It was Eunice’s good fortune that Kate Waymon regularly cleaned house for Katherine Miller, a widow who lived in Gillette Woods, the affluent Tryon neighborhood that meandered from the far west side of town right up to the South Carolina border. The development traced its origins to 1893, when William Gillette, an actor famous for his characterization of Sherlock Holmes, was en route to Florida by train and was delayed in Tryon for several hours. To pass the time, he walked around the countryside and was so impressed with its natural beauty that he returned and purchased the seven hundred acres that became known as Gillette Woods. After building homes for himself and family members, Gillette sold the property in 1925 to a group of businessmen with the proviso that it be mapped for further development. The new owners trumpeted their holdings as Tryon’s most “exclusive residential section.”
Mrs. Miller and her husband George arrived in 1933 from Rochester, New York, and bought two adjacent homes on Glengar-nock Road. A retired printer, George Miller was eccentric even by Tryon standards. He devoted one of the houses to his model railroad and installed a railroad signal out front instead of a doorbell. If it showed red, the visitor didn’t dare open the door because it meant that the train was about to cross the doorway on the other side. “Nobody ever saw Mr. Miller,” Holland Brady remembered, “except if you were interested in trains.” He died suddenly in 1938, and afterward, Mrs. Miller immersed herself in the typical activities of Tryon’s society women, the Lanier Library Association and the garden club.
Eunice often accompanied her mother to the Millers’ house on Saturdays, and Mrs. Miller was the first white person she had ever known to speak to. Eunice liked her because she seemed kind. Not only that, the Waymon children noticed that Mrs. Miller always referred to Kate as “Mrs. Waymon” rather than by her first name as most overly familiar whites did, even those much younger than their mother.
Mrs. Miller had become the guardian for David Johnson, a five-year-old who was the child of a previous housekeeper with two other children. His mother and Mrs. Miller had worked out the arrangement after Mrs. Johnson realized she couldn’t properly care for her youngest child. Eunice often played with David at the Miller house until Kate finished her work. Though Mrs. Miller often sent a taxi to pick up Kate on the days she cleaned and called a taxi to take her home, occasionally she drove her back herself, David in tow, so he could play with whoever was at the Waymons’. David loved it best when Kate let him eat her homemade biscuits. “I’d sit till I’d bust if she let me,” he admitted. The children were as curious as David when he asked Kate a question they’d wondered about, too: why was her skin so much darker than his? Realizing the answer required diplomacy, Kate came up with a genial story that had only the slightest barb to hint at much more complicated realities. In the beginning, she said, everyone was dark. Then there came a big vat of liquid that would turn skin white. The greedy folks jumped in and took most of that liquid. “What’s left,” she explained, “was just for the soles of our feet and the palms of our hands.” The explanation satisfied David, and he didn’t bring up the subject again.
Kate periodically talked to Mrs. Miller about Eunice’s talent, and one day Mrs. Miller went to hear Eunice, probably at the Tryon theater, where she accompanied her sisters Lucille and Dorothy during a concert. They billed themselves as the Waymon Sisters—Lucille, the soprano, Dorothy the contralto, and Eunice, if a song called for her to sing, alto. After the performance, Mrs. Miller said she was amazed that Eunice had never had any lessons. She told Kate it would be “sinful” if Eunice didn’t have proper study to nourish her talent. Kate responded honestly: the family couldn’t afford it. So Mrs. Miller made Kate an offer: she would pay for a year’s worth of lessons, and if Eunice showed promise, then she would find a way for the lessons to continue. Mrs. Miller even had a teacher in mind, her neighbor across the street on Glengarnock, Muriel Mazzanovich, a native of Britain who had moved to Tryon in 1927 (as Muriel Harrington) and then two years later married Lawrence Mazzanovich, a painter of some reknown and another Northern transplant. Eunice would walk to her piano lesson every Saturday morning and then go across Glengarnock to the Millers’ to wait for her mother to return home. Mrs. Mazzanovich received seventy-five cents per lesson.
ON THE TWO-MILE WALK that started at the Waymon house on Jackson Street, Eunice planned a route that took her through the gravel streets of east Tryon up to Trade Street. She might pass a little café behind the A&P and wave to “Jewbaby,” a fixture downtown beyond his unusual name because he was such a good shoeshine man and kept the café spotless. Jewbaby was a stocky, light-skinned black man with yellowish curly hair. Nobody claimed to know his real name, and folks could only guess at the origins of his nickname. Passing Newman’s livery stable, Eunice imagined the magic show her brother John told her about when she was a toddler. It sounded unbelievable, but he swore it was true: this white man would lie down on the ground and put a couple of crates on his stomach, and then a truck would drive over him.
Eunice occasionally stopped at Owen’s pharmacy to pick up a cheese sandwich, which she ate outside, rain or shine, because blacks couldn’t eat inside with the white patrons. The children didn’t talk much about such things among themselves; they accepted it as the required custom. But if the subject did come up, it was usually on summer days, when they bought their lemonade—at full price—but had to drink it in the hot sun. More than once they cast an envious, even angry look at the white kids sitting at the counter cooled by the breeze from the ceiling fans that twirled overhead. Eunice and her friends would later realize that whatever prosperity they achieved never erased the memory of their second-class status.
Crossing the street from Owen’s, Eunice might wave hello to the policeman who was stationed at a kiosk at one of the intersections with Trade Street. Some of the kids called him “Crip” because he had a bad leg and walked with a limp. Nobody knew what he did except walk back and forth along Trade to keep an eye on things.
When she reached the other side of the railroad tracks, Eunice walked past the Lanier Library and Oak Hall, the town’s main hotel, with its inviting wraparound porch. It was the place where elegantly dressed white people ate, drank, and danced at their parties, though the people Eunice knew who had actually been inside were the waiters and housekeepers who tended to these patrons and felt lucky to have their jobs. She knew this not just because the men and women said so. She could see it in the way they went about their work, pride on their faces and no less elegant in their carriage than the individuals they served.
After a few more blocks, Eunice made the turn onto Glengarnock and headed up the hill to the Mazzanovich house, nestled amid tall trees on the right-hand side of the road. The house had stucco walls; the sloping roof accommodated a cathedral ceiling inside. A gable hung over the front stoop, and except for a small opening next to the front door, the side that faced Glengarnock had no windows.
The house didn’t look like much from the outside. But inside three or four easels, each of them holding a Mazzanovich work in progress, were arrayed at one end of the large room that comprised the ground floor. A north-facing skylight took up much of the ceiling. A Weber concert grand piano stood against the street-side wall, and right behind it stood an upright, also against that wall. Windows filled the entire opposite wall, which provided a glorious view of the woods. A fireplace right inside the entry faced a sitting area where the Mazzanoviches had set up a round table and chairs. From the table or a window seat nearby, one could look out into the open room.
The home of Muriel and Lawrence Mazzanovich, where Eunice took her first piano lessons (Joan Nash)
Beside the back of the fireplace, a stairway led down to the basement, where the kitchen was, and up to the bedroom, which was in a balcony that ran the width of the house. It could accommodate another easel if Mr. Mazzanovich wanted to paint in the light of this upper room.
Eunice hardly knew where to look first and wondered for a moment if she might faint right there on the spot. But she caught her breath, determined to absorb all the details and catalog them forever, not just what she saw but what she smelled, which was not like anything she was used to—her mother’s biscuits coming out of the oven, the fried chicken cooking after church, or the livestock that roamed near their house. This scent was sweeter and more delicate, a mixture of the fresh flowers that adorned the big room and the swatches of paint that sat on Mr. Mazzanovich’s easels.
When the door closed behind her, Eunice felt so far away from Tryon that she could have been on another planet.
Muriel Mazzanovich (Courtesy of the Upstate Newspapers)
Muriel Mazzanovich was waiting for her at the grand piano, and she instantly reminded Eunice of a little bird. She was petite and about fifty-five or sixty years old, though Eunice couldn’t be sure. Her silvery hair was pulled back in a bun, but because of her delicate features the hairstyle didn’t make her seem severe. When Miss Mazzy, as Eunice called her, spoke, the accent of her native England was obvious, something Eunice had never heard before. They shook hands, and then Miss Mazzy introduced her husband, who was working at one of his easels. He nodded and smiled hello. Miss Mazzy motioned Eunice to the Weber grand to begin. It looked like the typical moment played out in countless cities and towns across the country, the student coming to the teacher for a lesson. And Eunice and Miss Mazzy treated it this way, too, neither openly acknowledging that this lesson was unusual. In how many other Southern towns could a black child take lessons at a white teacher’s home with no fear of retribution for either one?
Before letting Eunice play a single note, Miss Mazzy instructed Eunice to hold her hands at the keyboard just so, with the fingers spread for maximum advantage. Eunice felt lucky she had good hands—long, slender fingers that tapered slightly at the tips. Next, Miss Mazzy said, it was important to play from the shoulder rather than the wrist. These preliminaries out of the way, they were ready to begin. Though Miss Mazzy started her younger students with selections from Teaching Little Fingers to Play, a virtual standard since it was published, and supplemented the book with exercises from Hanon, another staple of music education, she knew that Eunice didn’t need them. She wanted to dive into the classical canon, especially Bach. Eunice was excited but intimidated, because Bach was so much more intricate than anything she could have imagined. When she wanted to stop, Miss Mazzy wouldn’t allow it. “You must do it this way, Eunice. Bach would like it this way. Do it again.”
This first lesson was over in two hours, and Eunice floated home, already dreaming about all the lessons to come. She realized that although she hadn’t left Tryon’s city limits, now she inhabited a larger world.
SERIOUS WORK TOOK UP the first hour of each lesson in Eunice’s new routine, with a focus on Bach. He had captured her interest once she understood that all the notes had a purpose, like a mathematical equation, only one that kept growing in force and intensity as the notes added up. Miss Mazzy helped her appreciate that every note had to be executed properly or the entire effect would be lost.
Miss Mazzy didn’t only teach Eunice the music. She talked to her about Bach and other classical composers, and she was so engaging that Eunice was sure the men were right there in the room with her. Teacher and student usually took a break for a piece of candy from a big basket Miss Mazzy kept filled to the brim. Then, instead of going back to the Weber for more classical pieces, they sat down at the upright for duets of lighter fare, which Eunice took as a welcome relief. In the warmer weather, Miss Mazzy prepared lemonade, and they took their breaks outside in the garden looking at the beautiful vistas from the top of Glengarnock. On colder days, a fire burned in the fireplace, but never warmly enough for Miss Mazzy, even when she wore her thick hose. “Uninhabitable, Eunice,” she complained. “Simply uninhabitable.” But Eunice knew Miss Mazzy really didn’t mind because the memories of a chilly winter evaporated on the first beautiful spring day.
Miss Mazzy had no children of her own (Mr. Mazzanovich had a son from his previous marriage), and Eunice had no way of knowing if she was as kind to other students as she was to her. What Eunice did know is that after only a few lessons, she blossomed under Miss Mazzy’s affectionate attention. At home, Eunice had to share her mother with the rest of the family and, as Kate gained prominence as a minister, with the Methodist Church. She may not have uttered the words out loud, but in Eunice’s mind, Miss Mazzy became “my white mama.”
THE FIRST YEAR of piano lessons flew by, and Eunice wanted to continue. J.D. and Kate Waymon couldn’t afford the lessons out of their own pockets, however, so they needed to find a sponsor. To a child already receiving so much attention, it must have seemed that the entire community rallied behind her, and years later Eunice wrote about the creation of the “Eunice Waymon Fund” of Tryon to further her studies. But the “fund” appears to have been confined to the generosity of two white women, Mrs. Miller and Esther Moore, another Northern transplant who was, like Mrs. Miller, a pillar of Tryon society and appreciative of Eunice’s talent.
Mrs. Moore’s son Tom remembered hearing his mother talking on the phone about Eunice and her potential. “My mother was telling Miss Mazzy to give her whatever she needed and she [Esther] would cover it.” Esther Moore’s generosity might have stemmed from her fondness for J.D. and Kate. As a jack-of-all-trades, J.D. helped Mrs. Moore around the house. “He did all kinds of nice thoughtful things. He was a cut above,” Tom Moore said. And Kate helped Esther Moore when she entertained. “She wasn’t just a maid,” Tom Moore said, but more like a caterer.
Miss Mazzy’s lessons now covered stage comportment for the recitals she wanted Eunice to give: how to walk gracefully to the piano, sit up straight at the keyboard, look elegant and composed even before striking a single note. All of this was especially important if Eunice was going to become the classical concert pianist they had envisioned. Eunice’s friend James Payne remembered one recital at a church in Forest City when either Miss Mazzy or Eunice had forgotten some of the music. “Eunice went right on and improvised,” James recalled. “No one knew it.”
When Kate wasn’t around to complain about “real” music, and she wanted a break from Bach, Eunice played for her friends at school. They gathered in the auditorium during a free period, and “she played for just about anyone who thought they had a little talent,” Ulysses Counts recalled, each of her chums vying for her attention. Eunice’s fast friend Patricia Carson might be the first to start, the girls urging each other on with tunes they heard on the radio. It felt like a guilty pleasure when Patricia broke into an impromptu “Soothe me baby, soothe me, make me feel good” or tried “Straighten Up and Fly Right.”
Sometime in 1944, after Eunice had turned eleven, Miss Mazzy arranged for her to give a recital, probably in the main room of the Lanier Library. It was going to be the kind of afternoon that would make an impression for a lifetime, savored (and maybe even embellished) with each retelling. Though this event was for white Tryon, Eunice insisted that her parents attend. As she remembered it, J.D. and Kate, dressed in their churchgoing best, came into the library and sat in the front row. The host introduced Eunice, and she walked to the piano with practiced elegance, just as Miss Mazzy instructed. But when she looked out, she saw that her parents were being asked to move from their front row seats so that a white couple whom Eunice had never seen before could sit there instead.
J.D. and Kate didn’t object and were in the process of moving, when surely by instinct—because she had never been encouraged to be a rabble-rouser or to cause trouble, had never heard her parents complain or even talk about race—Eunice spoke up. If anyone expected her to play, she told the audience, they better let her parents sit right where she could see them. The host, perhaps startled by such a direct outburst, obliged. Eunice went ahead and performed. She remembered her parents seemed embarrassed by the momentary ruckus, and in subsequent retellings, she asserted that some of the white patrons snickered.
Around the time of the recital Polk County’s black community moved to establish its own chapter of the NAACP, the acronym for the venerable National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. The timing was probably a coincidence, but it nonetheless reinforced the fact that race mattered, even in Tryon. An NAACP representative came to town in July to host an organizational meeting at St. Luke—“white friends welcome,” the Bulletin notice stated. The Polk County branch of the NAACP received its official charter in November during a ceremony at the church led by an NAACP representative from nearby Asheville. J.D. was appointed chairman of the membership committee, a post he held for three years, apparently with some success. In the first year, the new chapter recruited ten members. By 1946 there were sixty-one.
