Home Sweet Holiday Home

EUREKA SPRINGS OPENS DOORS TO TOWN’S TREASURES

By By Becca Bacon Martin <a href="mailto:BMARTIN@NWAO

Posted: December 4, 2009 at 4:04 a.m.

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Larry and Cathy Handley moved to Eureka Springs in 2007 to downsize and retire. They’ve done neither.

Both of the University of Arkansas alumni still work, Larry as director of the United States Geological Survey in Rolla, Mo., and Cathy in business development. And they live in a 5,000-square-foot house, which they’ll showcase on this weekend’s 27th annual Eureka Springs Preservation Society Christmas Tour of Homes.

“We looked for almost two years at everything that came on the market,” says Cathy Handley.

“When we first saw it, we didn’t give this house a second thought. It was too big.

“But after we looked and looked, we went back and made an offer. It just had a really good feel about it.”

The 1892 home - known as the Eagle Thomas House for a previous owner - also had many of its original features, among them an 800-square-foot front porch, an “unbelievable” chandelier and all the original woodwork.

“We had restored homes before, and this one didn’t require a tremendous amount of work,” Handley says.

One of the previous owners - there are only five in the home’s history - had recently refurbished the hardwood floors downstairs, added a pool and repainted in yellow with maroon trim. The Handleys had a craftsman create a library filled with bookcases that match the woodwork, recarpeted the upstairs and upgraded the master bath.

So what do they do with five bedrooms and 3.5 baths? One bedroom became the library, two became offices and the Handleys have a large family - 17 or so when they’re all together, Cathy says.

“We like to entertain - and my antiques fit beautifully,” she says in a phone interview, a smile obvious in her voice.

On the home tour, the entiredownstairs will be open for visitors, including the bathroom decorated to look like a treehouse. The porch - which is a Frank Lloyd Wright design - will be dressed up with antique sleds and toys, and visitors will enter through a “pocket” door, which Architectural Digest says is the only front door of its kind known to exist.

Inside, Larry Handley will display the family’s snow village in the library, complete with about 300 houses and a Lionel train running through it. Visitors will also see the home’s unique fireplaces, the living room one decorated with vintage snowmen and the dining room one with vintage Santas. The Christmas tree, also in the dining room, will be dressed with ornaments collected throughout the couple’s 43 years of marriage, and the dining table - which seats 14 - will be covered in red and silver trees with 1940s snowmen and Santas, Handley says.

The kitchen - “which is aneat room by itself,” she says - will house a 1950s silver tree to complement its 1940s retro furniture.

Handley has been collecting antiques all her life, she says.

“We didn’t have anything old around when I was growing up,” she says. “My parents thought it made you look poor. So I love anything and everything old!”

The one thing Handley can’t promise is that the oldest resident of the house will appear on the home tour.

“We do have a ghost, supposedly, she says. “We’ve been told it only appears to children, but I know it’s in my office because I find my rolltop desk open. It seems harmless, so that’s fine.”

Handley, who hopes to one day open an antique store in Eureka Springs, says she just wants people to enjoy what they see.

“When you have something this beautiful, you really have to share it.”

Entertainment, Pages 19 on 12/04/2009

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