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Coastal North Carolina Welcomes the Trust in Style

The Trust’s autumn visit to New Bern, North Carolina, provided a true retreat for those who attended it. The weather was perfect: a cluster of those golden days in which autumn stops for a pause and holds its breath a moment, before rushing downhill toward winter.

New Bern was destined for power until, like some other colonial capitols, it was left behind in the confusion of war and the dust of westward expansion. It went its quiet way until the twentieth century. Then, generations that had driven relentlessly forward turned with equal determination to reconsider their past. With other former seats of power like Annapolis and Williamsburg, it was brought a different, perhaps more lasting, fame.

Trust members, for whom the past is as present as tomorrow, gathered in the small seaport city to consider the “Grand Variety of Styles” in eastern North Carolina. Our co-host was Tryon Palace Historic Sites and Gardens.

Thursday evening we were greeted warmly by North Carolina’s secretary of Cultural Resources, Betty Ray McCain, who talked about the miracle of seeing things coming to fruition in the region. Graham Hood, providing the keynote address, commented that Williamsburg’s own governor’s palace reopened twenty years ago. “It seemed to make a difference at the time,” he said quietly, about the event that redirected the course of America’s historic house museums.

Describing the process by which the result was attained, he cited and praised the great scholars from the fields of the English decorative arts who contributed to the final product. And he concluded, not modestly but quite accurately, with the words, “What we achieved was a completely new understanding of the decorative arts in America in the decades before the revolution.”

The whole staff of Tryon’s Palace, beginning with Kay Williams, its director, made us welcome. Patricia Samford, archaeologist at Tryon’s Palace, began us at ground level. She described the ambitious beginning and ignominious end of Tryon’s dreams of grandeur: creating at New Bern a permanent capital with a royal residence. His successor, just a few years later, escaping in darkness, his furnishings auctioned off, his “palace” left to go to ruin. The land was covered by almost a hundred buildings in 1930, when two determined women began working to reconstruct the palace.

Samford documented efforts to locate the footprint of the building, the controversies that surrounded the excavation and the design, and left her audience amazed that anything had risen from those ruins.

Nancy Richards, Curator of Collections, and the person whose efforts in New Bern had insured the success of the weekend, talked to us about the first committee’s struggle to undertake the initial refurnishing without even an inventory. Traveling to England, under the assumption that an English political appointee would have brought his household with him, the committee contacted every decorative arts dealer they could, and listed their wants. Richards said frankly that “the committee wanted beauty, and if there were a question of beauty over accuracy, aesthetics always won.”

But that victory has left Tryon’s Palace with excellent objects: early Georgian furniture, fine English silver and ceramics, that would be difficult to obtain today. Richards’ continued refrain was that the educational experience available to a visitor is today’s main concern.

Perry Mathewes, Tryon’s Curator of Gardens, presented a compelling account of the meager documentation of the original garden and its brief life span; the design and creation of an extremely successful colonial revival garden in the 1950’s by Morley Williams, the architect initially responsible for the restoration of the building, and the intensive research being conducted today to provide as complete and accurate an image of the grounds and gardens as possible. He posed the difficult question often faced as research reveals information not available to the men and women responsible for mid 20th-century historic sites: they have an excellent 1950’s garden, “one of Morley’s best.” Do they destroy it in order to replace it with one that, though perhaps more accurate, is hypothetical?

With that excellent background, we spent the afternoon visiting the Palace and its outbuildings, guided by the docent staff and our speakers. We toured the state rooms, wandered through the kitchen garden, spoke with interpreters in the kitchen wing, and stopped at the early-19th-century Robert Hay House to “visit” with the mistress of the house, her housemaid and Mr. Hay’s journeyman.

The sun was fading when the last of us hurried back to our rooms to change for a candlelit tour of the Palace and dinner on the lawn. It was a convivial gathering, enjoying the food, the wine and the company — all of them superb. Trust President Jonathan Fairbanks rose after the meal to take the podium and present to Graham Hood the Trust’s Award of Excellence. Following the formal presentation, Jonathan gave both Graham and Gail gifts by one of North Carolina’s contemporary craftsmen.

But Trust symposiums follow rigorous schedules, and members assembled early to hear historical architect Peter Sandbeck put Tryon’s palace into historical perspective. He described the simple structures in New Bern in the 1760’s and the effect the addition of the palace complex had on the city: its size, elaboration, the skilled workmen brought from distant cities. Talking about the port’s relation to the barrier islands and the coastal inlets, he described its shallow waters and exposed location as unfavorable to large-scale shipping. Adding that the citizens didn’t catch “railroad fever” early enough, he made it easy to see why both the “capital” and the “capitol” drifted away. His illustrations of the region’s architecture helped greatly when an excellent trolley tour drove us around the district later that day.

No Trust symposium could ignore furniture, and three excellent speakers addressed it Matthew Hobbs, who first met Trust members as a Dewey Lee Curtis Scholar, spoke of the production and consumption of furniture in the region in the 18th century. Hobbs was far more than a speaker for this symposium. He assisted in its planning, was our guide on Wednesday’s optional tour, and introduced us to his parents’ vernacular architecture and furniture collection.

Giving us a lesson in the region’s economic history, Hobbs talked about trade along the coast. The shallow waters meant smaller vessels; traditional “southern” crops like tobacco were less successful, so a planter produced several different crops a year; the resulting variety made his produce desirable to northern traders. The colony was the leading exporter of all naval stores — pine, pitch, turpentine — so New England shippers endured the difficult navigation. A group of transplanted New Englanders, mostly Quakers, did very well along the coast: the availability of goods was limited only by what a buyer was willing to spend. Hobbs showed the work of a series of small regional cabinet shops, making it clear that their names will become as familiar to students as those of the men in large northern cities. (Members may recall Hobbs’ discussion of the shop of Thomas White, and be interested to learn that a “smoking chair” from his shop sold recently at auction for $165,000.00.)

Expanding further across North Carolina, Sumpter Priddy took what he called a look from the Virginia side of the line. Priddy is well known to Trust members for his insightful examinations of southern furniture. There was so much movement in this part of the south, he said, that it is still hard to tell who was where, and what a particular characteristic really means. Research is too early to permit us to say with certainty whether many of the attributions should be to Virginia or North Carolina — though North Carolinians are working at the questions harder. He emphasized that state lines don’t mean very much here, but regional ties mean a great deal. Priddy showed us a great range of very interesting objects, several of them pedimented case pieces that seem to show a relationship between Norfolk and North Carolina.

Completing the trio was Betty C. Leviner from Williamsburg, introducing us to an architectural form whose name if not its actual appearance is foreign. We learned about the “buffet niche,” a French term describing a formal adjunct to dining, a structure often recessed, capable of being expanded by a half-table, and almost always including water to assist in the serving of drink. We watched as her illustrations documented the shift from masculine/drink to feminine/ceramic orientation of the buffet, the disappearance of water and drink, and their reappearance on a new form: the marble-topped sideboard. Design books illustrate the buffet niche becoming a pair of double-doored cupboards flanking the fireplace. As the buffet niche became the bow-fat it lost its extension, the doors were closed more frequently, and the form grew by the early 19th century into a closet. We’ll never look at a closet the same way again.

Parallel to our expanded understanding of the architecture and furniture of coastal North Carolina is our comprehension of the region’s intellectual life. Robert G. Anthony, Curator of the Wilson Library’s North Carolina Collection, documented the impressive personal libraries of North Carolinians. The settlers in Albemarle county were buying books in the 1650’s; royal governors brought personal libraries with them; loyalists lost their books along with other possessions. Discussing the books of David Stone, whose early 19th century library some of us had visited, he cited its astonishing statistics. Illustrating the recreated library wing of Hays Plantation, which some saw on Wednesday, he documented four generations of book lovers whose 2260 volumes are now at the Wilson Library. Collecting books was a challenge in North Carolina, he concluded. There were no booksellers, no large towns, yet bibliophiles assembled libraries of great complexity and passed them on to us.

The symposium was closed appropriately by Reid Thomas, Restoration Specialist for the Eastern Office of State Historic Preservation, who talked about the preservation of coastal North Carolina’s great architectural heritage. We had become well acquainted with Thomas: he had accompanied or joined us over the days of the symposium and tours, introducing us to owners of private homes, providing informal commentary about the buildings we were visiting. He ended optimistically by showing us successful domestic restoration efforts, most of them small and private. The state has perhaps America’s best tax credit program, and “Preservation North Carolina” focuses on the acquisition of endangered properties, their sale to individuals, and assistance in their restoration. The program has inspired hundreds of successes. Showing us buildings that seemed ruins, he documented their gradual return to life, leaving us astonished and enthusiastic.

Recognizing the complexity of the subjects being covered and the unique landscape of the region, the symposium’s planners added two optional tours before the lecture sessions and one following, and we were rewarded. We visited one of the preservation movement’s great success stories. Majestic Hope Plantation, 1803 home of the scholar and statesman David Stone, has been returned from a ruinous state to reflect the position of its builder. The 1763 King-Bazemore house joins it in containing a genuinely impressive collection of southern furniture. We were invited to Hayes Plantation, a private home near Edenton. Its monumental colonnaded portico and curving wings, expansive center hall and secluded library provided an unforgettable glimpse into the life of a gentleman farmer in the early 19th century. The home of collector Jim Jefferson, rich with a lifetime’s choice objects, was a feast for the eyes, only to be equaled by an astonishing luncheon at The Colonial Inn to which Jefferson introduced us. Coolmore, the 1850’s Italianate villa being lovingly and intelligently maintained and updated by descendants, gave us a glimpse of high Victorian splendor seldom found in its original state. The cluster of vernacular buildings and the furniture workshop of cabinetmakers Benjamin and Matthew Hobbs provided an irresistible juxtaposition of present and past. Three collectors welcomed us into their homes, talking with us about their collections of antique and contemporary arts and crafts. And the whole town of Edenton, looking serenely out onto Albemarle Sound, was ours to walk through until we entered its homes for collection tours and cocktails. These spectacular things happen by themselves, of course. Trust Governor Hank Landon and his wife, Barbara, opened doors that added immeasurably to our visit, and gave us a real sense of the region’s style.