Beach Bites: Back Door Kitchen Tour

October 2014

17 www.wrightsvillebeachmagazine.com WBM Residents of Old Wilmington (ROW) will usher the public into back door tours of private kitchens, the heart and hearth of nine historic homes, 11 am until 5 pm, Saturday, October 11 during its annual Back Door Kitchen Tour. Doug and Denise Zieschang, however, welcome tour goers through their front door, at the historic McKay-Green House at 312 South Third Street. The stately mansion was built in 1835 for Murdock McKay (1775-1843), New Hanover County Register of Deeds, and his wife Jane McMurphy (1775-1847), a native of Scotland. Their son Kenneth Murchison McKay updated the home, adding popular Victorian era Italianate elements in 1870. Dr. William H. Green, a Wilmington druggist, purchased the property in 1878 and added the north Queen Anne Style wing in 1890, which houses the modern-day kitchen. Recently renovated, the home features four distinctive porches. Coined Four Porches during years as a bed and breakfast, it is the only stop on the tour to serve refreshments. ROW house captain Bob Wallen and his docents will also sell raffle tickets culminating in a 5 pm drawing for the 2007 framed original painting, “Miss Dolly’s Flower Corner,” by French artist Katia Campbell. Miss Dolly, the late Dolly Humphrey Pearson, a former founding member of ROW, will be remembered this year through her family’s charitable contribution to the raffle, for her colorful garden at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Nun Street and through ROW’s designation of Elaine and Larry Neuwirth’s Wells-Brown-Lord House garden at 300 South Front Street. The Neuwirth’s Mediter-ranean- style garden is the first recipient of the Dolly Pearson Beautiful Garden Award. Lush with Italian cypress and palms, a stroll through the only garden on the Back Door Kitchen Tour reveals topogra-phy articulated in terraces and narrow winding paths scaling the original slope of the river-view property. Look for outdoor sculpture, unusual busts and a white ceramic cat climbing a backyard tree, which is one of the few elements seen from Ann Street. Tour tickets are $25 for adults and $15 for children 12 years old and under. Raffle tickets are $5 each or five for $20. Visit www.rowilmington.org for details. House of Four Porches Back Door Kitchen Tour By MARIMAR McNAUGHTON Photography by ALLISON POTTER The Zieschang residence at 312 South Third Street will be featured on the Residents of Old Wilmington’s annual Back Door Kitchen Tour October 11. beachbites


October 2014
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