The Original Steel Magnolia

Frankie Fennel Limehouse

As Southerners, we relish our culture and true Southern hospitality. The most recent influx of Northerners has somewhat blurred the edges of our heritage.

Long before Rhett Butler uttered, “ Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” we were intoxicated with the thought of regional recognition.  Now, we long for a return to Southern charm and chivalry.

I believe the rest of our great nation has long wanted what Southern folks have. They covet our cast iron skillets, fried chicken, our stone ground grits and gravy, thirst for our bourbon, gentile manners, mint juleps, and cowboy boots. There is so much more.

Due east from Highway 21, across the vast marshlands, through palmetto-studded live oak hammocks and dark water cypress swamps, the landscape breaks into open vistas and well-tended fields in the heart of the ACE Basin’s plantation country.

This is the land of forgotten places, country churches, roadside shacks, cinder block fish houses, and decades of tradition. It’s home to antebellum plantations, polo matches, fox hunting, quail and duck hunting, and some of the most breathtakingly beautiful vistas in all of coastal South Carolina.

I stumbled upon it rather unexpectedly one March afternoon several years ago. My intention was to meet the artist in residence, Kendrick Mayes, at Airy Hall Plantation deep in the Ace Basin.

Once we entered through the open gates framed by red brick pillars, past the barns and rows of Formosa azaleas through cathedrals of ancient live oaks with beards of gray moss, my curiosity became intense. Here in front of me was the Old South in all its stunning beauty. The magnificent Ashepoo River was the backdrop to this spectacular scene.

I stopped the car in front of the main house, got out, and knocked on the front door to announce my arrival. A young woman opened the door, saying, “Miss Frankie is expecting you. Won’t you please come in?” I had no idea before arriving that I was going to be invited in to have a conversation with the legendary Frankie Limehouse.

Ms. Frankie, wearing pink flannel pajamas, was sitting in the den by a crackling fire with her beloved family dogs, Camilla and Chloe. She was in her mid-70s at the time but still a strikingly beautiful woman. It didn’t take a minute before Ms. Frankie had made me feel like we had been friends forever.  

Warmth and hospitality were the cornerstones of her style. I’d say she is the epitome of a grand, genteel Southern lady through and through. As the matriarch of the Limehouse family, she will leave a legacy of class and continuity.  In the South, we go back home in our memories and dreams, wanting to believe that things will remain the same.  For the Limehouse family, their lives stood the test of time with very little change, a rare occurrence. Her sons are quick to attribute this stability to their mother.

“Mother could ride a horse like a cavalryman, handle a shotgun, shoot skeet with the best of us, run the Cooper River Bridge, and warm up a polo pony,” said Chip Limehouse. “Anytime something was going on; you could count on mom to be right there in the middle of it.”

The fields and ponds of Airy Hall were hunting and fishing grounds for the young Limehouse boys, Barry, Chip, Brien, and Brad. Cane poles, rods and reels, crab traps, and Mossberg bolt-action .410 shotguns were their constant companions. “Early on, I knew the joy of walking through the woods with a .410 across my shoulder. Every day was an adventure,” recalled Chip.

Over time, polo matches and fox hunts became the norm as the boys followed their dad and mother on horseback across the wide expanse of fields and pastures.  At day’s end, the family relaxed on the brick veranda with a cool drink and watched as dusk settled across the great Ashepoo River, the distant soft sounds of cowbells echoing across green pastures.

For centuries, Southern boys have walked through fields with shotguns ready, hoping to fell a few quail to take home to mamma for supper. If a love for hunting is something fathers pass on to their sons and daughters, Buck Limehouse did it well. Hunting is tradition in our great Southland - a part of our rich heritage.

Artist Joseph Sulkowski spoke eloquently about the Sporting South:

“ The natural world is a reflection of our own inner beauty. Engaging in the sporting life brings us into intimate contact with this realization. Here, we may step away from the routine of linear time and commune with the timeless wonders of nature.”

https://josephsulkowski.com/

The Rock We Leaned On

Frankie was a key player in the Charleston art scene, serving on the board of the Gibbes Museum of Art and many other philanthropic organizations.  She built the family business when she went into real estate and started buying up older homes in town and renovating them for students.  Then, she purchased several boutique hotels - Indigo, The Meeting Street Inn, and the Jasmine.  She decorated each one, but it was her cette touche speciale that made them a success.

Her husband was the late Buck Limehouse, a Citadel graduate, Founder of Limehouse Properties, avid outdoorsman, tireless community leader, and, most of all, proud family man. Under Governor Mark Sanford, Buck Limehouse became South Carolina’s first Secretary of Transportation.

Frankie Limehouse proudly displays the skin of a 13-foot alligator that once roamed the grounds of Airy Hall Plantation.

With politics comes entertaining, and entertain they did.  Frankie was a celebrated hostess who held her own with the best of the Charleston elites.  The back entrance off the dining room contains a large walk-in storage area on one side and a powder room on the other side.  In between, the skin of a 13-foot alligator hangs from the top of the window.  Now, that’s a true daughter of the South - a brave woman who can shoot a gator between the eyes and hit the mark.  Frankie Fennell Limehouse is, indeed, the original steel magnolia.