Tate is a tiny community of less than 2,000 people in northwest Georgia. However, it boasts the title of Marble Capital of the US.
What do the Lincoln Memorial, New York Stock Exchange, Corcoran Gallery of Art, and the capitols of Kentucky, Arkansas, and Minnesota have in common? The buildings consist of Georgia marble mined by the Georgia Marble Company, founded by Sam Tate in 1884.
Sam Tate purchased these lands on a marble vein back in the 1830s. Although Europe boasted marble buildings and monuments, marble’s use in Georgia was limited to tombstones because of transportation issues. That all changed when railroads arrived in Pickens County in the 1880s. By the early 1930s, Georgia Marble Company’s value exceeded $3.7 million according to the New Georgia Encyclopedia.
The Tate House
Descendants of Sam Tate built the Tate House, aka the Pink Palace, out of local Etowah Marble in 1928. Primarily used for private weddings, Tate House hosts a Christmas wonderland every December. Accompanied by lunch, tea, or dinner, guests can wander inside the 19,000-square-foot mansion.
The Ballroom
Lunch began in the 4,000-square-foot ballroom. Round tables topped with festive silver tablecloths and holiday centerpieces dotted the room. We sat with two sisters, one from the area and the other visiting from California, and began eating a green salad with cranberries and feta cheese.
Served buffet style, our lunch consisted of sweet potato casserole (better than my recipe, which is hard to beat!), green beans, wild rice rolls, and breaded chicken topped with a delicious orange sauce. Before we knew it, servers brought the dessert of bread pudding and it was soon time to tour the mansion.
Before leaving, we took photos next to the large Christmas tree and winter sled flanked by large Palladian-style windows. My friend’s mother commented that there were so many ornaments, you barely saw the tree itself.
Mansion Tour
Walking through a marble conservatory filled with poinsettias, we entered the mansion under a grand cascading arch of pale pink ornaments and ribbon. One of the first rooms we entered was the dining room.
Set with Christmas china and tall candles, the elaborate dining room made me appreciate the history of the Tate family. Sam Tate’s sons, Stephen and William took over Georgia Marble in the late 1880s, which boasted almost every variety of marble found in the US, including the salmon-colored Etowah marble.
The number of workers increased and the company built houses, schools, and even a power plant to provide electricity for the employees and their families, thus establishing the community of Tate around 1900. Stephen’s oldest son, Colonel Sam Tate (grandson of founder Sam Tate) became head of the company in 1905 and remained at the helm until his death in 1938.
It was Colonel Sam who built the Pink Palace from 1923-1928. He invited his brother Luke and sister Florentine to live in the mansion with him. Since none of them married or had children, the house became vacant in the 1950s. Thankfully, after some years of neglect, the mansion was restored in the 1970s. Another owner purchased the property in 2001 and continues making improvements.
We walked next into a wood-paneled living room area, followed by the entrance hall and gentlemen’s parlor – all lined with marble floors. Each room featured Christmas garlands, trees, and decorations. Apparently, Tate House began decorating in mid-November for the Christmas Open House.
Bedrooms
We climbed a large staircase next to a Christmas tree and grand player piano to the upstairs area where another Christmas tree greeted us. Despite the large square footage, the mansion features only four bedrooms upstairs. However, each bedroom contains its own marble bathroom (a rarity back in the 1920s) and a large marble fireplace.
Both Luke’s bedroom and Colonel Sam’s bedroom featured more masculine decor. I preferred Miss Flora’s bedroom with deep red wallpaper. The guest bedroom, called the Jewel Room, was large enough for a dining room table and canopy bed.
The tour continued through the upstairs kitchen area and office before heading down the back stairs to the kitchen and butler’s pantry. My friend who introduced me to Tate House, and accompanied me on the tour with her mother, is also a huge fan of tea. While neither of us has the inclination to amass a large collection, we enjoyed looking at the cabinets filled to the brim with Christmas-themed teapots.
Although we didn’t want to leave, it was time to conclude the tour and drive the hour back to Atlanta. We exited the mansion through the pink sunroom. This totally would have been my hangout spot with a good book had I lived in the Pink Palace back in the day.
Finishing our tour, we walked across the grounds to the holiday gift boutique in the pavilion. Used for indoor wedding ceremonies, the pavilion featured an arched ceiling and glass walls bringing in natural light.
In addition to lunch, afternoon tea, and the live music dinner tours, the Christmas Open House offers a design class luncheon tour. Although I was inspired to decorate my own house for Christmas, I don’t think any design class could teach me how to make the intricate decorations we saw in the mansion.
For more information about the venue and Christmas Open House, visit the website here.
To learn more about marble in Georgia and take a quarry tour, visit the annual Georgia Marble Festival held in the area around October.