Pediment of the Singleton House, believed to be the work of itinerant carpenter S. J. Suiter
The construction of the late Greek Revival main house at the plantation of Rebecca Louise Griggs Singleton (1833-1907) and David Terrell Singleton (1831-1913) is credited, through oral tradition, to a very skilled but otherwise unknown carpenter named S. J. Suiter, who came to Putnam County from North Carolina. Suiter was still in Putnam County at the time of the 1860 census, living with the family of William Spivey and perhaps doing work on their property. To my knowledge, nothing else is known of Mr. Suiter. A Parisian plasterer lived on site for two years, creating the cornices and ceiling medallions.
Well house, dating to the ownership of the Singleton family. The Victorian details suggest it likely dates to the late 1800s-early 1900s.
The house was built circa 1854, the year of Rebecca Griggs’s marriage to David Singleton and in the National Register of Historic Places nomination in 1974 was described as “a modest, yet classically sophisticated plantation residence.” That characterization still applies. Structures added to the property by Earl McMillen, Jr., the architect who purchased it in 1968, are featured below with earlier historic structures.
Caretaker’s house, near the entrance to the farm. Likely built in the early-mid 1900s, but may be an expansion of an earlier cottage.
Rebecca Griggs Singleton purchased the property through an inheritance from her father, Robert Griggs, who owned adjoining land across Murder Creek. The Singletons bought several more large tracts in the area, and along with other plantations in the area, formed the basis in 1859 of a community first known as Avalona, and sometime between 1882 and 1895, Willard. The Singletons were members of the Avalona Baptist Church.
Covered bridge over Beaverdam Creek, built by Earl McMillen, Jr.
When Atlanta architect Earl McMillen, Jr., purchased the estate in 1968, the main house and outbuildings were all in a very run down state. As a passionate preservationist, Mr. McMillen set about restoring the house to its historical appearance, while adding modern conveniences to the grounds, He also saved and moved the old Phoenix Academy to the farm.
Covered bridge
Mr. McMillen also built a private covered bridge at a point where Beaverdam Creek crosses the property. Recent flooding caused one of the approaches to shift, but it’s still in good shape.
Tenant home converted into a hunting and fishing cabin by the Odums. Mr. Odum told me that one lady lived here most of her life, died at age 104, and climbed the steep stairs to her loft bedroom even in her old age. They’re some of the steepest stairs I’ve ever seen.
The Odums are the present owners and I am very grateful to their generosity in allowing me to visit and photograph a property that is as vibrant as it ever was. Mr. Odum is passionate about the historic structures but equally important, in keeping the land in good shape for future generations. They are doing a wonderful job.
This is the enigmatic Phoenix Academy, where Joel Chandler Harris attended school as a young man while working as a print devil for famed plantation publisher Joseph Addison Turner (1826-1868). It was saved and relocated to its present location in the mid-1970s by an Atlanta architect who owned the surrounding property, itself an historic antebellum plantation. More about that after a little background.
PLEASE NOTE: This property is not publicly accessible and trespassing is closely monitored by multiple means.
Phoenix Academy was built in the vicinity of Turnwold, northeast of Eatonton, circa 1860. The area is historically identified as Phoenix on maps. The house known as Turnwold today, the Lane-Turner House, was actually one of two on a large working plantation, the other being the older Alexander-Turner House. Joseph Addison Turner, published The Countryman, a weekly newspaper, from his property, the Alexander-Turner House. The Countryman was the only periodical ever published from a plantation during the Civil War and was widely read throughout the confederacy. His brother, William Wilberforce Turner (1830-1879), who lived in the Lane-Turner House, came up with the Turnwold name for the plantation, according to the National Register of Historic Places, and Joseph like it so much he applied to the entire property. (Turnwold means “Turner’s field”).
Union Academy, built circa 1820 by William Turner (1787-1853), the patriarch of the Turner family, originally stood on the site, but it was lost to fire*. Some time later, Phoenix Academy was built in its place. William Howard Seward, who served as Abraham Lincoln’s secretary of state, was an early rector at Union Academy. Joseph Addison Turner taught and served as president of the board of trustees for Phoenix Academy. He saw promise in a young, poorly educated Joel Chandler Harris, and encouraged him to attend school in the mornings while he apprenticed as a print devil for The Countryman in the afternoons. From his experiences among the enslaved people at Turnwold flowed Harris’s inspiration for the Uncle Remus stories. Though the Uncle Remus canon faded from popularity long before justified modern academic and social debates about controversial topics arose, mostly due to their rural subject matter and stereotypical portrayal of African-Americans, Harris remains a foundational figure in the history of Southern literature, if for no other reason than preserving the lost language of the enslaved and for his firsthand accounts of plantation life. A recent study found: Generations of Putnam County’s children, both black and white, have grown up with Harris, Remus, and Br’er Rabbit looming in the background of their lives. Yet in an age when the Harris books have fallen out of favor and Disney has permanently shelved the 1948 film version, nearly 100% of Putnam’s students engaged in this project acknowledge having never previously read a single Uncle Remus story.
*- (The date of the fire, and of the construction of Phoenix academy, is unclear; the National Register dates it to circa 1862 but also describes it as “antebellum”. I believe it may date to earlier in the 1850s and was assigned the 1862 date due to the Joel Chandler Harris association. The National Register also notes: “Over the years as the student body grew, a larger structure was constructed alongside the academy. The original Phoenix Academy became the headmaster’s residence until the academy’s closing, when it became a tenant residence. The second Phoenix School was torn down approximately ten years ago (c. 1965). Like many rural schoolhouses of the period, Phoenix Academy is of the Greek Revival style. It exhibits a pediment, pilasters with Ionic-order scrolls and molding around the door and window frames. The unusually fine application of Greek Revival details to one of the few surviving examples of rural antebellum academies in Georgia makes Phoenix Academy a unique and noteworthy structure.”).
Now, back to the story of how Phoenix Academy wound up clear across Putnam County. It’s all due to the foresight of architect and preservationist Earl McMillen, Jr. (1938-2007), who practiced in Atlanta and purchased the historic Singleton Plantation in 1968. When McMillen learned of the imminent demolition of the schoolhouse circa 1975, he acquired it from Putnam County and brought it to his property, where he painstakingly put it back together, just as it had originally stood. Its connection to Joel Chandler Harris was too important to be lost, McMillen rightfully believed. He did remove a rear wing, which had been added later in its history. It was used a rural schoolhouse well into the 20th century for children who lived in the area of Turnwold. An early 1900s photograph of Phoenix School, which the old academy was known as by then, shows that the school had a small front porch with a shed roof, but that was likely not original and was also removed by Mr. McMillen. I’m honored to be able to share these photographs, and am grateful to Dutch Henderson for the introduction, and to the Odum family for their generosity in allowing me to do so and for their continued stewardship of this important piece of Southern history. I’ll share more of their historic property in the next post.
This has been identified locally as the Scienceville Church, and I believe it was an African-American congregation. Scienceville must have been early community in Stewart County, and I’ve since lost a reference I once had stating that there was a plantation at Scienceville before the Civil War. The name didn’t stick around too long because other than the name of the church, it’s lost to history. There was a post office in the community from 1850-1901. In the early 1900s, County Line School and a community house were located nearby. Findagrave notes that a cemetery is located at this property, and identifies the graves of Steven Weathersby (1778-1840) and his son Vincent A. Weathersby (1813-1860). It’s likely that they were the owners of the surrounding land and the plantation.
One more identified grave belongs to Rev. Eddie Smith (1907-1956). Rev. Smith was most likely the pastor of this church, but again, I have no background on any of these people. Eric Korn wrote to say that he had discovered that Rev. Eddie Smith was white.
Driving into Yatesville, this headstone caught my attention, but I figured it would be like others I’ve found throughout the countryside: a small family plot long forgotten by the passage of time. And though that was true to some extent, what I learned about the man who was buried here was quite fascinating. It turns out that this was the cemetery of Bellwood Hall, a plantation owned by one of Georgia’s early country doctors, David Lane Kendall, Sr. (1790-1850).
Dr. Kendall was born in Washington County in 1790 and moved to Upson County in 1830 where he and his second wife, Louisa Rogers Steele Kendall (1804-1881), built Bellwood, a grand plantation house complete with formal gardens. The property was likely maintained by enslaved men and women. It was destroyed by fire sometime in the late 1800s, but thanks to the foresight of Dr. Kendall’s daughter, Louisa “Loula” Winifred Kendall Rogers (1838-1931) , much of its history survives in special collections at Emory University.
The Frederick Gnann House, standing in a scattered grove of old oaks, is to me one of the most beautiful locations in all of southeastern Georgia, evocative of another time*. It really does look like a movie set and is well maintained and secure.
Since Frederick (1865-1910) was born at the tail end of the Civil War, I wonder if the house wasn’t built by his father, George Bergman Gnann (1824-1890). The Gnann family were very active in the nearby Bethel Lutheran Church and there are many wonderful houses throughout this section of the county that bear their names.
I’ve often read Gnann descendant Susan Exley’s great historical articles in the Effingham Herald, but have somehow missed the full history of this house. I’ll just say that Effingham County is lucky to have someone as passionate and knowledgeable of local history as Mrs. Exley.
*-The general assumption with almost any property of this size, from this era, is that it was built and worked by enslaved persons, but according to Susan Exley, there is no record of any slaves being owned by the Gnann family, in census or family papers. This is quite unusual, as many Lutherans did own slaves but I feel Mrs. Exley, being a family member, has done some serious research.
Ten years ago, this amazing house was hidden by saplings and one would have imagined its future to be uncertain. Luckily, someone has cleaned up the place and obviously appreciates its historical importance.
To me, it’s of a type house that I associate with the decade or so before the Civil War. In floor plan, it’s what is now called Georgian Cottage, but the Georgian Cottage is really just a “toned-down” evolution of the Greek Revival to me, and this house is certainly more Greek Revival than Georgian Cottage. In comparison to the Georgian Cottage I shared in the previous post, you’ll notice that this house is set on piers, has a much lower hipped roof, a wider layout, and not only a transom, but full-length sidelights, as well. The windows are six-over-six and there is a porch with square Doric columns.
As to farm house, it was certainly that. Considering the date, it was probably the center of a working plantation that was transformed into a tenant farm after the Civil War. And enslaved people would have surely been a part of the operation. Google Earth views from 2009 and 2013 show several outbuildings that have since been removed, likely due to poor condition.
It may have been associated with the Walker descendants or other area pioneers like the Griffins, Walkers, or Jordans. That’s just a guess and probably not even a good one. I’m just grateful someone cared enough to save it.
*- The 1855 date comes from real estate listings, and while such listings are often wildly inaccurate, I tend to think this one is correct.
Rena P. Wilson (16 July 1869-17 August 1934). The text* on the stone is difficult to read, which isn’t an insult to the maker, but rather an indictment on the state of education available to black Georgians in the Jim Crow era. *Bon July 161869 -Di.d. Au 17 1934-Age 65 3-Mont 1 Day- At rest
The challenges facing African-Americans in tracing their ancestry have been widely publicized in recent years and among them is the absence of marked graves in cemeteries dating from the days of slavery well into the Jim Crow era. Groups like the Black Cemetery Network are working against time to research and document these important resources.
Dunwoody Cemetery, in a patch of palmetto and oak beside Interstate 95 near Darien, is a perfect example of such a place. The beautiful vernacular headstone of Rena P. Wilson, who was born just after slavery’s end, is the only memorial I could locate here. Most of the earlier markers were made of wood and are long lost to the elements.
The land where Dunwoody is located was originally part of a grant from King George II to Sir Patrick Houston dating to 1757. When the land was purchased by James Smith upon Houston’s death in 1798, it was named Sidon and became part of Smith’s network of profitable rice operations along Cathead Creek. A tabby plantation house, slave dwellings, and this slave cemetery made up the main part of the plantation, which was operated by Smith’s daughter, Elizabeth Dunwoody. All traces of the plantation are now gone, except this cemetery.
I’ve found numerous prominent homes in scattered Georgia towns which are examples of architectural evolution, or put simply, houses that grew over time. The Usry House may be one of the best examples of this practical phenomenon, having originated as a one or two room cottage and expanded throughout the years to its present appearance. The suspended balcony is said to be one of the largest in Georgia.
Long before McDuffie County or Thomson existed, the land on which this house was built was part of Warren County. William Usry’s family moved to Georgia from Virginia and first appear in the Warren County Tax Digest in 1805. Per Jonathon Davila: [The house, now called The Usry-Davila House, was built in 1795. My husband and I are the current owners. The roof, walls and floor of the original 2 room cottage are still here, the large house was built around the original cottage. Even though my husband is a very distant relation to the Usrys, we are the first family to live in the house that wasn’t directly Usry. Hence, the name change]. Usry was a successful plantation owner and like all plantations of the time, its success was dependent on the labor of enslaved men, women, and children. After the war, the Usry family wisely looked beyond agriculture for income and created the Goodrich-Usry Railroad to move timber from their vast holdings along Little Briar Creek to nearby markets. They were successful entrepreneurs in various pursuits.
Members of the Usry family lived here and maintained its historical character for well over two centuries.
The land on which this fine Greek Revival plantation house stands has been in the Willis family since James Henry Willis married Sarah A. Barksdale in 1840. Mr. Willis began construction on the house in 1854, according to his granddaughter Mary Sale Stennett, and it was completed in 1857. Willis was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives the year the house was completed and served in the 1857-1858 term.
It is believed to be the first of three houses within a six-mile radius attributed to James Cunningham, an area carpenter. The Chenault House and Matthews House, in Lincoln County, and by influence, the Anderson House in nearby Danburg, make up this collective resource. The Chennault House is the closest in appearance to the Willis-Sale-Stennett House.
Cay Creek is a tidal waterway in eastern Liberty County, originating near Midway and meeting the coast near Harris Neck. Originally known as Salter’s Creek, it was renamed Cay Creek for Raymond Cay, Sr. (1805-1883), who owned a plantation near the present-day Cay Creek Wetlands Interpretive Center. The relatively short waterway features an amazing variety of ecosystems, including upland forest, open wetland, tidal swamp, brackish marsh, and finally tidal creek.
