The CultureMap web site has a great story about a party celebrating the newly renovated home of Anderson Clayton founder William Clayton. This building later became the Clayton Genealogical Library and, still later after a new building was built, has been restored to became a conference center and an LDS Family History Center.
(The photo of the Clayton House to the right was taken on a recent trip to Houston by Dick Eastman. Click on the image to see a larger picture.)
The beautifully restored Clayton House was the main attraction at the third annual "Party in the Stacks" fundraiser for the Houston Public Library Foundation.A languid lawn party feeling permeated the grounds of the Clayton Library Center for Genealogical Research in the Museum District as guests toured the newly renovated home where Anderson Clayton founder William Clayton lived until his death in 1966, feasted on a buffet of fried chicken strips, deviled eggs, and biscuits with gravy, sipped Old Fashioneds, and listened to Yvonne Washington and the Mix perform in a backyard tent amid crepe myrtles, roses and other vegetation that was popular in Houston in the early 1900s.
The Clayton family gave the three-story brick Georgian-style house, designed by Birdsall P. Briscoe and built in 1917, to the city of Houston in 1958. Ten years later, it became the center for the library's genealogical collection. In 1988, a new building was constructed in the same style next door.The main home had fallen into a state of disrepair before the recent six-year renovation.
You can read more about the recent party at http://culturemap.com/newsdetail/05-19-10-party-in-the-stacks-shows-off-renovated-clayton-library/ and also find a great picture of the Clayton House at http://www.claytonlibraryfriends.org/Content-Public/Page-Edit/Page.asp?iID=-262393516.
