Walking into the home of Powell and Megan Litton on River Road Extended in Greenwood, one is struck by an air of serenity. That sense of soothing is among the house's most appealing features, the couple says.
Constructed in 1939 by renowned Memphis architects Everett Woods and Robert Brown, the two-story Greek Revival home provides everything the Litton family needs — peace, security, privacy and room to grow.
“We’re in town, but we’re out of town,” explained Powell, settling into a brown leather sofa in the couple’s wood-paneled den, which many visitors have referred to simply as “the wood room.”
“It’s a small oasis,” said Megan. “It’s wonderful to live here.”
The solid, well-established house, which the Littons updated soon after purchasing it in 2018 from previous owner Jane Thomas, boasts four bedrooms, five bathrooms and the unique feature in the Delta of a basement. A sunroom converted into a nursery for their youngest child, Charlotte, age 18 months, increases the number of bedrooms to five.
“The house gives us space to grow,” said Powell, 45. This is an important function, as the family includes two other children: son William, 14, and Martha, 10. Both are students at Pillow Academy.
The house, located in the Elmwood Subdivision, was originally built for the Provines. It was sold to William and Jane Thomas in the 1980s. The Thomas family lived in the house for many years. “Mr. Thomas passed away,” Powell said, and “Mrs. Thomas somewhat relocated to Oxford. She still had the house fully furnished but didn’t spend much time here. She loved the idea of a family coming in and giving it the attention it deserved.”
The Littons have since done many updates, including opening up the high-ceilinged rooms by raising the height of the door frames, expanding the kitchen and creating a spacious back porch area that can accommodate large get-togethers with ease.
“We have done everything in keeping with the character of the house,” Megan said. “We wanted to honor the original architecture. This house has great old bones. We wanted to enhance its many wonderful features.”
The wood-panelled den provides warmth and an area of togetherness for the family. (By Johnny Jennings)
Powell and Megan met in 2017 and married in 2020. The house on River Road Extended is their first home to own together. They met each other after spending many years away from their home state of Mississippi.
Powell, who is the chief financial officer of Wade, Inc., was born and raised in Greenwood, the son of William P. Litton, the president of Wade. G. A. Wade, Powell’s great-grandfather, started the company in 1909 as Wade Hardware Store. Megan, who is a Realtor with Powers Properties, was born in Grenada and lived in Oxford and Memphis before relocating to New York City, where she worked in real estate for the Corcoran Group. Powell graduated from Pillow Academy in 1996, went to Ole Miss, then completed his college education with a degree in business and finance from the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia.
He spent a year working for a cotton broker in Brisbane before returning to the U.S. Powell then worked on the floor of the U.S. Senate in the early 2000s, as a communications liaison. He has worked for Wade, Inc., since 2004.
Megan, 36, earned her business degree from Borough of Manhattan Community College and sold real estate for Corcoran, which was created by the entrepreneur Barbara Corcoran, of “Shark Tank” fame. She later relocated to Memphis, and she and Powell were introduced by a mutual acquaintance.
“We both wanted to do something different,” she said of her decision to work in New York and Powell’s to transfer to Australia and later work in Washington. “I grew up in Mississippi and always saw myself coming back to raise a family. I do miss some of the luxuries of New York, but Greenwood has that perfect feeling of home. This is where we want to be at this point in our lives.”
They spend most of their family time in their den, which is dominated by a cozy fireplace and filled with comfortable furniture. The mahogany paneling is unique and hard to replicate. “It is a great built-in feature,” Powell said.
The Littons brought a mixture of furniture they already owned and new furniture to fill the house, giving it a fresh feel that makes a charming contrast with the original architectural styling of the home. The formal living room is filled with sleek, stylish white couches and other tasteful contemporary touches that give the space a lighter feel than the den. It is open and airy while the den promotes a feeling of togetherness and relaxation.
Separating the den from the living room is a spacious foyer. A staircase curves gently down from the first floor, providing two closets for storage. The front door offers a direct view through the foyer to the backyard, where crepe myrtles line a concrete path pointing to Elmwood Plantation beyond.
“I love that view,” Megan said. “We love having the farm nearby. It provides such beautiful views at sunset.”
The original hardwood floors, polished to a gleam, stretch throughout the house. A smaller seating area featuring a wet bar connects the formal living room to the kitchen, which has been updated with white marble countertops and cabinets that strikingly contrast the darker wood elements of the other spaces.
In remodeling the kitchen area, workers exposed a portion of the original brick which Powell and Megan have retained. A load-bearing wood beam was also exposed and is visible along with the brick, making an attractively stylish transition into the kitchen with its sleek countertops and stainless-steel appliances.
New hardware on the interior doors as well as modern light fixtures bring a sense of low maintenance and the present day into the house, which Powell said was once part of a subdivision established by Elmwood Plantation.
The plantation provides not only a pleasant, pastoral view that the Littons and their guests can enjoy from the back porch, but a safe respite for their children. A farm road running behind the house connects the Litton children with others in the neighborhood. “They can hop on their bikes or in a golf card and just run up and down the road, going from one set of friends to another,” Megan chuckled. “It’s a safe location for the kids; everybody knows everybody.”
One favorite activity of the Litton children in the summer is having a lemonade stand in the driveway. Last summer, their stand proved particularly successful as they got into a sales competition with the kids next door.
Many areas of the home enhance a feeling of family togetherness. Three fireplaces, including one on the screened-in back porch, exemplify its ability to provide warmth and closeness.
“We spend a lot of time here with the children,” Powell said of the back porch. “It’s just unique in the way it provides for us all on a Sunday afternoon. We’ll cook steaks or burgers and hot dogs and just hang out and watch the kids play.”
A sealed flagstone floor fits nicely with the exposed brick and wood of the back porch, which can hold up to 40 people at once.
“People enjoy it,” Powell said of their porch. “They like to bring coffee out here and relax. The view and the landscaping are great, and at night it is particularly impressive.”
In addition to the crepe myrtles, the back yard has a lovely little playhouse for the kids that looks almost big and solid enough for an adult to move into.
“It’s an easy home for entertaining,” said Megan. “We love having guests over, we love to entertain. We have space for dining, we have space for kids to play. We really want it to feel lived-in. We think we’ve achieved that when we have people over.”
“Family is the most important thing,” Powell said. “Everything else in life is transitory. We wanted to have memories with our children, a place that will bring us together. You realize that’s what really matters — the memories of the family.”
