Issue link: http://maconmagazine.uberflip.com/i/1184228
3 0 | M A C O N M A G A Z I N E F E B R U A R Y / M A R C H 2 0 1 9 Jonathan H. Poston, director of Hay House, with special thanks to attorney and historian Nathan Corbitt, who initially discovered the 1902 article, as well as a group of board members, staff and friends of Hay House who have been searching for more information about this lost structure. 934 Georgia Ave., 478.742.8155, hayhousemacon.org. H AY L O R E An English visitor recalls his stay in 1856 Macon An ongoing series about Hay House lore, traditions and history L ast month, I again watched the 2017 film, "e Man Who Invented Christmas," portraying Charles Dickens and the month of his writing and publishing "A Christmas Carol" in 1843. Dan Stevens and the other actors are amazing, but one character stands out for me: Dickens' contemporary and opinionated nemesis, William Makepeace ackeray. Some Maconites are aware that ackeray visited Macon in 1856 while on his American lecture tour, but few have read his description. ackeray had interesting things to say about our city, its people and the builders of the Johnston House (now Hay House). As one of England's most famous satirists and novelists, he was still basking in the notoriety from his book "Vanity Fair." He wrote a lengthy letter to his two daughters, Anne and Harriet, reporting, "I am 200 miles from jolly little friendly Savannah. I am in a great big rambling shambling village which they call a city here." When ackeray arrived he already knew two Maconites, William and Anne Tracy Johnston, and paid them a call on his second day. He recalled in the letter: "I have been to see an old friend of yours and Granny's and Maria's ... Mrs. Johnstone of the Rond Point, with whom M. lived and who was an anatomy of a woman at Paris, now grown to be fat, healthy and pretty ..." Although ackeray seems to have genuine affection for the couple, especially Mrs. Johnston, he went on to refer to Mr. Johnston's livelihood and the society of Macon: "Johnstone keeps a shop here – almost everybody keeps a shop. He is very rich though, and has left the business to his brother. I think I like this simple way of trading – the tradesmen form the society. ey have pretty houses a little way off from their business. ey have not an idea that they are not as good as other folks; you talk to them here without an effort or thought of condescension." Explaining that the Johnston's were "building themselves a house in this rambling lazy out of the way place," ackeray described their current residence on the property as being a building formerly housing slaves, adding that it possessed "an uncommonly nice big room on the ground floor in which I felt I could instantly write novels." e building to which he refers was apparently a two-story wooden structure from the late 1830s and the period when Mrs. Johnston's family, the Tracy's, owned the property, and before their original house was shifted off the lot for construction of the present Hay House. First built as a school and known as the Presbyterian School House, it was chronicled in a recently discovered 1902 Telegraph article, "is Landmark must be Spared." e reporter wrote, "e house was occupied by Mr. William Johnston at the time he was building the magnificent residence now occupied by Judge Felton." e reporter added that W.G. Solomon had purchased the building and intended to move it to Nisbet Street for renovation as a residence. e fate of this outbuilding and whether it still survives in some form on another site remains a mystery.