NYC #59: Thomas Wolfe, Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn

'THOMAS WOLFE
AMERICAN AUTHOR

LIVED ON BROOKLYN HEIGHTS FROM 1931 TO 1935,
AND IN THIS HOUSE, 1933 TO 1935, WHILE WRITING
OF TIME AND THE RIVER.
–––––––––––––––––––––
"GREAT GOD, THE ONLY BRIDGE, THE BRIDGE OF
POWER, LIFE AND JOY, THE BRIDGE THAT WAS A
SPAN, A CRY, AN ECSTASY – THAT WAS AMERICA."

DEDICATED ON MAY 20, 1983, BY
THE THOMAS WOLFE SOCIETY'

Angels Re-visited (again), Old Fort, North Carolina: Southern Literary Tour, Part Two: #8

At Old Fort Cemetery, in the Blue Ridge mountains of North Carolina, is another angel carved in Carrara, Italy, and bought by W. O. Wolfe for his monument shop in Asheville. But there is no argument of which I am aware about this angel being one of Thomas Wolfe's contested literary ones on which he modeled Look Homeward, Angel. Instead, though, is a story involving gambling.

The claim is that Samuel A. McCanless heavily beat W. O. Wolfe at a game of poker, as a result of which W. O. forfeited one of his angels. McCanless made use of this prize later when his wife Hattie died of a perforated appendix, although his second wife couldn't square her husband's general meanness with his apparent magnanimous behavior toward his first wife.

It was McCanless's niece Daintry Allison who revealed this information to Bob Terrill, a writer of the Asheville Citizen-Times.

Please click on the comment link below to read the correct story as told by Victoria Sherrill, the great-granddaughter of Samuel Alonzo McCanless and his second wife Geneva, (known as 'Peggy). I'm grateful to Victoria for her contribution and elucidation.

Addendum: As Victoria Sherrill didn't leave an email address, Joe Elliott of Asheville, NC, has sent me the following message:

'Note to Ms. Sherrill: I was born & raised in McDowell Co. where my family history goes back to the late 18th century. I'm currently working on a series of historical sketches about the county, thus the reason for wanting to get in touch with you. Hope to hear from you. Thank you.'

The Riverside Cemetery, Asheville, North Carolina: Southern Literary Tour, Part Two: #7

In Asheville's Riverside Cemetery, North Carolina, it's easy to spot the famous writers buried here - Thomas Wolfe, and O. Henry (William Sydney Porter) because they're well signposted. The grave of Horace Kephart's photographer friend and companion is far less easy to find as George Masa isn't a household name, and I was too weary to ask at the office (assuming there was anyone there.) However, by way of a bonus, I spotted the grave of a notable writer and Wolfe scholar, and here is Ted Mitchell's obituary.

A person could be forgiven for expecting an angel statue on Thomas Wolfe's grave.

W. O. Wolfe's grave is at the side of his son's.

The grave of William Sydney Porter, better known under his pseudonym O. Henry.

Ted Mitchell's gravestone contains a quotation from Wolfe: 'Where shall the weary rest? Where shall the lonely of heart come home? What doors are open for the wanderer, and in what place, and in what time, and in what land? Where? Where the weary of heart can abide forever, where the weary of wandering can find peace, where the tumult, the fever, and the fret shall be forever stilled?'

Thomas Wolfe's Angel Reconsidered in Bryson City, North Carolina: Southern Literary Tour, Part Two: #6

In a blog post last year, I wrote about the Hendersonville Angel as a model for Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel here. The theory - that Wolfe had been inspired by the angel in his father's monument shop in Asheville - was very interesting if not entirely convincing. However, things were no doubt a little more complicated than that. George Ellison, a writer who has frequently published articles in Smoky Mountain News about such local literary figures as Horace Kephart, for instance, has been aware for a number of years of the wobbliness of the Hendersonville angel theory. As he has said, the original idea about the angel on Margaret Bates Johnson's grave in Hendersonville came from Thomas Wolfe scholar Myra Champion in 1949, and seems to have been accepted without question ever since.

Ellison puts forward the suggestion that the angel in Wolfe's mind was a composite: certainly, Wolfe saw more than one angel from Carrara in Italy in his father's shop, and an angel in Bryson City Cemetery, also sold by W. O. Wolfe, actually holds a lily as mentioned in Wolfe's novel. The Hendersonvillle angel holds no such flower, but wheat. There nevertheless appears to be a conscious effort to exclude the existence of any other angelic candidate in favor of the Hendersonville one.

The Bryson City Cemetery angel marking Fannie Everett Clancy's grave.

The lily close up. George Ellison's article about the angels is here.

Hendersonville, North Carolina: Thomas Wolfe: Literary Landmarks of the Southern United States, #18

I wasn't even aware of this street marker – or the existence of the angel, for that matter – until I noticed it on a map of Hendersonville that the hotel receptionist had given Penny. But here it is: 'Wolfe's Angel. Marble statue from the Asheville shop of W. O. Wolfe. Inspired title of son Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel. Stands 150 feet south.'

And here it is. The story goes that Thomas Wolfe saw it in his father's shop one day, and was so impressed with it that he took it for part of his title, and it then became part of literary history.

Asheville, North Carolina: Thomas Wolfe<: Literary Landmarks of the Southern United States, #17

Thomas Wolfe (1900–38) was born at 92 Woodfin Street, Asheville, North Carolina, the youngest of eight children. His father William Oliver (frequently just known as 'W. O.') was a stonemason with a tombstone shop in Asheville, and his mother, Julia Elizabeth Westall, was a hard-nosed businesswoman who took in boarders and aquired real estate. In 1906 the family bought and moved in to 48 Spruce Street near their former home, and ten years later Julia extended and modernised 'The Old Kentucky Home', as the boarding house was called'. Later, in Wolfe's autobiographical Look homeward, Angel (1929), he called it 'Dixieland'. The house is largely intact, family members having arranged the furnishings as it was then. Because Look Homeward, Angel was so heavily autobiographical, Asheville public library banned it for more than seven years due to less than complimentary outlines of the none too well disguised characters.

A replica of the card Julia got her children to distribute as an advertisement.

The marital bed in which Thomas Clayton Wolfe was born, although of course not in the same house.

The rather spacious dining room – the house has twenty-nine rooms.

A detail from the kitchen.

One of the guest rooms.

I have to add how much we enjoyed our visit to the Old Kentucky Home, which began with a number of photographic representations of Wolfe's brief life, continued with the most enthusiastic, brilliant performance (and that is the only word for it) that I have ever witnessed a guide give, and ended with a short biographical film. It was two (well, very nearly: the parking meter clock still registered a few minutes in our favor) very entertaining hours, and all for one dollar. Compared with the hugely disappointing (and comparatively savagely expensive) autopiloted guide to the Margaret Mitchell home in Atlanta, Georgia (to come: I'm saving the worst till last), well...

Between 13 September through 15 September (three nights), Dr John S. Phillipson, a fan of Thomas Wolfe, was the only guest at the Old Kentucky Home. He had come boarded a Greyhound from Rochester, New York state, to visit a friend in Fort Jackson, South Carolina, and timed his visit to coincide with the anniversary of Wolfe's death on the final day of his stay. He was delighted to be able to talk to Julia Wolfe, and to make notes for the booklet he wrote about his experiences, which includes a rather hazy photo he took of Julia standing beside the writer's grave.