Dublin Core
Title
Westend: Country Inn
Subject
Country Inn Brochure, 1910-30
Description
The brochure for the country inn run by Nancy and Lucy: "The Misses Taylor" of Westend. Their mother, Mary Minor Watson Taylor, specified in her that her unmarried children should have a life interest in Westend.
The girls' mother and father, Henry Taylor, were both gone by 1914. In their forties, without any male provider, Lucy and Nancy were left to profit from their country home in any way they could. They kept livestock and paid black help to cultivate crops in the fields. While those ventures were not so feminine, taking in boarders was a perfectly acceptable occupation for two unmarried women.
Westend was staffed with a cook, and hired black men in livery, who would likely take guests' bags to their room and serve the meals in the dining room. Alice Spilman, a great-niece of Lucy's and Nancy's, remembers a marble topped table in the center of the neighboring great parlor, stacked with books for guests.
The boarders were likely kept in the four upstairs rooms. Alice Spilman, a great-niece of Lucy's, remembers a great meal served in the middle of the day, brought in from the kitchens (and former slave quarters) behind the house. She remembers duck at one end of the table, and chicken at the other-- livestock raised at Westend.
The girls' mother and father, Henry Taylor, were both gone by 1914. In their forties, without any male provider, Lucy and Nancy were left to profit from their country home in any way they could. They kept livestock and paid black help to cultivate crops in the fields. While those ventures were not so feminine, taking in boarders was a perfectly acceptable occupation for two unmarried women.
Westend was staffed with a cook, and hired black men in livery, who would likely take guests' bags to their room and serve the meals in the dining room. Alice Spilman, a great-niece of Lucy's and Nancy's, remembers a marble topped table in the center of the neighboring great parlor, stacked with books for guests.
The boarders were likely kept in the four upstairs rooms. Alice Spilman, a great-niece of Lucy's, remembers a great meal served in the middle of the day, brought in from the kitchens (and former slave quarters) behind the house. She remembers duck at one end of the table, and chicken at the other-- livestock raised at Westend.
Source
Westend Family Papers
Publisher
Catherine Ann Taylor
Date
1910-30
Contributor
Contribution Form
Online Submission
No