Carl Sandburg and Connemara

On this day in 1919, Carl Sandburg won his first Pulitzer Prize for a collection of poems, Cornhuskers. Of course, at the time he was still living in Illinois, the state in which he was born.

In 1945, he moved to Connemara, a 246-acre estate in the beautiful North Carolina mountains. While here, near the village of Flat Rock, he wrote over a third of his published works. The farm also had plenty of room for his wife to raise her goats. A Chicago reporter had predicted the move would be "a hard pull" for the writer, but he couldn't have been more wrong. The Sandburgs loved it.

Seven family members moved to the new home: Carl; his wife, Lillian; Margaret, the oldest daughter, who had nocturnal epilepsy; Janet, the middle daughter, who had a nervous condition and headaches from being hit by a car when she was 16; Helga, the youngest daughter, who was divorced; and Helga's 2 children, Paula and John. All of them seemed happier in the peaceful mountain countryside.

Carl chose two small rooms in the loft for his personal, writing space. Lillian spent a lot of time in her office and at the barn. In fact, the estate was large enough, with extra buildings, that there was plenty of space to spread out. Yet, none of them were luxurious or lavish. Some of his friends failed to understand the Sandburgs preferred a simple, comfortable life. 

Today Connemara is presented much the way the Sandburgs left it, as a National Historic Site. It's open daily from 9:00 am - 5:00 pm, except for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Days. There's also hiking trails available from sunup to sundown. You can tour the grounds free, but for a guided tour of the house, the fees (cash or check only) are:  
$5.00 for ages 16-61
$3.00 for those 62 and older
Free for 15 and under

________________________________________________________