Scott & Zelda in Montgomery

October 8, 1931 the Montgomery newspaper announced with a headline: Scott Fitzgeralds to Spend Winter Here Writing Books. There was excitement at the return home of the former Zelda Sayre, daughter of a prominent judge, after the Jazz Age couple's extended tour of Europe.

The paper kindly overlooked Zelda's discharge from a Swiss clinic one month earlier following prolonged treatment for her first "breakdown."

The famous couple leased a home at 919 Felder near Zelda's parents. By November, Scott had accepted a job in Hollywood and left Zelda with their ten year old daughter, Scottie, in the Felder house.

An excerpt from one of my favorites: The Great Gatsby

"We walked . . . Into a bright rosy-coloured space, fragilely bound into the house by French windows at either end. The windows were ajar and gleaming white against the fresh cut grass outside that seemed to grow a little way into the house. A breeze blew through the room, blew curtains in at one end and out the other like pale flags, twisting them up toward the frosted wedding-cake of the ceiling, and then rippled over the wine-coloured rug, making a shadow on it as wind does on the sea."

- The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

While they occupied the house on Felder, Zelda's feelings for Scott remained true and she wrote to her husband, "Scottie is so sweet and darling and the house is so pleasant and I have everything in the world except you."

The home is now the Fitzgerald Museum, however it was closed when I was there.

A map! in case you were wondering where Montgomery is.