Julia Evans Reed, writer and philanthropist 1960-2020

Born in Greenville, Mississippi, on September 11, 1960, Julia Evans Reed was the daughter of Judy and Clarke Reed. Her mother was a native of Nashville, the child of a prominent Belle Meade family; her father, a businessman and leader of the Mississippi Republican Party who played a role in the years of Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush.

Educated in Greenville, and at Madeira, Georgetown, and American University, Julia lived and worked in Washington, D.C., New York City, New Orleans, and Greenville. A longtime editor and writer for Vogue magazine, she also contributed to the New York Times, Newsweek, Conde Nast Traveler, the Wall Street Journal, U.S. News & World Report, and Elle Décor. And until the time of her death, she was a cornerstone of Garden & Gun, where loyal readers and fans would turn immediately to her column for dispatches from her world.

As an author, columnist, and speaker, Julia was a figure in the tradition of M.F.K. Fisher and Edith Wharton. She was a writer of great range whose subjects included corrupt but charming Southern politicians, first families, food, art, architecture, gardening, decorating, and the triumphs and the tragedies of the American South.

Her books, include: Ham Biscuits and House on First Street; Julia Reed’s New Orleans: Food, Fun, and Field Trips for Letting the Good Times Roll; South Toward Home, Adventures and Misadventures in My Native Land; Julia Reed’s South: Spirited Entertaining and High Style Fun All Year Long; But Mama Always Put Vodka in Her Sangria; Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena; One Man’s Folly: The Exceptional Houses of Furlow Gatewood.

Julia served on the National Advisory Board of the Eudora Welty Foundation as well as the board of the Link-Stryjewksi Foundation. She was a founding member of the Board and long-time Trustee of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. She divided her time between New Orleans and Greenville, Mississippi.

Books

Dispatches from the Gilded Age: A Few More Thoughts on Interesting People, Far-Flung Places, and the Joys of Southern Comforts

Dispatches from the Gilded Age: A Few More Thoughts on Interesting People, Far-Flung Places, and the Joys of Southern Comforts

The end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first was a time in which the high and the low bubbled furiously together and Julia was there with her sharp eye, keen wit, and uproariously clear-eyed way of seeing the world to chronicle this truly spectacular era. Dispatches from the Gilded Age is Julia at her best as she profiles Andre Leon Talley, Sister Helen Prejean, President George and Laura Bush, Madeleine Albright, and others. Readers will travel to Africa and Cuba with Julia, dine at Le Bernardin, savor steaks at Doe’s Eat Place, consider the fashions of the day, get the recipes for her hot cheese olives and end up with the ride of their lives through Julia’s beloved South.

With a foreword by Roy Blount, Jr. and edited by Julia’s longtime assistant, Everett Bexley.

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Julia Reed's New Orleans: Food, Fun & Field Trips for Letting the Good Times Roll

Julia Reed's New Orleans: Food, Fun & Field Trips for Letting the Good Times Roll

This follow-up to Julia’s bestseller Julia Reed’s South showcases her entertaining know-how and that of her noted chef friends—and her love of New Orleans. Held in a variety of venues, from courtyards to gracious interior spaces, the gatherings’ menus include such dishes as grillades, grits, and seafood gumbo, and cocktails ranging from the traditional Sazerac to a Satsuma Margarita. Featured are an elegant holiday dinner, a crawfish boil, and a lunch under the live oaks. All are presented in luscious photographs and include tips on setting tables, arranging flowers, and crafting playlists to create a festive mood.

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South Toward Home: Advenures & Misadventures in My Native Land

South Toward Home: Advenures & Misadventures in My Native Land

In her warmhearted and funny new book, South Toward Home, Julia chronicles her adventures through the highs and the lows of Southern life—taking us everywhere from dive bars and the Delta Hot Tamale Festival to an impromptu shindig on a Mississippi River sandbar and a coveted seat on a Mardi Gras float. She writes about the region’s music and food, its pesky critters and prodigious drinking habits, its inhabitants’ penchant for making their own fun—and, crucially, their gift for laughing at themselves.

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Julia Reed's South: Spirited Entertaining and High-Style Fun All Year Long

Julia Reed's South: Spirited Entertaining and High-Style Fun All Year Long

The ultimate primer for every party-giver. Julia offers up a feast of options for holiday cocktails, spring lunches, formal dinners, and even a hunt breakfast. Eleven seasonal events feature delicious, easy-to-prepare recipes, ranging from fried chicken to Charlotte Russe and signature cocktails or wine-pairings, and each occasion includes gorgeous photographs showcasing Julia’s original approach to everything—from invitations and setting a table to arranging flowers and creating the mood. Reed also provides practical considerations and sources.

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But Mama Always Put Vodka in Her Sangria!: Adventures in Eating, Drinking, and Making Merry

But Mama Always Put Vodka in Her Sangria!: Adventures in Eating, Drinking, and Making Merry

Julia Reed, a master of the art of eating, drinking, and making merry, takes the reader on culinary adventures in places as far flung as Kabul, Afghanistan and as close to home as her native Mississippi Delta and Florida’s Gulf Coast. Along the way, Reed discovers the perfect Pimm’s Royale at the Paris Ritz, devours delicious chuletons in Madrid, and picks up tips from accomplished hostesses ranging from Pat Buckley to Pearl Bailey and, of course, her own mother.

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The House on First Street: My New Orleans Story

The House on First Street: My New Orleans Story

After almost fifteen years of living like a vagabond on a reporter’s schedule, Julia got married and bought a house in the historic Garden District in New Orleans. Four weeks after she moved in, Hurricane Katrina struck. With her house as the center of her own personal storm as well as the ever-evolving stage set for her new life as an upstanding citizen, Reed traces the fates of all who enter to wine, dine (at her table for twenty-four), tear down walls, install fixtures, throw fits and generally leave their mark on the house on First Street. Through it all, Julia Reed discovers there really is no place like home.

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Ham Biscuits, Hostess Gowns, and Other Southern Specialties: An Entertaining Life

Ham Biscuits, Hostess Gowns, and Other Southern Specialties: An Entertaining Life

In Ham Biscuits, Hostess Gowns and Other Southern Specialties Julia collects her thoughts on good cooking and the lessons of gracious entertaining that pass from one woman to another, and takes the reader on a lively and very personal tour of the culinary—and social—South. In essays on everything from pork chops to the perfect picnic Julia Reed revels in the simple good qualities that make the Southern table the best possible place to pull up a chair. She also elaborates on worthwhile information every hostess would do well to learn: the icebreaking qualities of a Ramos gin fizz and a hot crabmeat canapé, for example….

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Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena

Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena

In classic Dixie storytelling fashion, with a rare blend of literary elegance and plainspoken humor, the inimitably charming, staunchly Southern Julia Reed wends her way below the Mason-Dixon line and observes many phenomena– from politics, religion, and women to weather, guns, and what she calls “drinking and other Southern pursuits.” To hear Reed tell it, the South is another country. She builds an entertaining and persuasive case, using as examples everything from its unfathomable codes of conduct to its disciplined fashion sense. And then there is Southern food, which is an entire world apart…

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One Man's Folly: The Exceptional House of Furlow Gatewood

One Man's Folly: The Exceptional House of Furlow Gatewood

Julia Reed takes us to the magical property of antiques collector and designer extraordinaire Furlow Gatewood’s highly personal property in bucolic Americus, Georgia, where he has meticulously restored his family’s carriage house and added intimate dwellings and outbuildings. This book is a feast for the eyes and an introduction to an incomparable Southern character in the best sense of the world.

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