Thomasville gift supports Hemingway home rescue
By Furniture Today Staff -- Furniture Today, August 29, 2005
Thomasville, N.C. — Thomasville Furniture has donated $20,000 to support efforts of the National Trust and the Hemingway Preservation Foundation to save Finca Vigía, author Ernest Hemingway's home in San Francisco de Paula, Cuba.
Thomasville produces the Ernest Hemingway Collection of furniture, which reflects the famed author's life and travels.
The grant, secured by the National Trust's Save America's Treasures program, will help send a team of architects and engineers to Cuba to study the hillside home to determine long-term solutions for its restoration.
"Private support from generous contributors like Thomasville Furniture is essential to the preservation of historic treasures like Finca Vigía," said Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
The home was built in 1886, and Hemingway lived there from 1939 to 1960. Structural problems and damage from the elements have caused the site to deteriorate so severely that experts call it a "preservation emergency."
Thomasville is a division of Furniture Brands International.
