Cheap Dresses

Julia Wolfe’s clothing to star at Asheville fundraising dinner
The clothing will be the star at this year’s Dinner at the Old Kentucky Home, the biannual fundraiser for the Thomas Wolfe Memorial downtown.After the dinner, the home will display seven dresses worn by Julia Wolfe, the author’s mother. The display will remain in the home through Dec. 31.
“We’re using them as a jumping-off point to dive into Julia’s story here at the house,” said Christian Edwards, a historic interpreter who was in charge of handling the clothes and dressing mannequins. “She appears as Eliza Gant in the novel, so this is the story of what’s behind the mother of Eugene Gant.”
Published in 1929, “Look Homeward, Angel” was Wolfe’s first novel and created a huge stir in Asheville. A thinly veiled depiction of the bustling mountain town in the early 1900s, it tells the story of young Eugene Gant growing up in his mother’s boardinghouse, called “Dixieland” in the novel.
Born Oct. 3, 1900, in Asheville, Wolfe died Sept. 15, 1938, from tuberculosis of the brain. The author of numerous short stories,led light bulbs, as well as classic American novels, including “Look Homeward, Angel,” “Of Time and the River” and “You Can’t Go Home Again,” Wolfe became one of America’s most celebrated writers.In the novel, Wolfe depicted his mother as a stern, penny-pinching woman consumed with business, a characterization that wasn’t too far off the mark in real life. The clothing reflects the woman.
“There’s a lot of rayon, which was very popular in the ’30s and ’40s, some satins and some cotton dresses,” Edwards said. “The earliest one is from the 19-teens, and the newest is Julia’s birthday dress from 1945 ― a black satin dress. We have a lot of pictures of her in the sun parlor in that dress.”
Julia Wolfe was born in 1860 and died Dec. 7, 1945. Tom’s father, W.O. Wolfe, was born in 1851 and died in 1922.In 1906, Julia Wolfe bought the rambling wood-frame house, built in 1883 at 48 Spruce St. She ran it for decades as a boardinghouse called the Old Kentucky Home.During the roundup, agents said they found counterfeit designer clothing and CDs. They are now charged with 26 counts illegal use of a counterfeit trademark, recording of performances without consent prohibited and Counterfeiting or possessing counterfeit labels prohibited. If convicted, they all face up to 131 years in prison.