Everybody dreams of being king for a day, but I became a king for several years. Not really, though I did get to live in a real castle, which was certainly a very special life experience. High above Asheville, right off Town Mountain Road, sits an imposing stone castle offering spectacular panoramic views. The 20,000-square-foot… Read more: Article 1 – Seely’s Castle, An Asheville Wonder

In my first article in this series (May 9 Xpress), I described Seely’s Castle and some of its fascinating history and myths. Here’s how I came to be the faux king of the castle. My partner, Jack Doloboff, and I owned a junkyard on Riverside Drive, dealing in all sorts of surplus salvage, scrap metal… Read more: Article 2 – Buying Seely’s Castle

The first question people would ask when they heard about my acquiring Seely’s Castle was “What’s it like living in that place?” The answer was, “Actually we just camp out.” Although I was beginning to have some success in business, I never had the wherewithal to renovate and furnish this architectural wonder in the style… Read more: Article 3 – A Man’s Castle is His Home

It could have been the set for one of those stuffy old English movies where the royalty sit around in their robes surrounded by their fittingly dressed councilors and courtiers harrumphing about the commoners’ shortcomings. The very enormity of the castle’s Great Room was overwhelming. At 2,000 square feet, this one room was far larger… Read more: Article 4 – Furnishing the Great Room

Fred Seely, a teetotaler, would have turned over in his grave if he’d known that I turned his very sedate music room, with its tapestry and oak walls, into a barroom. And what a barroom it was! The men who worked with me gave me a most thoughtful, wonderful, surprise gift. On their own time,… Read more: Article 5 – The Library

A lot of people let their hair down in my castle, but Rapunzel never did. No, the answer to the third-most-frequently-asked question about my former residence lay deep in the bowels of the ominous, imposing tower at the west end. The question was “How the hell did you heat this place?” and the answer was… Read more: Article 6 – Warm Parties in the Cold Castle

The castle’s high priestess was one of the most remarkable women I’ve ever known. She came to us as a domestic when we were living in a small house in Lake View Park. Her name was Beulah Young, but in her squalid neighborhood, where central heat and indoor plumbing were rarities, she was known as… Read more: Article 7 – Miss Beaulah Young

Life in the castle ranged from the usual round of raising a family to the periodically bizarre feeling of living in a fishbowl. Because the castle was so isolated, perched high on a mountain with a fence and big gates and no neighbors, we encouraged the kids to have friends come to visit and stay… Read more: Article 8 – Generals, Guards, and Guests

It didn’t take long for my partner and me to figure out that if we got no other benefit from owning the castle, we were sitting on an invaluable public relations asset. Anyone and everyone wanted to visit, including the many customers of our contract waste-hauling company and the executives of the industrial and manufacturing… Read more: Article 9 – Annual Parties