick fireplace in the living room serves as testament to the home’s original purpose — fishing — where the catch of the old days was cooked over fire, according to David Norwood. Between the paneling, the fireplace and hardwood floors, the room is a nod to the past.

“The rest of the house was kind of built around it,” Norwood said.

The catch of the day, these days, has been crabs, according to Lisa Norwood, who has spent many hours on the dock with baited string in the water, angling for blue crab, an abundant resource in the Pamlico. Every summer, the Norwoods have enjoyed many a night serving up steamed crab that came straight from the creek yards away.

Situated on Broad Creek between the Washington Yacht & Country Club and McCotter’s Marina, the home also comes with a short dock with a 40-foot slip that will accommodate a boat with up to a 5 1/2-foot draft, another slip with a 10,000-pound lift, and a permitted storm mooring a short distance away. The combination with the sheltered creek makes for a good situation when hurricanes come calling.

“It’s just a good location, being able to keep the boat of the end of the dock, as opposed to out (on a pier) on the river,” Norwood said.

In fact, hurricanes have not been an issue for the Norwoods. Sitting up on slight hill, the house has never had water beneath it — not even during Tropical Storm Dennis in 1999, which was the highest water that area has seen.

“We were fortunate to be here and not have to deal with that,” Norwood said.

Though the house has been the family home for nearly four decades, the Norwoods are in transition too — making their lives a little simpler, a little more maintenance-free and lot closer to amenities offered by downtown Washington. The decision to downsize and give up life on the creek has been a long one, and David Norwood knows he’ll miss the many memories made there with family and friends: “It will be with a tear in my eye when we leave here because we have been on the banks of Broad Creek since 1981.”

For more information about the Norwood home on Hilltop Lane, call Jackson Lancaster at Coldwell Banker Coastal Rivers Realty at 252-975-8010.