In 1978, sitting United States President Jimmy Carter stipulated that the island was to become Georgia's first heritage preserve.
[2] At the time of the Torreys' purchase of Greenwich Place, it had "an elaborately furnished main house, a six-car garage, a laundry building, a superintendent's office and cottage, a gate lodge, a chauffeur's cottage, other servants' quarters, an artificial pond, and formal gardens.
"[3] Outside there were stables (which are still visible), a dairy farm, a 200-foot-long greenhouse (at the western edge of the mansion), a bath and pool house, and a yacht dock.
[3] It was said to have rivaled the Vanderbilts' Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, as the most opulent in the South.
[1][5] Instead of rebuilding, the family moved to Ossabaw Island,[2] where they built a house between 1924 and 1926,[6] taking with them the two large iron gates from Greenwich Place.