It rained most of the day Friday so after sleeping in I decided to do something indoors. 2 miles from the base is Beauvoir- the Jefferson Davis home. Just in case it is really late and someone is having trouble remembering history (no one in MY family, I know) Jeff Davis (as they seem to abbreviate it out here) was the president of the Confederacy. This house was the house he retired in after the Civil War. After he died it was a VA type home for Confederate soldiers up until the 50s. I'm guessing at that time the last of the soldiers had died (they must have been VERY old) and the house was donated to the state where it was turned into a museum.
It is actually a small house. No second story. One of the parlous was turned into a bedroom. The house was originally build has a summer home for a very wealthy James Brown. The summer house part of it explains why you have to go outside to reach 2 of the bedrooms and the dinning rooms. Brrr! in the winter!
The house was very badly damaged in Katrina. I'll explain that with the photos. Since I like historical buildings, this tour was just what I was looking for.
(I realized I didn't get any pictures of the outside front of the house. This picture is from Wikipedia courtesy of Jeffrey Reed.)
House has a lot of property with it and is right across from the beach.
View from the front porch.
Large front porches are awesome! If I ever get to build a dream home, I'd have trouble deciding between a southern large front porch type, or a southwestern style with a center courtyard. A choice that I will probably never "have" to make. :)
Lots of oak trees. Makes me wonder why CA is so proud of their oaks if so many states have them?
The shutters that saved all but 2 of the windows. The window glass is the original glass from when the house was built. I don't know the technical name, but it is not perfectly flat like modern glass.
The main entry. Was originally all hand painted and was restored the same way. No wall paper in the entire house. The corners of the public rooms are rounded an so is where the walls join the ceiling. Mr. Brown- the original owner- liked to show off his wealth and rounded corners are more expensive than square. The bedrooms have square corners since guests did not see them.
One of the oldest things in the entire house. From before 1780. Has new minute hand courtesy of Katrina.
Younger daughter's bedroom. That is her in the portrait in a Mardi Gras gown. Bed is not original. Everything else is.
Same bedroom.
Close up of "color history." When the house was restored after Katrina, the people who re-did all the hand painting (only 2 people for the entire house, husband/ wife team) brought in art and color historians. It was found the colors the house was painted in pre-Katrina were not actually the original colors from when the Davis family lived there. The colors had faded over time and when they were repainted, they were repainted using the faded colors, incorrectly thinking those were the originals. On this door there are 3 colors. The one on the far left most closely represents the original colors. At some point the doors were painted white. When they were repainted (incorrectly) they were the darker color to the right.
Music/ game room. Drapes are a re-creation. ALL of the textiles in the house were destroyed by Katrina, except one.
Remember when I was talking about painting doors? This door is hand painted. It is a cypress door, painted to look like oak. All that "grain" is painted in by hand.
More color history. This room is currently a very light blue. Over the years the color had been misrepresented and faded to a green. So when the house was painted to keep it up, it was always repainted green. But the true color was supposed to be blue.
These were pics of the damage Katrina did. Lost the entire porch. Water came up 24 ft above sea level and house is at 23 feet. Front door was boarded up but wind tore door open anyway and 1 foot of water came in the house.
Since only the front door opened the pressure with the wind was so great the roof pooped off in one corner. 30 of the 60 brick support columns came down. But the house remained standing.
Another view of the storm damage. I can't believe the entire porch is gone!
The pink chairs are the only textiles that are original.
View from second bedroom (guest room) into younger daughter's room. They did have an older daughter, but she never lived in this house. Sadly, the only child to survie was the youngest daughter. The older daughter died in her 30s (AND NEVER MARRIED- GASP!) and all of the sons died as children.
Notice the square corners. The painting on the left is on fabric and was bought by the elder daughter on a cruise. It was during the cruise she caught a form of malaria and that is what she died from.
The floorboards are original. They were under a foot of water and had to be re-sanded then refinished. They are about 3 inches wide and the tour guide told me they are also 3 inches thick, and it is her opinion that is the floorboards that kept the house from falling down completely.
The back porch looking towards the dining room. And a storage cabinet. Mrs. Davis didn't have enough room to store her stuff so she used 2 of these cabinets. They are made out of cypress, like the inside doors. This is what those doors would look like if they had not been painted to look like oak.
The cistern.
There used to be a rose garden here that took up over an acre of land. The sun dial was the middle. You won't need three guesses to figure out what happened to the roses. They do plan to re-plant the garden.
The other cabinet.
These are the brick pillars that support the house, 30 of which fell down under the waves.
Mr. Davis' bedroom. With a bathtub in the left corner. He chose the front bedroom so he could see the sea. Mrs. Davis chose the larger bedroom that had 2 closestes (unusual for that time period.) Also, from her bedroom she could see the roses.
The dining room. For adults. The kids had a separate dining area.
View of the back of the house.
Some items that were too damaged to display in the house.
Looking out at the ocean from the parking lot. This is really strange to me: there do not appear to be any waves here.
A pelican.
After leaving the house I was driving to dinner and spotted an interesting looking... something. So I pulled in. This is not the something, but is the view from the something, looking back at the JD house. I don't know what that large round thing is.
View of the coast from the thing I drove out onto. After getting back to the internet, I found out this was The Broadwater. A marina that at one time also had a hotel/ casino. Most recently there was a hotel/casino on a huge barge tied up to the marina. However, during Katrina the entire barge with, from the pictures I found, seemed to be at least a three story casino, washed ashore, over the freeway. Most of the structure of the marina that is left I was unable to determine what was what.
A lighthouse type thing. See the walkway? I considered walking out to it. After all, if it was unsafe it would be roped off right? See- that is what living in California will do to you. It will turn you into someone unable to think for yourself. The state of the railing- twisted, broken and hanging into space- made me think for myself and realize just because it was not roped off did not guarantee safety. (Although in CA it would be roped off, with barbed wire, several large signs and guard dogs. And if you still made it out there and got injured you could sue, and win!) In fact, in CA, I think this entire area would have had keep out signs. Instead there were only "No Littering" signs.
Looking down the coast the other way. It sure was a dreary day.
Don't know what these were.
Don't know what these steps were for.
More steps, falling down.
Outdoor tiles.
Cannot figure out what this room was for. There were 2 of them and at one time they had a roof.
My poor GPS thought I was out in the middle of the ocean!
All along the beach there are empty lots with for sale signs. On some of the lots you can see concrete pads where houses used to stand. Sad.
I don't know if the following houses are new, or just lucky. But I like pretty houses so I took their pictures.
This one was 3 stories tall and very skinny!
A big one.
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