A Little piece of Paradise… College Hill, Ohio - SELFCRAFT

Chapter 32 Life at Laurel CourtBy Chilton ThomsonLaurel Court was seldom called that by members of the Thomson family or their close friends. It wasthe ‘Big House’ and, in many ways, it was a BIG mistake. It originated in the sudden, and quite dramatic,decision of my grandfather, Peter Gibson Thomson, to provide a ‘meaningful opportunity’ to a youngcousin who had just completed architectural school in the Beaux Arts in Paris. It did what it was supposedto do: ‘Cousin Gamble,’ Yale ca. 1896, went on to rebuild much of modern Yale and numerous otherimportant structures in the northeast quadrant of the country.James Gamble Rogers was my grandfather’s nephew. Like her, he came from a modestlycomfortable Louisville family that included most of the Gambles who did NOT make soap or move toCalifornia at the turn of the century and make fortunes in real estate out there. He was a grandnephew ofGeorge Rogers Clark and son of a well intentioned and ambitious mother who painted in oils. Heinherited much of the daring dash and skill of both of them, along with a powerful physique and weakeyesight that prevented him from playing football at Yale. He did however pick the right room-mate, fromthe future’s point of view: Wm. L. Harkness was to inherit countless millions and make as much again, topay for the rebuilding of Yale and Harvard!Gamble (as he was always called) came through Cincinnati on his way home from Paris and, asalways, stopped to visit his beloved Aunt Laura and Uncle Peter. At this distance of nearly eighty years, Iam sieving bits that I was told or overheard over FIFTY years ago, such as whether the house should havea ‘garritch’ (always PGT’s pronunciation) for ‘motors’ or a carriage house and stable. I know that it wasto have both. Also, there was never any doubt that Grandfather intended it to be his beloved Laura’s‘court’ and so it was named. It had to have a relatively large number of bedrooms. My father, Alec, wasstill living at home and working at the paper mill in Hamilton. He was twenty-five, a bit younger thanCousin Gamble. Peter Jr. was frequently at home, Hope and Mary Belle were in school in Cincinnati andLogan was about to leave for the new school in Cleveland that had a boarding department, UniversitySchool. He didn’t go. So: five bedrooms for children, a master suite with dressing and sitting room, fourbathrooms (and they were glorious, seven-foot porcelain tubs, separate stall showers complete with ‘liverspray’....I never knew what it was but the handle said so!) And the necessary service accouterments madep the second floor.The first floor, a true ‘piano nobile’ in classic tradition, is about six feet above ground level.(Incidentally, there was a good sized hill on the site, which was removed by a dummy train to a marsh S.E.) There are (or, were....several of the rooms have changed ‘assignment’ over the years) in a flat horseshoefrom the N. E., billiard room, library, front hall, ballroom and dining room. As above, all backedonto an atrium covered by a (once) removable reinforced glass roof. In the back if the house are pantry,very large kitchen, larder, servant’s dining-living room and a large general service area which housed ahydraulic elevator which, to the best of my knowledge, never had worked. I remember it as a coat andbroom closet. The cellars were out-of-bounds when I was a young boy; grandfather died when I was tenand my step-mother, Mother Kate, moved to the Dower House on Windermere Way very soonafterwards. Then, when the house was empty of all but care takers, I really had a chance to explore! Theground rules were firm, however. No closed door was to be opened, no piece of furniture or bric-a-bracwas to be moved. But we were free to play Sardines in the Can, Hide and Seek, slide on the tremendousbanisters, play pool, use the house intercom telephones and ...particular joy...play the dinner chimes andthe gilded piano in the ballroom. What more could a kid want for a ‘play-house’ on a dull day?Then, in 1934 (about), my uncle Logan and Aunt Sylvia decided to move up from Hamilton Avenue.My father and the other heirs sold their shares and, very rapidly, the Big House was itself again. Some ofthe old furnishings were changed; the billiard room became a cozy cocktail room, its fine fire-placefrequently used. The living room and dining room got new rugs and draperies (after thirty years, theyneeded `em!). Best of all, with relatively young adults who loved hospitality and teen-aged Dwight andten year old Jane, it was a home again.208