the years—and sometimes clients would take something from the table and leave home for high tea in the living room. another thing in its place. “Folks just kind of trade,” Gaylord says with a laugh. The house also is home to a pump organ from the 1850s and still has much of Keeping with the older charm, its original charm. The brick facade is the house is furnished with many original, along with the awnings over the antiques and cozy chairs. It has the windows. The doors and wood floors are feel of a home and not a law office. also original. Oak was “Other lawyers are amazed at how comused in the common fortable they feel here,” Gaylord remarks. areas downstairs and “It's a comfort zone. It's just a great pine was used upstairs environment to be in.” A large wood in the bedrooms. Pine table standing in Gaylord's office—a gift was cheaper and used from a client—is in view as he speaks. upstairs for that reason, Gaylord notes. Gaylord naturally has fond memories The two-story garage of growing up in the house with his two in the back is also brothers, Harry and John. Bay Street original; the top floor didn't have nearly the commercial growth was used for the house as it does help's living quarters. now and The house also has a the lots basement, quite a rarity in Florida. near the Gaylord In the days before cell phones and interM a n o r coms, a buzzer system was used to sumw e r e mon the help. A buzzer was installed in the wooded. floor of the dining room and one would The trio simply step on it and it would signal the of brothhelp in their living quarters. The dining ers would room has since been converted to a client e n j o y waiting area and a rug covers it, but the watching their neighbor chase snakes buzzer is still there. Also in that waiting with a pitchfork. They also had a fire area is a table with a collection of trinkets pedal car they would “drive” down the hill towards Lake Eustis. Usually the curb would stop them short, Gaylord remembers, and his brothers would go flying. Today the pedal car still sits in the living room where the boys' mother and her students once enjoyed high tea. (Continued from previous page)
Gaylord continued to live in the house until he was about 16 years old and the city decided to turn the area into commercial property. In terms of its use today as a law office, Gaylord has no plans of retiring and that's been given to the attorneys over said he will likely practice until he dies. 12
Lake Legal News Aug. 2015