Emblems of Conduct (Brown Thrasher Books) - Classic Literature for Book Collectors & Readers - Perfect for Home Libraries & Literary Gifts

Donald Windham died Monday May 31, 2010 at age 89. I spent about about 90 minutes in his company in August 2004 interviewing him onthe front porch and the third floor of the Margaret Mitchell House.When he was a boy he lived down the street at Peachtree and Thirteenth in the vicinity of today's 35-story green-glass development called the 1010 Building along Midtown's Million Dollar Mile.Donald Windham's "Emblems of Conduct" is one of my favorite perspectives of growing up in Atlanta. It is definitely another way of life and a different viewpoint from that depicted in "Swan House" by Elizabeth's Musser," which I have previously discussed.Donald Winham captures the story of a fading prestigious pioneer Atlanta family, which once lived and built in better times a three-story 14 room house with eccentric verandas. His story happened about 50 years before the community became Midtown.Windham writes, "It (family home) stands as an emblem of the new, proud, and never-to-end, grace and prosperity."He captures an authentic feeling about a changing residential section of Peachtree Street, which evolved intothe commercial Tenth Street Shopping District. He mentions Albert's Ice Cream Parlor where a few folks in Buckhead still remember tasting their first store-bought-ice cream.Windham really had no memory of his first six years when he, his mother, and brother lived with his father.It was before the divorce. He remembered the family stories about the Great War,later called World War I, and the Great Influenza.His mother told him once "There are some people, I guess," she said "who cannot stand success, and your daddy was one of them."By 1939, Windham realized because of his lifestyle he would eventually leave Atlanta for good. He and his friend Butch board the Greyhound bus at the old terminal atation on Cain Street, today's Andrew Young International Blvd.The two of them are heading to New York City each with a one-way ticket. Windham is excited and yet sad because he knows what not coming back to Atlanta will do to his mother. "I am forming cataracts of unhappiness over my mother's eyes, but I think of the unhappiness, I am saving her by not remaining."As the Greyhound rolls down Carnegie Way Windham said "And somehow, I remember my grandfather and great-grandfather and the world they went forth to encounter after the Civil War, and I feel nearer to them than to the intervening generation, all of whom will live out their lives in the city where they were born, near enough to visit one another each day."Farewell, Donald.