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Traveling back
to Ohio, from Florida, my husband turned off the interstate and we moseyed on
over to Cross Creek, near Gainesville, Florida. Tucked away in a swampy,
palmetto thriving, alligator and snake infested, Spanish moss hangin’-from-the-trees
kind of place, I suppose you’re wondering why I was so excited to visit such a
non-destination.
Cross Creek was
the home of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, author of The Yearling, published in April of 1938. Her first novel, South Moon Under, was published in 1933,
her success putting an end to her first marriage to Charles Rawlings. I suppose
back then it wasn’t such a good thing for a woman to be more successful than
her husband.
Marjorie
bought her Cross Creek farm in 1928, determined to earn a living from her 74
acre orange grove. It was there that Marjorie wrote her stories about the
colorful people who lived in the community of Cross Creek.
An independent, educated woman, Marjorie could drink like a man and cuss a blue streak. In other words, Marjorie was a woman before her time, fueled by determination and a yearning for success as a writer in the flamboyant era of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner.
Driving into
the parking area of the Florida State Park of Cross Creek, I immediately felt
disappointed that I wasn’t somehow magically transported back in time to
experience first-hand the house and citrus grove as I’d envisioned it. Silly,
huh? I suppose that’s the writer part of me – strongly imagining how something should
be, and then disappointed to find out that it t’ain’t necessarily so.
It was chilly
the day of our visit to Cross Creek. We got out of the car and wrapped up in
our light jackets, anticipating a guided tour of the house and farm yard.
Walking through the rusty gate and following the path leading to the barn and
house, we were welcomed by a flock of chickens, one of whom politely consented
to pose for my camera. However, the ducks pecking at the ground nearby chose to
ignore us completely.
Except for
ducks and chickens, my husband and I were alone on the premises.
Then, we
heard the friendly squeak of a screen door at the front of the house and out stepped
the tour guide, supposedly dressed in 1930’s garb. Her frumpy appearance looked
more like she was headed to the barnyard to feed the chickens, which pretty
much fit the scenery of Marjorie’s home. Being the last tour on this nippy, overcast
day, Tom and I constituted the so-called tour group.
Following our guide to the front porch of the house, I experienced my second wave of disappointment. After having watched the movie, Cross Creek, with Mary Steenburgen, Peter Coyote and Rip Torn, for about a thousand times, I childishly had the notion in my head that the movie was shot entirely on location. It wasn’t. In fact, I was soon to find out that there were many things in the movie that were not exactly true.
My first
question to the guide was this: “Where’s the lake?” The guide laughed and told
me that anyone who’d seen the movie expected to see a lake not far from
Marjorie’s front door. She informed me that the movie production team had
constructed a replica of the cracker house “a piece” down the road by the lake.
Darn. It was akin to telling a kid there isn't a tooth fairy.
It wasn’t
until I stepped onto the wooden porch that I shed my preconceived impressions
of what I thought Cross Creek should look like. After all, this was Marjorie’s
porch! To the right was the round table made by her first husband, Charles, the
same table where Marjorie placed her typewriter and wrote her novels. This was
the exact place – right here, right here - where she wrote The Yearling, the novel for which she won the Pulitzer in 1938.
Goosebumps
shivered up and down my arms as the guide invited us into the cozy living room
and intimate library. All the furniture is original, donated back to her home by
Marjorie’s second husband, Norton Baskin.
Standing in
the center of the room, I imagined the likes of Ernest Hemingway sitting in one
of the upholstered chairs drinking his whiskey, bourbon or whatever, immersed in
conversations with other authors who had, at one time or another, visited
Marjorie here at Cross Creek. Or, Max Perkins, the most fabulous editor of the
mid-twentieth century, dining with other guests, in a second connected board
and battened structure that housed the kitchen and dining room. Marjorie, an
excellent cook, (See Cross Creek Cookery on Amazon.com) was known to serve seven
course meals to her guests.
The guest
bedroom, located in a third connected structure, is Spartan in furnishings with
a bed that looks a bit too narrow for visiting company, but I suppose everyone
was smaller and shorter back then, all except for Gary Cooper (actor in The Yearling) who
once stayed in this guest room. Perhaps Gary just kind of dangled his feet off
the side of the bed. This bedroom was also used by Margaret Mitchell, author of
Gone with the Wind. Marjorie and "Peggy" Mitchell became good friends.
Let’s see, Margaret Mitchell won the Pulitzer in 1937, and Marjorie won the Pulitzer in 1938. Two brilliant, independent women who attained remarkable literary success less than twenty years after women gained the right to vote! Truly amazing.
Let’s see, Margaret Mitchell won the Pulitzer in 1937, and Marjorie won the Pulitzer in 1938. Two brilliant, independent women who attained remarkable literary success less than twenty years after women gained the right to vote! Truly amazing.
A comical
point of interest in Marjorie’s house is the bathroom. It seems Marjorie had put
in the first bathroom in the community. To celebrate this marvel of indoor
plumbing, she held a party, icing down champagne in the bathroom sink and
arranging red roses in the commode water. Lordy, I wish I’d known this gutsy woman!
The kitchen
and dining room structure gave me the best insight as to who Marjorie really
was as a person. The wood cook stove, wooden counters, old porcelain sink, the open
cupboards displaying her dishes, and shelves filled with empty spice tins from
the era. Not far from the backdoor of the kitchen is a fenced in garden. Ahhh,
this was Marjorie’s domain, her real life as the woman who wrote about her
existence in a rough backwoods environment.
Marjorie
lived full-time at Cross Creek from 1928 through 1942. In 1941, she married
Norton Baskin, her long-time friend. Marjorie and Norman spent the next decade
dividing time between a farm in New York and Crescent Beach cottage, near St.
Augustine, Florida. However, most of her
later writings she did at Cross Creek and the Crescent Beach cottage. Marjorie
died December 14, 1953, after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 57.
She is buried at Antioch Cemetery near Island Grove, not far from her home at Cross
Creek.
Our tour of
Marjorie’s Cross Creek home came to an end. Before leaving our guide at the
back porch of Marjorie’s quaint kitchen, I asked her if she thought Mary Steenburgen and Peter Coyote did an adequate portrayal of Marjorie and Norman Baskin? She replied that Peter Coyote had actually met the then still-living Norman Baskin
during filming and how close they were in appearance and speech. As to Mary Steenburgen,
the guide kind of chuckled, saying that while she thought the actress did a
marvelous “younger version” of Marjorie, she would like to see another movie
made of Marjorie’s later years and that Kathy Bates would probably fit quite
comfortably into the role. Interesting thought
The web site
for Cross Creek Florida park is
For Marjorie's books, check out
Sherry Hartzler is the author of Three Moons Over Sedona, Island Passage and Chasing Joe, all available on Amazon.com
