Victor Fleming’s iconic film “Gone With the Wind” described the antebellum South as a “civilization gone with the wind.”

From acres of cotton and ladies’ hoopskirts to the sugary-sweet drawls and blistering heat, the 1939 epic captured the imagination of global audiences with its romanticized version of the Southern plantation.

However, this ideal is far from reality.

Judy LaRose, executive director for the Historic Ramsey House in East Knoxville, explained how Colonel Alexander Ramsey’s stone mansion fits only the most basic definition of “plantation,” referring to the acreage used for sustenance farming.

“We rebranded the name from Ramsey House Plantation to Historic Ramsey House, because, in the modern vernacular, people come here expecting to see Scarlett O’Hara and the big white pillars and the porches across the top, and that is not what this house is or any houses in area (are like),” LaRose said.

In his lifetime, Col. Ramsey sat on the first Board of Trustees for Blount College, the predecessor institution for the University of Tennessee. His oldest son, J.G.M. Ramsey, would also pen the Annals of Tennessee and found the East Tennessee Historical Society.

LaRose explained that the Ramsey family’s 1797 home, constructed from nearby marble outcroppings, largely existed to feed the 35 to 40 individuals that lived and worked on the property at any given time.

For the Ramsey family, this consisted of the head of the house, his wife, children, slaves, guests in the home and the sharecroppers employed by the family.

“If you go to Middle and West Tennessee, there were many more plantations there, but the land here just wasn’t conducive to planting,” LaRose said.

But rocky soil wasn’t the only feature that distinguished an East Tennessee home like the Ramsey’s from other southern agricultural communities.

Because of the area’s limited food production, slavery did not take root as strongly as in neighboring states, painting a much different picture than other plantations.

“This was more of a business kind of community,” LaRose said. “Certainly there was farming here, but it was more on a local basis. So slavery in this area was totally different.”

While this 101.5 acre home sits off the beaten path, another influential Tennesseean erected his own mansion near the heart of Knoxville’s downtown — just few years before the Ramsey family settled on the frontier.

Set to undergo the second phase of a $2 million restoration, William Blount’s 1797 mansion remains a more visible part of Knoxville’s history.

A land surveyor like Ramsey, Blount and his family are considered one of the founding families of the city, mostly due to Blount’s long-time association and representation of the area as one of Tennessee’s first congressmen, senator and role as “Superintendent of Indian Affairs” under President George Washington.

Unique from the surrounding log cabins of the time, Blount Mansion still attracts a crop of local visitors, out-of-towners and school groups every year.

Megan Stromer, a fifth year senior in history and psychology, who works at the site as a docent, noted that while many are surprised to learn the property did not operate as plantation, its slave force totaled 27 domestic and field workers.

“We definitely don’t push (slavery) under the carpet,” Stromer said. “Yes, the Blounts did own slaves. And the Blounts actually, for whatever reason, were pretty progressive … they ended up freeing most of their slaves so the slaves could marry. It was legal at the time for slaves to be taught to read and write. We don’t know if any of the Blount slaves knew how to, but they could have, and the Blounts went to pains to keep families together.”

This home, noted for its exquisite hillside view of the Henley Bridge and the Tennessee River, was almost lost in a haze of construction frenzy.

Originally scheduled to be flattened in the ’20s, the efforts of Mary Boyce Temple, one of Knoxville’s most vocal activists, stopped the motion to tear down the land for a new parking garage by the Andrew Johnson Hotel.

“I don’t think a lot of people knew — or maybe didn’t care — at the time, that this was the Blount home or the significance of the family,” Stromer said. “She recognized the value of this home and together with the mayor and some UT professors and said, ‘Hey, this house is important and it’s important that we preserve this.

“Just because we’re in this age were we are building stuff and modernizing doesn’t mean history has stopped being important.'”