We are still quite the talk! It just blows their minds to think that we are all the way from Washington and pulling the Manor with a Rave4! The Open House was fun. Not too many took part but we did and we got some new ideas in talking to some of the other TM owners. We are getting some of the lingo: TM = TrailManor, SOB = some other brand of trailer.
Macon was our destination today. This is one of the cities that did not get burned in the Civil War. The downtown is definitely thriving but some of the buildings need a lot of loving care which means $ and work. This is the last weekend of the Cherry Blossom Festival and the downtown was blocked off to traffic with the festival and entertainment stages. We didn’t have a lot of time so we drove some of the neighboring streets with some of the lovely old homes. Mercer College and two of the churches stand out from quite a distance.
Chris and I took the Hay House tour. The home is known as “The Palace of the South.” and is beautiful. Mr. Jackston, who married at 41, and his young new wife enjoyed a three year European tour for their honeymoon. They had in mind the home they would build on their return and collected many fine art pieces plus studied Italian renaissance architecture. They came home and built a 24 room Italian Renaissance mansion. The building was begun in 1855 with the interior finally finished after the Civil War. Our tour guide was darling and adored the home. She had the opportunity to study Italian Renaissance architecture in Italy a couple of years ago. The restoration will be ongoing for years but the exterior and the second or main floor have been completed. They have left the exterior with the brick showing. Originally it was all plastered for the Italian look. Jackston incorporated many interesting innovations. A wind tunnel brings in cool air for the home through panels in the doors that are closed at night and opened during the day. A wine cellar is below the marble porch. The beautiful marble porch has both Italian marble and local black granite. In the center of the floor design is quartz which gives light below to the wine cellar. The home has curved pocket doors that still open easily. The linen closet is in a secret room behind a niche between the floors on the stair landing. It was the perfect place but design wise he didn’t want a door there. He had indoor plumbing with hot and cold running water in three bathrooms! The large entry hall is done with ornate plasterwork and trumpe l’oeil with the walls done in beautiful faux marble. It cost more to do the faux painting of the marble and wood than it would have to import marble from Italy but trumpe l’oeil was the “in” thing. Luckily they had covered it with shellac to protect it. It had been painted over a couple of times through the years but they could bring it back with all it’s beauty during the restoration. The largest room was the art gallery. They needed space to show their art they had collected on their honeymoon. They commissioned a copy of a sculpture they fell in love with and set it on a pedestal. When they were entertaining, they had one of the servants stand and rotate the pedestal during the entire party. All of the rooms were beautiful. The restoration of the dining room had just been completed in 2010, and our guide was absolutely in love with the room.
The upstairs is slated for restoration work to begin. There were 6 stories including the copula. They were setting up for a wedding when we were on our tour. They were using the entire bottom floor with the ballroom, dining room, and the largest room, the art gallery. What an absolutely lovely place to be married! The bride gets to get dressed in the daughter’s bedroom upstairs. One of Jackson’s daughters raised her family in the home. It was eventually sold to the Hay family. They donated the home to the Macon Historical Society.
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| Hay House in Macon No photography allowed inside. |
We came back in time for the Pot Luck with the Trailblazers, the TrailManor Club. It was fun to get together. Everyone is friendly and interesting. Of course we ate too much! There are about 50 people with 25 Manors. It’s really fun to see them all lined up. We finished up the evening with another campfire.
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| The TrailManor Pot Luck! |
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| Check out the shirts! |
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| 25 TrailManors All in One Place |
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