Hello, and welcome to my world. In the last couple of days the city has begun its transformation into summer. It is finally warm again a the humidity has begun to arrive... the salty smell of the pluff mud... and the thick odor of magnolia is in the air.... another Charleston summer.
Summertime,
And the livin' is easy
Fish are jumpin'
And the cotton is high
Your daddy's rich
And your mamma's good lookin'
So hush little baby
Don't you cry
One of these mornings
You're going to rise up singing
Then you'll spread your wings
And you'll take to the sky
But till that morning
There's a'nothing can harm you
With daddy and mamma standing by
Summertime,
And the livin' is easy
Fish are jumpin'
And the cotton is high
Your daddy's rich
And your mamma's good lookin'
So hush little baby
Don't you cry
In the early 1920's, Du Bose Heyward wrote the book "Porgy" based on the comings and goings of the residents of 89 and 91 Church Street. The Building was commonly known at that time as Cabbage Row because of the cabbages grown in the court yard and sold on the doorstep. In Heyward's book the location of the building was changed to the waterfront and renamed the buildings as Catfish Row.
The Building has had a colorful history from being a tenement for many years, A much missed ladies dress shop, Porgy & Bess; and now the home for the last 7 years to Carolina Antique Maps & Prints at 91 Church. I moved the Print Shop from King Street in 2001. Next Door at 89 Church are Martine and Emilie Dulles of Dulles Designs
specialist dealers in fine stationery and gifts.
In the Book "Porgy", Heyward writes of Catfish Row:
" Catfish Row, in which Porgy lived, was not a row at all, but a great brick structure that lifted its three stories about the three sides of the court..... and pierced in its center by a wide entrance way. Over the entrance there still remained a massive grill of Italian wrought iron, a battered capital of marble surmounted each of the lofty gate-posts. The court itself was paved with large flag-stones, which even beneath the accumulated grime of a century, glimmered with faint and varying pastel shades in direct sunlight. The south wall, which was always in shadow, was lichened from pavement to rotting gutter;and opposite, the northern face, unbroken except by rows of small-paned windows, showed every color through its flaking stucco, and, in summer, a steady blaze of scarlet from rows of geraniums that bloomed in old vegetable tins upon every window sill.
Within the high-ceilinged rooms, with their battered colonial mantels and broken decorations of Adam designs in plaster, governors had come and gone, and ambassadors of kings had schemed and danced....
