Carl Sandburg's Home

I am working my way through my National Parks' Password book, adding date stamps from each new park I visit.  Friday's park was the Carl Sandburg Home where the nationally renowned, twice Pulitzer Prize winning poet spent his final years from the age of 67 until his death in 1967.

Located in a serene setting near Flat Rock, North Carolina, the home, called Connemara, was purchased by the Sandburgs in 1945.  Carl wanted a place where he could find the "creative hush, that holy place where the heart sings and the pen records."

The property includes not only the home, but also the barns and holding pens where his wife, Lillian Sandburg, raised her prize-winning herd of goats.  Lillian was famous in her own right for her efforts to improve her herd's bloodlines and milk production.  In 1952, her herd numbered over 200 goats.  Unbelievably, Mrs. Sandburg was once asked by a visitor who came to consult her about goats, "Now, what does your husband do?"

Carl and Lillian Sandburg

The National Park Service still cares for a herd of her goats' descendants.  Unfortunately, Tim & I didn't have enough time during our 1-hour visit to walk to the barn where the goats were corralled.  Instead, we took the very informative guided tour of the home.  We learned that Lillian sold the house to the park service soon after Carl died.

The interior of the home looks as if Carl and his family just stepped out for a ramble through the woods and will soon return.

It is filled with the Sandburg possessions, including his more that 14,000 books.

Almost every room has a bookcase overflowing with books.

One wonders how the Sandburgs were able to pack them all up in their move from Michigan to this home.

Carl Sandburg's office

Residents of this home included not only Carl and his wife but also their three daughters and two grandchildren.  No wonder Carl kept late hours, writing most of the night while it was quiet and sleeping late in the morning.

Carl Sandburg's bedroom

Carl Sandburg once wrote:  "It is necessary now and then for a man to go away by himself and experience loneliness; to sit on a rock in the forest and to ask of himself, 'Who am I, and where have I been, and where am I going?'"

That universal question is one to ponder.