Winnie's Memorabilia

In spite of the fact that Winnie Hewitt was by no means a hoarder - rather the reverse in fact - when she died in 1963, she managed to leave behind significant traces of her life and that of Gurley, her husband, whom she outlived by twenty-five years. Much of this was stored - probably not by Winnie herself but by one of her sisters - in the old family home in an enormous black trunk, the same trunk in which she carried her wardrobe back and forth to Rollins College in 1906 and 1907. She also had a big pink candy box for personal keepsakes. Below are images showing a fraction of the physical evidence that survives Winnie. Winnie and Gurley: The Best-Kept Family Secret incorporates 130 images from her memorabilia, as well as from family photograph albums.

The Author

Robert Griffith Hewitt, the author of this book, is the grandson of Winnie and Gurley. His father Griffith Gurley "Buster" Hewitt was their younger child and only son.

By the time Robert was born, his grandfather Gurley had been dead long enough so that he was never spoken of, and Robert knew Winnie only as a sweet-faced, heavyset older lady, a more-or-less permanent house guest, who was always good for a candy bar, a homemade coconut cake, or an addition to his Lionel layout if he whined enough.

For much of his life, he knew almost nothing else about her other than the fact that she was deaf, adored chocolates, worked crossword puzzles, played endless games of solitaire, never missed reading her preferred daily newspaper, and did not like his father, her only son, a sentiment that was heartily reciprocated. Then his mother almost accidentally revealed a secret so bizarre that he realized he had not known Winnie at all.

There the matter probably would have rested had it not been for Winnie's memorabilia, which over the years - box by box, piece by piece, and album by album - came into the author's possession. Prompted by questions from readers of No Instructions Needed: An American Boyhood in the 1950s, his 2010 memoir of childhood pastimes, he opened Winnie's big black trunk in which all the memorabilia, keepsakes, and photographs were stored. What he found there raised as many questions as it answered, and he went on a quest to learn what had really happened with his grandparents all those years ago.

Robert Hewitt is an award-winning designer and illustrator, and the founder and president of Hewitt & Hewitt, Inc., an Atlanta public relations boutique that specialized in communications strategies for Fortune 100 companies. He now concentrates on artwork and writing. To see examples of his art, check out www.hewittandhewitt.com.

Book Details

Reader Reviews

FIVE STARS. Best Kept Family Secret Should Be No Secret, It's A Great Read, March 6, 2012. Alert the fans of Don Robertson's The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread: A Novel as you will love this book as much as you love Robertson's book. From the first page to the end, one is mesmerized and brought back to a different time and place. While Tolstoy said "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way," I believe every family has their happiness and their sadness and Bob Hewitt brings us into his family to share both the high and low poins. Having never read his other works, I now want to buy them to read them.

FOUR STARS. Memoir and Mystery, March 5, 2012. I just received this book and read it from cover to cover before the day was over. It is a quite good memoir of a family from the early 1900s to the 21st century. Tragedy and conflict are covered in detail, but in a way that raises your curiosity and leaves you with at least one major question at the end of the book. The book includes period photographs that are fascinating to look at and is well written.

FOUR STARS. A Family Memoir Written in a Folksy, Conversational Way, March 8, 2012. The secret shaped the lives of his parents and in some ways the author. I enjoyed reading about the Hewitt family; you can feel the love and respect the author has for his family and I thank him for sharing it.

FIVE STARS. This could have been my bio...except that I am a female. Hewitt missed the fun doing girlie things like playing beauty parlor. He nailed my childhood except for my working for an uncle; I cried; I nodded my head “YES!”. All my childhood friends will receive a copy of his book from me. Hewitt could have spent his childhood on my street. Those were fun days.
FIVE STARS. A charming book of nostalgia. Makes me want to go back to the “good old days”. A really good read in this depressing climate.
FOUR STARS. I’m 12 years younger than Mr. Hewitt and female instead of male, but have many of the same feelings about my childhood as he did - the safety, the more separate lives of children from their parents, the freedom we had. I really enjoyed this book. It brought back my own memories of growing up in the suburbs of Los Angeles. It’s well written and glows with the happiness of his childhood. I found the book trailer on YouTube, which had some wonderful pictures of him and his family. They made my experience complete.
FIVE STARS. A refreshing look at an era when kids had the time and personal freedom to experiment (perhaps not always wisely) with “growing-up”situations and skills. Some of the things these kids did sound hair-raising, but survival seems to have been a proof of sorts that whatever adulthood offered could be handled. A light and pleasant read with interesting illustrations.
FOUR STARS. This was such an enjoyable read, I finished the book in two days. It brought back so many memories of the games the neighborhood boys used to play, sometimes even the girls (including me and my two sisters) would join in. The illustrations were by the author and quite fun.
FIVE STARS. I liked this book . . . I really liked this book. Perhaps it had a bit to do with identifying with what the author had to say - I’m about the same age as him and recall growing up in the late forties and early fifties with much of the same frame of reference. Hewitt never identifies the town where his childhood takes place, but it seems to have been a small to medium sized city somewhere in the eastern United States. He talks about the events of his growing up in an unaffected and clear voice. This delightful book is a wonderful read and one that I highly recommend.
FOUR STARS. In his introduction, the author, talking about his boyhood, says, “It was a lot of fun”. And so was this read. Nothing happened - no mysteries were solved, no shocking discoveries found, no dark family secrets aired, no bodices ripped, no aliens invaded. But it WAS fun. Hop on your childhood wheels . . . and come along for a trip back to a simpler time and place. A memoir writ with a dash of dry humor, on a landscape of fond memories . . . this makes us privy to the workings of the mind of a boy. After closing the covers with a sigh, my overall feeling was one of nostalgia for my own idyllic childhood, and a sense of loss that future generations will likely have less and less opportunity for childhood play time with “no instructions needed”. I recommend this book, if you enjoy a trip now and again down someone else’s memory lane.
FIVE STARS. An interesting, surprisingly affecting book from an adult looking back at a childhood that he has come to realize was special indeed.

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