Chapter 5

Galanos is a mansion located in Aiken, South Carolina, which is the primary residence of former South Carolina Governor and philanthropist, Carter Ridge. It is located on the southwestern corner of the larger Ridge estate, and was constructed between 1957 and 1958. Designed by Ridge and Italian architect Alessandro Posi[1], it is one of the first and most influential examples of Southern Renaissance architecture in the United States. Blending a less ornamental version of Art Nouveau / Arts and Crafts style from the late 19th century, with references to Southern antebellum architecture of the Colonial and early Federalist era, Southern Renaissance was one of several larger cultural themes introduced by Ridge while governor from 1963 to 1965[2]. It served as his unofficial residence during his tenure, and hosted most famously President John F. Kennedy during his only stay in the state in March 1963[3].

The house is named after the Greek word “Galanos” which is a literary word for blue, often used in poetry. The background color for the state flag of South Carolina is deep blue, as is the national flag of Greece. Ridge’s private foundation, The Institute, and other residence, The Rocks[4], is located on the Greek island of Corfu.

Carved apart from the primary Ridge family grounds, Galanos is a 10,300 square foot, two-storied mansion set back from a serpentine red brick wall shielded behind dogwood trees. The initial design was conceived by Ridge while touring through Europe in 1955, and he approached architect Posi during a stay at Lake Como in July 1955[5]. Ridge invited Posi to visit South Carolina the following year, to tour Charleston, Columbia, and Aiken to get a better sense of the architectural history and influences that he wanted his house to reflect. Posi later recollected in an interview with Abitare magazine (June 1981) that “Ridge was adamant that Galanos needed to be in balance with its environment, but not bound to it or restricted by it. Authenticity in the use of construction materials, locally sourced whenever possible, with limestone and granite from nearby quarries, and decorative ironwork from artisans in the Low Country outside of Charleston, were important to him. He viewed architecture as just one part of adding beauty, and giving hope to his greater vision of what he called ‘The Good Life’.”[6]

Situated at an angle off a red clay road called Easy Street in the “Horse District” of Aiken, behind a red brick serpentine wall that is seven feet tall, the estate is barely visible behind a substantial black iron ornamental gate. A pebble driveway banked by fresh flowers lead from the gate back two hundred feet to the residence where a glass and iron covered porte-cochère frames the front entry, evocative of famed Art Nouveau architect, Hector Guimard. The façade of the house is in pale brown brick that is contrasted with white, cream granite and limestone trimming the windows and doors. Subtle carved embellishments in the stonework add decoration to the windows and doors, with some windows having intricate stained-glass accents as well. Custom-crafted ceramic wall decorations of entwined flowers and tree branches are embedded as decorative motif along the base of the back façade. A simple red-tiled roof slopes in a Mansard style, with single brick chimneys at the western and eastern ends of the house. A Doric colonnaded esplanade extends out from the northeastern corner of the house, acting as the barrier between a high hedge and a long twenty-five-meter pool. The larger Ridge family estate is beyond the border hedge. A secondary building (4,500 sq. feet) in a similar architectural style to the main Galanos house sits beyond the pool, and acts as residence for guests and staff supporting the Galanos villa. The historic Hitchcock Woods abut the edge of the property. A bronze 4-foot statue of a Greek Kouros stands off to the center of the pool patio.

The main entry hall from the front façade is open to the rooftop, exposing the support beams and covered entirely in a soft, light oak finish. Wood parquet floor is throughout the manor, except in the sunroom, kitchen, and bathrooms in which either granite stone, ceramic tile, or marble is used, respectively. The main floor has a large salon for receiving guests and entertaining, an equally large dining room, a kitchen, pantry, butler’s room, private telephone cabin, two separate wash room/toilets, a sunroom, a breakfast room, and a two-storied library/office. There are three stairwells, the primary one off the main hall between the salon and the library, a second one between the two levels of the library, and a third one in the kitchen leading up to the valet rooms.

The second floor has the master bedroom and study, with private bathroom and closets, as well as a balcony overlooking the pool and back gardens. Three guest rooms with attached rooms and private bathrooms and balconies line the hall, while three separate valet quarters comprising simple bedrooms and baths complete the second floor.

Exquisite stained glass windows line the dining room and the library on both floors, and artisanal details surprise visitors and guests alike with elaborate custom mosaic woodwork and tiled flooring, wrought iron accents, cut glass floral patterns and chandeliers, and ceramic embellishments throughout the home.

Prior to becoming governor of South Carolina, Ridge enjoyed privately entertaining close friends and would invite visiting dignitaries to stay when possible. These included political, cultural, and entertainment figures from the 1950-1960s, including Governors Nelson Rockefeller (New York), George Romney (Michigan), and Pat Brown (California), as well as U.S. Senators and President John F. Kennedy, in 1963. Media and cultural celebrities included writer/publisher William F. Buckley, jr., Gore Vidal, Merv Griffin, Van Johnson, Andy Williams, and others.[7] Upon being elected governor in 1962 he limited his guests to only close associates and friends. Singer Andy Williams commented that his visits to Galanos in the early 1960s were what finally prompted him to buy a neighboring estate and to move to Aiken in the 1980s. “I fell in love with this town, and the great memories I made at Governor Ridge’s home, Galanos, continue to inspire me to this day.” (Augusta Chronicle Newspaper, 1982).[8]

A photo album book of curated black and white photographs, Galanos Day and Night, by world famous Brazilian photographer Emerson Salgado with accompanying text and anecdotes by Margot O’Neill was published in 1965 and sold well. It is out of print and considered a collector’s item. (citation needed).

THE GOOD LIFE

June 1962, Aiken

After leaving her job as Editorial Assistant for Harper’s Bazaar magazine in November, Margot had told her closest friends that she rarely looked back at the life she had left behind in New York City. The seemingly fairy-tale wedding with Carter the beginning of December had been a dream come true for her, although she had subsequently joked that the amount of planning she had put into it dwarfed the preparation of the Olympic Games that year in Rome. But life at Galanos was a complete change of pace from the constant excitement she had experienced in Manhattan. It certainly put a temporary pause on her former active intimate life given Carter’s sexual predisposition, something she had figured out with her sixth sense almost immediately when they had first met back in Atlanta ten years earlier.

Granted, Aiken was a lovely enough Southern town. But it was a small town. What made it tolerable for Margot was the fact that it had attracted a significant number of wealthy northerners at the turn of the century. Families with names on the Social Register such as Whitney and Astor had made their winter homes in Aiken because of its mild climate and amenable terrain for horses. A distinct colony of this elite spent winter after winter there, taking the Southern Railways #31 Augusta Special down from New York City’s Penn Station. Between September and April they would train their thoroughbreds, go on foxhunts, play polo, and entertain each other in their palatial “cottages” with the same subdued White Anglo-Saxon Protestant passion that they had exhibited on the clay tennis courts.

The Ridge family estate was in the center of this aristocratic enclave of Yankee magnates and genteel landed families of the former Confederacy, and when Carter built his own manor nestled between his parents’ mansion and the adjacent Hitchcock Woods, Margot confided to him that she could “make do” with living back in the South.

The locals in town didn’t know Margot’s long and deep history in Manhattan as the right-hand person to famed Bazaar art director Alexey Brodovitch. Nor did they have any idea that Margot had been the charming hostess of Sunday brunches at her Greenwich Village apartment, where over the years she had cultivated her new network of confidantes, friends, and lovers to include authors, actors, actresses, musicians, intellectuals, and models. Celebrated literary lions such Truman Capote, Jack Kerouac, and Allen Ginsberg had replaced her former Atlanta acolyte “kittens.” And they certainly didn’t suspect that she was the genius behind the budding campaign of Carter Ridge.

She maintained constant contact with her former social circle in New York City, and orchestrated regular visits for select celebrities to come and stay at Galanos so they could meet Carter and enjoy the charm of this unique Southern town. Invitees dined inside the manor, often with live music from a pianist and singer, and then for the “after dinner,” the guests retired for their desserts and cocktails outside, seated on reclining chairs along the patio after the sun went down, while watching a movie outdoors. Everyone loved these evenings, and would rave to friends back in Manhattan, making the soirées at Galanos an invitation greedily sought after.

As the inevitable announcement of Carter’s candidacy for governor grew closer, Margot’s guest lists for her hand-drawn and painted invitations to visit Galanos began tilting towards more political figures, both nationally and locally. Her immediate one-year plan for 1962 was to clear the path for Carter within the state, to line up as many of the power brokers who might stand in his way, and for those who may pose a problem, to neutralize them. Because he was going to run as a Republican she already knew that there would not be any opposition within the party since it was still in its infancy. But there were already rumors that the conservative Southern Democrat Senator Strom Thurmond was weighing switching parties, and thereby bring with him the not insignificant influence of his segregationist followers.

Her longer, multi-year plan was to raise the national profile of Carter within the Republican party, so that once he was elected governor he would be viewed as a rising star, worthy of consideration for a future run for President. At least that was her plan, whether Carter was on board with it yet, she was unsure. He was more focused on the immediate, and let her manage the larger picture.

Carter listened to the calming notes of Chet Baker, and closed his eyes, letting the melancholy trumpet sing what his heart was feeling as he feared for the days ahead. He felt the coarseness of the noose as it tightened steadily around his neck.

Even if only metaphorical, for Carter the sensation was real. Each moment he had the temptation to seek out sexual release reminded him that his days were numbered before he would no longer be able to remain unknown. The risk from such ventures was already high: of being caught by the police, of being found out by someone who knew him, or of a scandalous report in the newspapers ruining his reputation and all possibility of bringing The Good Life to South Carolina as its governor.

Once when he was a child his father had slowed down the car one morning as they were driving along a country road in the valley between Aiken and Augusta, Georgia. “This is ‘Queers End’,” his father had said as they came to a sharp turn. The road veered off on a curve and down below was Richardson’s Lake, a swimming hole popular with the locals.

“I better never find out that you’ve been down here,” he’d said. “Sometimes bad things happen to boys who — “ The car had picked up speed, as if in concert with him wanting to change the subject as well as the locale. But the mystery of that brief encounter, just grazing the edges of what his father must have already assumed about his sensitive firstborn, had seared his memory.

He had always known he was attracted to men, even at a young age while a student at Aiken Prep. His first crush had been on a fellow student a couple years older, Lane Swearingen, from the Virginia Tidewater. With his emerald-green eyes, buzz cut brown hair, and his confident stride as he’d walked around campus, Carter had jealously guarded the glimpses he’d snuck of Lane. He’d replayed those snatches of glances in private during his evening bath, lingering on how Lane’s suntanned arms had just a dusting of hair, and how he said certain phrases in his thick accent. When something was interesting, Lane said it was “smart,” and if a person were nice, Lane would call him “decent.” And if something was great, to Lane it was “fantastic.” As his infatuation had grown deeper, Carter had begun wearing his tie in the same manner as Lane, with the knot loosened enough to have his white dress shirt’s top button undone.

But having a crush on a boy, and actually acting it out through a romantic relationship, was an idea that Carter did not even know how to explore. The very possibility seemed as queer as growing wings and flying. Just the exercise in finding a willing sexual partner for a hasty interlude in a parked car or off of a park’s path in the darkness of night was complicated enough. The hunting of the prey, the chase, and eventual conquest all had to be done in stealth. His frenzied, animalistic urges were followed through in silence save for the moans of satisfaction and release.

For Carter it was inherently anti-social behavior, not in the manner that polite society regarded it, as a threat to Christian civilization, but rather because he was forced to pursue such interaction, if however brief and debased, in the shadows. This polite society, this pervasive emphasis on Southern manners, prevented him from expressing his desires, his innate need for a romantic partner. This is what was anti-social, this restrictive culture that prevented him from being his true self. Any loving physical contact and emotional bond had to be obscured from others. The bonds of love, trust, dignity, and respect that society recognized between a man and a woman were invisible for him.

So when he saw the reality of life in the Jim Crow South, the perversion of justice that allowed an all-white jury to acquit thirty-one fellow whites who’d purposefully lynched a black man, Carter came to know that he, too, was a silent victim of the same perverted society that prevented him from truly being who he was. This gradual realization that part of the antipathy he felt when he’d seen Geraldine harassed by the gang of racist thugs, was also because like her, he couldn’t fight back to claim his full humanity lest he wind up thrown into a ditch at Queers End. If he couldn’t fight for his own liberation from the shadows, he would fight for the freedom of others.

But in seeking to help bring about full equality for the Negro, by running for governor, he knew that he was sacrificing himself, because he would no longer be able to have even those exceedingly tiniest instances of sexual gratification. To Carter, the noose felt real.

The odyssey towards the Governor’s office began in 1952 after he’d graduated from university. He had gone to Chicago that summer to attend both the Democratic and Republican party nominating conventions for president. The excitement of being in the midst of history that July had been exceeded only by the fact that Carter was alone for the first time in his life, away from the benevolent surveillance of his Aunt Elizabeth in Atlanta, and his family back in South Carolina. The Republicans kicked off their convention the second week of July at the International Amphitheatre, and Carter had attended as many of the public events as possible with his un-official delegate status, courtesy of a family friend who’d been the state delegation chairman from Charleston. When the platform committee, with their plank on civil rights calling for direct Federal action to eliminate lynching, had finally been approved, Carter had joined with the rest of the attendees in hoisting his “I like IKE” placard and cheering. The subsequent Democratic convention held a week later had torn at him because his heart had loved the intellectual clarity of Adlai Stevenson, but his head had known that the conservative Southern Democrats ran the platform and would block any meaningful civil rights advancement.

By 1961 he had long made up his mind that his future in politics had to be as a Republican. The reason why Jim Crow existed in the South was because of the overwhelming power of the racists in control of the Southern Democratic Party. If Carter was to fight Jim Crow, he would have to have a vehicle to be able to do so, and as weak as it was, the Republican Party in the South was the only means available.

As he was continuing to hone his political skills on the stump, he reached out to a friend from that week in Chicago almost ten years earlier. Elbert Tuttle was a distinguished jurist back in Atlanta, and like him, a liberal on race relations. Following the election of Eisenhower, Tuttle had been appointed to the Federal Court of Appeals, and was hearing civil rights cases from throughout the Southeast as the tension between Federal desegregation orders butted against entrenched local interests in maintaining the Jim Crow status quo. Elbert and Carter had maintained a friendship over the years, and with Tuttle in Columbia for a legal seminar at the university, Carter invited him to lunch at a downtown cafeteria to discuss the future of the Republican Party in the South.

“Elbert,” Carter began after they ordered their club sandwiches, “thanks for meeting with me. As I mentioned before we sat down, one of the nightmare scenarios that I have in my head is what happens if the Southern racists in the Democratic party somehow manage to take control of the national Democratic party, and get someone like Senator Russell elected president? Aren’t we essentially doomed? All of Jim Crow and its related segregationist policies will remain intact because the Democrats will never enforce any Federal court rulings, and they’ll begin filling the courts with their own conservative judges.”

“Ah, the ‘tail waggin’ the dog’ phenomenon is what I call it,” Tuttle nodded. “I agree, in the unlikely event that the Democrats ever nominate, and even more improbably, win with a Southern segregationist at the top of their ticket, it would be a true nightmare. Nationally, the Southern wing of the party only represents, at most, forty percent of the total Democratic vote, so it would be a minority within the Democratic coalition — ”

“— But, excuse me,” Carter interrupted. “Isn’t that the nature of each party? Minority factions gaining a consensus to lead?”

“Yes, but in the case of the Southern Democrats it would truly be trying to get an inside straight in poker, possible, but extremely difficult. They would carry the Old South in the Electoral College, but past that, it would be a steep, uphill climb.”

The waiter brought their iced teas, and then Tuttle continued.

“No, what keeps me awake at night, my own personal nightmare scenario, is something far more insidious.”

Carter took a sip, and looked at Tuttle.

“You and I both agree that for the Republican party in the South to grow, we need not only the enfranchisement of the Negro, and to win their vote, but to appeal to those whites of a liberal and fair-minded disposition, the small business owners, the college educated professionals, who value progress and modernity. Together these two factions, the Negro and the white liberal, can build a governing majority across the South.”

“Correct, that is exactly what I hope for as well,” Carter said.

“But, think about this. What would happen if because of Federal enforcement of civil rights for the Negro, the Democratic party becomes a Northern liberal party, identified with the Kennedys and Humphrey, with leaders so polar opposite to the cause of these unreconstructed Confederates that they become disenchanted with the Democratic Party altogether.”

“Sure, like in 1948,” Carter said. “Thurmond already tried that and failed in his third party run. I’d say good riddance and let them stay in their own little political pig-pen.”

“Ah, but what if instead of forming their own Dixiecrat, States Rights third party, they left the Democratic Party and joined...the Republicans?”

Carter’s face blanched for a moment, realizing that this nightmare scenario was entirely possible.

“For all intents and purposes, the current state of the Republican Party in the South is embryonic. We are just a collection of cells, a small liberal grouping here, an esteemed college faculty there, a club of sober minded individuals over there, but it would be eminently possible for the powerful leadership elite of the Southern Democratic party to migrate to the Republican party, use it as its new host, and thereby align itself with their national conservative brethren in the West and Midwest of the country.”

Carter nodded, and said after reflecting a moment, “You’re right, because in many instances, there is a broad overlap between Nixon’s positions and the Southern conservatives — small government, reactionary foreign policy, rural interests — yes, I can see how that would work.”

“If that came to pass, it’s going to be messier than a three year old eatin’ an ice cream cone in August,” Tuttle said.

The timetable to run for governor was a collaboration between Margot and Lou Harris. She would build Carter’s image, creating his public persona as a charming, thoughtful philanthropist, intelligent (he’s an engineer!), someone wealthy and independent of outside (Yankee) influences who would stand up for the common man (and woman) of South Carolina. To Margot, his campaign would be a synthesis of what she learned at Harper’s Bazaar, to influence the subconscious of the voter through visual cues and subtle images so that they would be compelled to vote for Carter without even really knowing why. The political mechanics of the campaign she left to Lou, who recommended that Carter formally announce his candidacy following the Democratic primary that was in June. Their presumptive nominee, Harry Thompkins, was an archconservative state senator from Barnwell County and part of the all-powerful “Barnwell Ring” of conservative Southern Democrats who had run the state for over a generation.

That left Carter with the task of filling in the void of what program he would run on, and he had decided on a package of reforms that he called The Good Life. The initial idea had come when he and Margot had vacationed in Italy years earlier. La dolce vita had become a reality for Carter that summer when he’d fallen in love not only with the Tuscan landscape, with its medieval villages clustered tightly around small piazzas and towering church bell towers surrounded by amber fields, but also with a young Italian architect. Together they had talked long into the evenings over plates of grilled local vegetables and bowls of fresh homemade pasta, accompanied by bottles of Tuscan Montepulcianos and Piedmont Barolos, with Alessandro and Carter finishing in the privacy of Carter’s bedroom suite of the villa he’d rented in Siena.

The foundation for The Good Life was built upon making life better for the little guy. He had witnessed in Europe that there was a balance between a day’s hard labor, and a rich reward of life’s pleasures, whereas in America there was just the emphasis on working hard. For the average South Carolinian life was a daily struggle of toiling in the fields or in a mill, and Carter saw that there was not enough of the countervailing joy to be had of celebrating life through delicious local cuisine, the richness of culture through song and literature, and girding it all with a social contract that protected and nurtured the family. Every family. Whether white or black. Rich or poor. In order to move forward into the future, South Carolina needed to envision a bright possibility of what could be. Of a common vision that brought people together into a new tomorrow, turning away from the divisiveness and wasted years of the past.

Civil rights and racial equality were going to happen eventually. But it could come either peacefully, with both races coming together to agree on a new path forward, or it could come through conflict, through the brutal imposition of change by one powerful entity over another.

Over the course of that summer in Italy the skeleton of The Good Life came into being. They’d started off by discussing the importance of culture and the arts in Europe, and how it was vastly under-appreciated in America. Food, music, stories were a staple of the human existence, and in the United States they all just “happened” but it was rarely the focus, and certainly even rarer for the government to get involved to actively encourage its development and celebration among the greater population. Only in the rarified cultural centers such as New York City or Boston were the arts, and culture more broadly speaking, acknowledged to be instrumental in the human experience. Carter wanted to bring the power of the government, a newly invigorated state government of South Carolina, into the lives of its citizens in a positive way, by engendering what he called a Southern Renaissance of culture. There were so many manifestations of a distinct South Carolina culture, everything from literature, to architecture, to native cuisines — South Carolina style barbeque, Low Country seafood, even the lowly chitlin’ — he wanted to build an identity and pride around South Carolina culture in all of its manifestations. He envisioned an annual arts festival to be held in Charleston, highlighting music, dance, paintings, photography, movies, literature.

More importantly, he viewed this idea of a cultural Southern Renaissance as a positive antidote to the poison of racism and ignorance. “It’s not about changing the subject,” Carter said, “It’s about creating a unifying project for everyone, to re-imagine what life can be like after segregation, to celebrate our common heritage.”

“Charleston is such an amazing little city, it really has so much potential to be a great American city,” Margot had said one lazy evening after a day trip to Florence. They had been comparing the towns and villages of Tuscany to those of South Carolina, and as Margot had stubbed out her cigarette, Carter settled his leg against Alessandro’s under the table.

“It needs to be the cultural capital of the state,” Carter said after taking a sip of his Barolo. “With funding provided to develop world-class museums, a symphony orchestra, and a full calendar of festivals and events to bring people from across the South and from all over the country into its warm embrace.”

“When I’m here in Italy, I think the same thing,” Margot said. “You look at similar-sized cities such as Florence, Siena, Lucca in Tuscany, and Charleston should be able to compete with them, it just needs to be intelligently designed and marketed as such.”

“What I love,” Carter said as he turned to Alessandro next to him, “well, one of the many things I love about Italy is that your culture is embraced by everyone, from the working class to the aristocracy. The city festivals are alive with everyone celebrating their patron saint, the local food, wine, and music. It is what helps define you as a people: happy, passionate about life.”

“There’s no reason why that can’t happen there back in South Carolina,” Margot nodded in agreement.

“It has to happen there. Maybe I’m a bit tipsy from the wine, or from the heat, or from —” he smiled as he looked at Alessandro who lifted his glass in a toast. “ — but we need to have a bold vision because at the end of the day, it’s the culture is that will unite us. That can’t just happen by happenstance and luck. It has to be a coordinated endeavor, organized and funded by the state.”

Alessandro smiled, and looking back at Carter said, “I should come and see all of this for myself someday,” he said.

“I would like that,” Carter replied. He blushed and then, reaching to pour the last of the wine into their glasses, said to no one in particular, “Should we get another bottle?”

Chapter 5 — Prologue

CHAPTER 5

THE GOOD LIFE