During my 2007 trip to Atlanta, I was bowled over to see this inside the Margaret Mitchell Museum. The front door to Tara from “Gone with the Wind” (1939) AND the original painting that Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) threw a drink at! From the museum descriptive placard which prevented me from getting “up close and personal” with the painting:
Scarlett in the blue dress, by Helen Carlton, oil on canvas, 1939. This portrait of Scarlett after the war hung on the wall in Rhett’s bedroom in their Atlanta mansion. Joseph B. Platt, head of the large New York decorating firm, coordinated the set interiors for Selznick’s art department, including the selection of appropriate furniture, wallpapers, carpets, and accessories for “Gone with the Wind.” In 1939, the portrait traveled from California to the movie’s premiere in Atlanta, where it hung in the windows of downtown Davison-Paxon Department Store. More recently the painting hung in the cafeteria of the Margaret Mitchell Elementary School in northwest Atlanta. Loaned by the Atlanta Board of Education.
Here’s a shot of the aforementioned department store:
The downtown Atlanta Davison’s store was located on Peachtree Street. A vintage postcard:
The store was owned by the Macy’s chain for sixty years. Over time, the Davison-Paxon Company name was shortened to Davison’s. By early 1986, all Davison’s stores were renamed Macy’s. In 2003, the Atlanta store was also closed, but the building still remains.
Yes, I will be checking it out this fall. As for the Margaret Mitchell Elementary, it opened in 1954. According to the
Margaret Mitchell Civic Association website:
The Margaret Mitchell neighborhood was originally developed during the 1950's as Cherokee Forest. The neighborhood included the Margaret Mitchell Elementary School located on Margaret Mitchell Drive and thus evolved into the the Margaret Mitchell neighborhood (Peggy Mitchell never lived this "far out"). Morris Brandon Primary School (k-2) now operates at the previous site of the Margaret Mitchell Elementary School. Our neighborhood includes old and new homes and streets which are located on the west side of I-75 along West Wesley Road, from Moore's Mill Road to Nancy Creek.
Based on a November 2018 online article by Darla McCammon from the
Ink Free News, it sounds like the Carlton painting was still in the hands of the Mitchell home museum:
Today we are very fortunate because you can visit Margaret Mitchell’s home and tour it in Atlanta. Featured prominently among the many artifacts and information you will see on the tour is the original portrait of Scarlett in that daring blue dress that hung in Rhett Butler’s bedroom in the mansion he built after the war. Not much information exists about Helen Carlton, who did the painting of actress Vivien Leigh in 1938, but her other work included her daughter’s portrait, likenesses of Einstein, Marilyn Monroe and Bing Crosby.
Carlton was a multi-talented actress, artist, and singer. As you can see from the photo of her painting, she was also a master at all of it. As with many creative types, talent seems to flow out of their pores in many directions. Oddly in my research I noticed a remarkable resemblance between Vivien Leigh, Margaret Mitchell, and Helen Carlton. Not only were all three remarkably talented, but they could almost have been triplets.
Let’s take a closer look at the painting itself:
Even closer:
Yes, she nailed it. An incredible likeness of Vivien Leigh. Note the wedding band on her finger, courtesy of Rhett Butler.
I continued down the internet rabbit hole and hit pay dirt, stumbling upon
a November 23, 2010 article from which the 2018 one most likely gleaned its info. Written by Carlton’s granddaughter, it allowed me to see what the artist looked like:
My Grandma Carlton passed away when I was just 8 years old, and I feel like I'm just now getting to know her. All I remember from my childhood is going to visit her in the nursing home where she would give us hand-drawn birthday cards and Big League Chew.
I've always known that she was a talented woman, but the more I learn about her, the more in awe I am of what she accomplished in her life, especially as a woman in the early 1900s. She was a successful actress, singer, and artist.Helen painted this portrait of Vivien Leigh/Scarlett O'Hara for Gone with the Wind. She's pictured here in front of the portrait for Redbook Magazine as she was nominated as Mother of the Year (at the time, she was very pregnant with her only child - my mom). She actually didn't like this painting very well.
What?!? Didn’t like her painting? How can that be. While I was writing this post, I recalled the other time that I saw a piece of Tara. In 1984, I was visiting my best friend at his school, Washington and Jefferson College. Yes, that’s me in the Members Only jacket. No, I didn’t borrow it from Rosario. I proudly wore my own, along with my perfectly styled coif courtesy of yellow Conair hair dryer. No wonder my scalp is still so dry.
This building is Lazear Chemistry Hall. When my friend Kevin gave me a tour of the campus, he was sure to take me inside to show me a piece of Tara. I thought he was full of crap.
Turns out he wasn’t. Inside this building on the door to the Troutman Library on the first floor of Lazear is the original doorknob from the movie version of Tara. I could not find the photo that I shot of it, but online I was able to learn that it was donated to the college in May 1940 by the film’s producer and Pittsburgh native David O. Selznick, who had family in the Washington area. I couldn’t find any photos online, either, and have no idea if it’s still there or not. Readers?
See more Margaret Mitchell Museum photos at my
main website.
