Mary Sue and I just returned from Cashiers, NC, a small mountain town just across the South Carolina line, nestled in the Appalachian Mountains. They worked me, and it was fun.
I was asked to speak to three difference audiences by Ann Austin, a native who’s deeply concerned about Cashiers’ future; by Millie Lathan, an Atlantan whom my mother taught Sunday school at the Cathedral of St. Phillip, and who also has a wonderful home in Cashiers, and whose sister Kathleen Carroll I’ve known and liked for years; and Amelia Golcheski, the new director of the Cashiers Historical Society, who like me went to Brown University’s grad school; and John Rivers, a Charlestonian, who hosted us Thursday evening at his lovely Chattooga Club.
Mary Sue and I stayed with Steve and Liz Reynolds, who live near Cashiers and enjoyed their home, gardens, and mountain views. Steve and I were suite mates at Sewanee and have known each other for some 60 years.
On Saturday, we had lunch near Cashiers with one of my favorite former students from Lovett, Elsa Sibley, and her friend and fine woodworker Jim. We much enjoyed their mountain house, their 4 dogs, their horses, and their gardens, both floral and vegetable. Elsa recited a poem she’d learned in my French class – a pleasure for me as her teacher some 55 years ago.
Like so many towns and cities popular in the South, Cashiers is at a crossroads.
Will it be overwhelmed by development, or will it chart a way of managing change and continuity? The challenges are real and won’t go away, so they really worked me.
I spoke to c. 30 people Thursday night, to the Cashiers Historical Society’s board Friday morning, and that afternoon to a full house of c. 100 at the Friends of Cashiers Library.
The Friday morning presentation to the board focused on strategic planning, while the ones Thursday and Friday centered on a key question of historic preservation: What kind of future do you want?
As I looked out over the audience, I could “feel” they were with me. It helped that my friends were among them: Monte and Molly (Drayton) Osteen (they are in my book, and Molly is the oldest daughter of Charlie Drayton, last owner of Drayton Hall); Palmer and Monte Gaillard (Monte worked with me at Drayton Hall, and they both are friends); Jim Hendrix and his wife (Jim was former headmaster of Lovett); Gordon and Jeannie Coleman (Gordon was fraternity brother of mine from Sewanee); Phil and Linda Maddox (friends from Atlanta).
