Beyond ‘Good and Evil’

Alive with history, architecture, flowers, food and art, Savannah is an ideal spring-break getaway.

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By: Carolyn Foote Edelmann

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TIMEOFF PHOTOS/CAROLYN FOOTE EDELMANN
Factors Walk


   France’s Le Monde names Savannah "The Most Beautiful City in North America." I nominate the southeast Georgia town our "Most Human," and especially "Most Flower-Filled."
   Savannah is an ideal site for spring break: You don’t have to wait until narcissus tips battle Jersey snows. Spring comes early and often in Savannah — especially when those astounding azaleas explode into bloom, often mid-February.
   It’s as impossible to write about this historic port city without saying "charm" as it is to write of Hawaii without "aloha." Savannah’s people are gently welcoming. The city was founded with a motto that translates, "Not for ourselves, but for others," and opens verdant arms through a celebrated array of public squares.

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A Confederate soldier’s grave


   Town founder Gen. James Oglethorpe of England landed in February 1733. Of his terribly civilized squares, 21 of the original 24 remain. Yes, there was a Savannah before John Berendt’s Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which chronicled a potpourri of unforgettable characters in the 1990s. As a former Savannah resident, I was introduced to the villain of the piece, Jim Williams, some years before the scandal.
   Williams was formidable and imperious. I would take Yankee guests on a tour of Williams’ Mercer House. It had been named for Gen. Hugh Mercer, ancestor of Savannah songwriter Johnny Mercer. (His "Moon River" flows not far from center city, en route to Skidaway Island.) Jim Williams’ in-your-face-opulent dwelling was renowned for collections. Sotheby’s later auctioned these treasures toward the accused’s astronomic legal fees.
   About that cemetery. Savannah friends took me to Bonaventure on Sunday outings, a local tradition. One had put himself through school by working in a flower shop. The shop had a standing order for fresh bouquets to adorn Bonaventure graves — far more frequent rituals there than in my Midwestern childhood. Chief among the headstones were arresting statues memorializing the deaths of children. One of them became world-renowned for gracing the publishing industry’s most successful book cover. This elegant sculpture is no longer at the grave — seek it within Telfair, Savannah’s very accessible art museum.

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Lafayette’s balcony


   Apart from Bonaventure Cemetery and Mercer House, you cannot enter most Midnight shrines. People by the thousands seek information on Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil tours. They stand rapt, outside, considering nefarious goings-on. Savannahians cast jaundiced eyes at "the book" — its impact on public perception of their city, on the town itself. Many other houses, tastefully furnished and reeking of significant history, welcome visitors.
   Savannah’s Green-Meldrim House is a must-visit. In 1864, this handsome brick manse sheltered William Tecumseh Sherman. The infamous Union general had finally ceased marching to the sea. Settling in to this Gothic residence at the invitation of cotton merchant Charles Green, Sherman sent the following telegram to President Abraham Lincoln: "I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah, with 25,000 bales of cotton." If the recent electoral convolutions have disconcerted you, use Savannah as time machine to enter other centuries.

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Porch rocker on Bluff Drive


   Few realize that Savannah fell resoundingly in our Revolutionary War, but was spared in the Civil, because the Green-Meldrim House charmed Gen. Sherman.
   You can walk Savannah seeking out unique double-staired porches; wicker porch rockers still in regular use and touted in B&B ads; stand below the balcony of the Owens-Thomas House, where Lafayette spoke to the multitudes; and tour the birthplace of Juliette Gordon Low, Girl Scouts’ founder.
   Head early on to waterfront, tastefully, evocatively restored. Factors Walk and the Cotton Exchange are redolent of history, not all of it savory. Old pubs and new hotels vie for your attention. In the age of sail, this town was as vitally connected and impressive as 18th- and 19th-century Philadelphia.
   That surging Savannah River was Oglethorpe’s reason for choosing the grass-swept bluffs for which the town was named. A forest of masts was her norm in other centuries, linking fortunes, not limited to cotton and tobacco, to the entire globe. The Savannah River is like a dowager, her past echoing, still resonant amidst modernity.

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Owens-Thomas house


   The movie Glory was filmed on the Isle of Hope Street, a riverside residential community a few miles from Savannah, where I lived from 1988 to 1989. Filmmakers did not limit themselves, however, to our century-old white houses; nor to militarily significant Skidaway (River) Narrows across the way. Bluff Drive had to be covered with ruddy sand, granting us a week of silky quiet. Fire hydrants and modern fences were masked by new shrubs.
   The producers of Glory also required the city of Savannah as a stand-in for Civil War Boston. Downtown Savannah still resembles the Massachusetts metropolis of those contentious days. For filming, Savannah permitted removal of all tendrils of Spanish moss. (Southerners insist, "It’s an epiphyte, not a parasite!" But my Yankee guests remained convinced that the moss was killing those trees.) Those powdery, silvery cascades all had to be replaced on branches before film crews could depart.
   The actors/soldiers remained remarkably in character, despite tourist hordes. One steamy evening, my cat and I were startled by something familiar yet impossible. Through our closed windows came sounds of marching and song. Shooting was over for those smoke-suffused boat scenes, out upon the Skidaway. That flaring implacable sun had plunged at last, sparing the men in their thick blue wool Union uniforms — all of them singing Civil War songs, en route to the cast buses.
   Savannah concentrates intensely on her past, is proud of her present and working assiduously on her future. One site that effectively bridges the time gap is Telfair Museum of Art. British architect William Jay had designed the Telfair mansion for Alexander. His father, a Revolutionary War patriot, had been Edward Telfair, governor of Georgia. At her 1880s death, descendant Mary Telfair endowed significant local charities, as well as founding Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences.
   So, if you’re in search of lovely spring walks or need a trip back-in-time, hospitable Savannah, Ga., is your ideal destination.
For more information on Savannah, see the following Web sites:
Overall guide: www.officialsavannahguide.com
Trolley tours: www.oglethorpetours.com
Savannah Walks: www.savannahwalks.com
Johnny Mercer: www.johnnymercer.com
Telfair Museum: www.telfair.org