The influential Maurice family’s Hollybourne Cottage re-welcomes guests through a new exhibit
By Richard L. Eldredge
Photography by Allison Leotis
To step inside Hollybourne, the historic tabby cottage built by Jekyll Island Club members Charles and Charlotte Maurice in 1890, is to spend time with one of the island’s most beloved families. Patriarch Charles was an iron bridge pioneer and counted the Memphis Bridge over the Mississippi River among his engineering feats. The Athens, Pennsylvania and Jekyll Island–based family so loved the island that they would often arrive in time to celebrate Christmas and even Thanksgiving on occasion, weeks before everyone else. The Maurices are perhaps one of the only members who retained membership for the entirety of the Jekyll Island Club era, from 1886 until its final bow in 1947, before the state of Georgia acquired the island through eminent domain.
Now, after decades of rescue and restoration by dozens of volunteers, interns, and staff, the doors to the first floor of the 12,271-square-foot, nine-bedroom Hollybourne are back open. Thanks to meticulous diaries and archived photos kept by Charlotte Maurice and her daughter Marian, the home offers Jekyll visitors one of the most three-dimensional portraits of any of the “Club–Era” families. The sprawling, eclectic Jacobethan Revival Tudor-style structure provides a fascinating glimpse into how one of the island’s most famous families lived.
“Because of Charlotte’s record-keeping, we know so much more about the Maurice family compared to other Club members,” says Andrea Marroquin, curator at Jekyll Island Museum. Her notes included how they spent their time on the island, who they interacted with socially, and even what they ate for dinner. Archival records show the Maurice family hosted events almost daily, entertaining the likes of the Rockefellers, Kennedys, Goulds, Claflins, Porters, and other Club families.
Hollybourne is significant architecturally. It is one of the few remaining cottages constructed with tabby, a concrete mixture utilizing indigenous materials, including lime, sand, and shell. Inside, visitors are treated to one of the cottage’s most unique construction characteristics. Assisted by architect William H. Day, Charles Maurice put his bridge-building skills to use, reinforcing his home with suspension trusses and stepped piers.
“Because of the structural engineering Charles Maurice brought to Hollybourne, it’s quite likely that it prevented the cottage from falling in during years of vacancy,” says Will Wagner, director of historic resources at Jekyll Island Authority. Wagner also credits the creative use of tabby as a reason Hollybourne has successfully weathered 135 years of coastal storms. Among the island’s first preservationists, Charles and Charlotte Maurice were enamored by Horton House, one of the oldest tabby structures in the state that dates to 1743. The couple were among the donors who headed the effort to help save the structure, and used it as inspiration for their impressive cottage.
Now, Jekyll visitors can partake in life as the Maurices saw it, thanks to a new Hollybourne exhibit. Guided tours from Jekyll Island Museum are offered daily. Interactive stations, chock-full of information about the family’s daily life, contain facts gleaned from family letters and Charlotte and Marian Maurice’s diaries. There’s even a naturalist room dedicated to the family’s fascination with the island’s indigenous botany. “The family was so interested in the island’s plant life, they wrote pamphlets on Jekyll’s flora and fauna,” says Wagner.
Legend has it that when the state of Georgia took over the island in the 1940s via eminent domain, including Hollybourne, the Maurice family was so enraged by the loss of their beloved home that they stripped the property bare and dumped the stove into the Jekyll River. Though unconfirmed by historians, this tale has endured over the years. Even after constructing a new Southern winter home in Florida, daughters Margaret and Marian Maurice remained so averse to all things Georgia that they bypassed the Peach State altogether, traveling through Alabama to reach their destination.
Thankfully for Jekyll Island preservationists, tempers cooled over the decades. Following youngest daughter Emily Maurice’s death in 1975, her estate donated the family’s massive dining room table that had accommodated Charles and Charlotte plus their nine children, to the island’s museum.
The refinished family heirloom was proudly on display for the 2017 marriage of great-granddaughter Holly Maurice McClure’s wedding at the home, the first family gathering held there since 1942. “We’re glad those wounds have healed and that we’ve reconnected with the family now,” says Wagner.
The rehabilitated Hollybourne is a tribute to the decades of work from staffers, preservationists, interns, and volunteers, an effort that dates back to 1999. Marroquin chooses to see the 25-year labor of love with a glass-half-full attitude. After decades of disuse following the state’s takeover of the island, Hollybourne began deteriorating. Ceilings had fallen in, and flooring had given way to the elements. “The positive thing about that time is that, because there was no plan for the building, it wasn’t torn up or repurposed,” Marroquin explains. “It became a time capsule. Watching an entire community come together to save Hollybourne and to make it safe and once again available to the public has been transformational.”
In addition to daily tours via the Landmark Trolley Tour, Hollybourne’s lawns, its rebuilt side porch, and signature horseshoe driveway have become popular destinations for weddings and other social gatherings, including touchingly, the nuptials of two preservation interns who met while working on the project.
While visitors enjoy daily deep dives into the Maurice family’s luxurious Gilded Age lives, Jekyll Island Authority’s preservation team is hard at work developing design plans for phase two of the exhibit. The effort will restore some of the bedrooms on the second floor and include interactive spaces for school-aged children. Phase three of the project will focus on restoring the attic where the Maurice children spent hours playing.
“It’s an ongoing, living, breathing, learning laboratory,” says Marroquin. “The goal is for visitors not only to learn more about this Gilded Age environment and the people who lived here, but also how this past has been preserved.”
