The Many Lives of Elettra
Artist. Restaurateur. Adventurer. The woman who brought the world back to Tryon.
About This Evening
She called herself an architect.
She was born Carolyn Gale Kidd in Rochester, New York, in the early years of the twentieth century — the eldest of five children in a family that summered in Tryon. Everyone who knew her called her Elettra.
She trained at the Cranbrook Academy of Art and spent her life making things: oil paintings, hand-woven textiles, and sweaters so intricate they carried pictorial scenes. She competed horses with the Genesee Valley Hunt. After her divorce she moved to Taormina, Sicily, became fluent in Italian, and sold her knitting to tourists. She spent time in Granada before political unrest sent her home.
When she landed in Tryon, she designed her own house on Hogback Mountain. She called herself an architect. No one who saw what she built thought to argue.
She opened Elettra's restaurant on Trade Street, with its Blue Grotto Pub, and ran it with unmistakable flair. She was a magnificent cook and a generous host — the kind whose parties people talked about for years. In 1984 she bought sixty-eight acres above Lake Lanier in Landrum, created Song Hill, and designed and built three residences on the land. A fire in 2004 took everything she had built last: artwork, heirlooms, things that could not be replaced. She escaped with her life.
Song Hill endures. It is run today as an event center by one of her granddaughters.
Elettra was flamboyant, self-possessed, and wholly original. Tryon was where she chose to be.
Doors open at 4:00 pm for refreshments. The program begins at 5:00 pm. Free and open to the public.
About This Program
Told by family.
Elettra's story comes to us through the people who knew her best. Family members will share recollections of her life, her houses, her table, and the years she spent making Tryon her own.
Tryon was where she chose to be.
Tryon History Museum