My Trip to the Margaret Mitchell House

As most of you who know me, you know I have been a fan of Gone With the Wind since I was a pre-teen. I can’t remember my exact age and the details are slightly fuzzy, but I recall the movie, Gone With the Wind, being featured on television. My grandmother, Margaret – aka: Granny – mentioned she would be watching it. Since I lived with Granny and next door to Granny for most of my childhood, I believe we ended up watching it together.

I was a child, so the storyline probably didn’t sing to me as much as the beautiful actors and actresses and their elegant dress. I LOVED those huge hoop skirts Vivien Leigh wore as Scarlett. I loved the setting in Georgia and the gorgeous mansions where they resided. I loved the idea of going to balls and, mostly, being the “Belle” of the ball.

For all of you who don’t know, I was an only child for most of my childhood until my half-brother and stepsister came along. Not in that order, mind you, but the point is, I loved being the center of attention, so imagining I was Scarlett wasn’t unheard of…

Granny bought me all these lovely media books of GWTW. In those, there were large pictures of the cast and the set. The books included stories about the casting search and talked a little about the author, Margaret Mitchell. I believe, at one time, Granny found a hoop skirt or a large crinolin that I would wear during dress up. I was happy to play for hours and hours by myself, in my own little dressed up world.

Ever once and a while, Granny would have to breakout her electric typewriter to conduct business on or to type a letter. I became very interested in the typewriter. This was around the time I was so interested in GWTW and decided I was going to write my own story.  I remember sitting at the bar – where we ate all our casual meals – and Granny would set up the electric typewriter for me – it was an ugly brown, heavy old cuss and would hum when it was plugged in. I still have that typewriter today…

So there I’d sit at the bar, the book Gone With The Wind open to Part One, Chapter One, and I’d type the first words: “Scarlett O’Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charms as the Tarleton men were.”

Sometime in 2010, accompanied by my author friend Dianna Shuford, visited the Margaret Mitchell House in Atlanta, Georgia. This is where Ms. Mitchell lived in the early 20th century. Per Google, the site is currently closed, but this was a dream come true for me to visit and sit at Ms. Mitchell’s typewriter.