On a Street Called Easy, in a Cottage Called Joye - Hardcover

Smith, Gregory White; Naifeh, Steven W.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0316597058 ISBN 13: 9780316597050

Publisher: Little Brown & Co, 1996

Synopsis

When Gregory White Smith and Steve Naifeh stumbled on Joye Cottage, it was love at first sight. They'd just finished their Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Jackson Pollack, and they were fed up with apartment life in New York City. What better way to escape than to sell everything and get a steal on a rundown, turn-of-the-century mansion built by robber baron William C. Whitney in that most exotic of all places, the American South? So what if none of its sixty rooms was air-conditioned? So what if the roof leaked and plaster fell from the high ceilings in murderous chunks? So what if the grand old place was rumored to be haunted? Smith and Naifeh were determined to make their lifelong fantasy of living in a palace come true - and nothing could stop them.
On a Street Called Easy, in a Cottage Called Joye is the story of their three-year adventure transforming this "handyman special from hell" into a home - while adjusting to the rhythms of small-town life in magnolia-shaded Aiken, South Carolina. As the authors of bestselling true crime books, Smith and Naifeh had encountered all kinds of colorful characters, but nothing could have prepared them for the crew that showed up to "help": an ex-Mafia plasterer, brawling painters, feckless security men, randy gardeners, and heavily armed carpenters.

About this title

Reviews

Fed up with their dark, cramped apartment in Manhattan, Pulitzer Prize winners Smith and Naifeh (for Jackson Pollack: An American Saga) dreamed of living in a palace and found it in a Sotheby catalogue for a million-plus dollars they didn't have. But they made a lucky deal, raised the money, spent three years renovating the 60-room "cottage" in Aiken, South Carolina-built for William C. Whitney-and became so accustomed to its vastness that they considered adding another room. They describe with verve the problems in restoring this white elephant, their experiences with local help and local society; and their delight in the gossip about the high life that centered around Whitney and this house at the turn of the century is contagious. The street it's on really is called Easy and the cottage really is named Joye. For reasons unexplained, Smith and Naifeh plan to donate their dream palace to the Juilliard School as a retreat for musicians; one can imagine that it may, after all, be too big for two people.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

For sale: century-old Joye Cottage, 60 rooms, including 12 baths, billiard room, ballroom, 100-foot veranda; needs work. Smith and Naifeh offer a lighthearted look at what it took to recreate this mansion and build a life in Aiken, N.C. The authors (A Stranger in the Family, 1995, etc.) won the Pulitzer Prize in 1991 for their biography of Jackson Pollock. The day in 1988 that they delivered the manuscript, they also visited the real estate section of Sotheby's in New York and fell in love with this palace of a cottage, created in 1897 for his second wife by William C. Whitney, a multimillionaire robber baron who became secretary of the navy in President Grover Cleveland's cabinet. The asking price was $1,700,000--crashing plaster ceilings, leaking roof, and all. Raising the threat of nuclear destruction from the nearby Savannah River nuclear-bomb plant, the authors offered $200,000, and the harried owner took the offer. A long procession of laborers, vividly described, began showing up at Joye Cottage. There was the stylish Mordia Grant, who headed the clean-up crew and supplied constuction workers; Lucky Dale, the chimney sweep and ``king of pack rats,'' who happily recycled the mountains of basement trash (including a five-ton boiler and a telephone pole). Bubba Barnes was the chief contractor, charged with repairing and replacing the pipes, wiring, marble, fixtures, plaster, floors, and windows, work that ``created a cloud of plaster dust sure to affect weather patterns over the Southeast for years to come.'' Chapters on the inevitability of Murphy's Law are interspersed with the history of the house and of the Whitney family. The nearly finished renovation, carried out in a spirit of ``discovery, accomplishment and community,'' was celebrated with a local hunt ball. A deft, amusing look at history, life, and people in a small southern town, as well as at a large-scale adventure in renovation. (18 b&w line drawings) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

It's a long way from apartment living in New York City to buying, rehabilitating, and inhabiting a 60-room house on Easy Street in Aiken, South Carolina. But what can you do when you're in love? When the Pulitzer Prize-winning biographers of Jackson Pollock (Jackson Pollock: An American Saga, LJ 9/1/89) first saw Joye Cottage, built by robber baron William C. Whitney in the late 19th century, they knew they had to buy it. This is a warm and lighthearted account of the trials and tribulations of purchasing and renovating a 100-year-old house with 20,000 square feet of living space (including 18 bedrooms, 12 baths, formal gardens, and a swimming pool), not to mention a leaky roof, literally tons of falling plaster, faulty plumbing, and more. Interesting bits on the history of the Gilded Age and the Whitney family scandals are interwoven with the problems of getting good help and finding decent restaurants. Ultimately, this cannot be compared with Peter Mayle's Provence books or John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (LJ 1/94); the narrative drags at the end, and the book as a whole could have used a little judicious editing to eliminate repetition. Still, this is an appropriate purchase for large libraries.
Nancy Pearl, Washington Ctr. for the Book, Seattle
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The Pulitzer Prize^-winning authors of Jackson Pollack: An American Saga offer an enchanting chronicle of the three years they spent renovating Joye Cottage, a dilapidated turn-of-the-century gem located on the outskirts of Aiken, South Carolina. Weary of life in the Manhattan fast lane, Smith and Naifeh relentlessly pursued their mutual lifelong dream of living in a palace. When they stumbled across a real-estate advertisement for Joye Cottage, an abandoned 60-room mansion built by late-nineteenth-century robber baron W. C. Whitney, it was a true case of love at first sight. Overcoming numerous practical and financial obstacles, they purchased their dream house for a fraction of the asking price and set about the arduous task of restoring it to its former grandeur and glory. The often hilarious narrative details the major and minor pitfalls of two novice rehabbers and their comic cast of contractors and laborers undertaking such a gargantuan project. Interweaving their contemporary trials and triumphs with the fascinating saga of the original owners and occupants of Joye Cottage, Smith and Naifeh infuse both their home and their story with a rich sense of history. An absolutely charming architectural and sociological memoir. Margaret Flanagan

Edition details

• Publisher: Little Brown & Co
• Publication date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0316597058
• ISBN 13: 9780316597050
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Baxter Daniel
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 321