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Conway Twitty spent decades topping country charts, but in 1981 he poured $3.5 million into building a place that would bring his entire family under one sky. On a nine-acre property in Hendersonville, Tennessee, he began constructing Twitty City, a private compound designed around kinship rather than isolation. The layout centered on his own residence, placed a home nearby for his mother, Velma Jenkins, and added four separate houses for his adult children—Joni, Kathy, Jimmy, and Michael. After years of long highway tours and nights away from home, he wanted his children and grandchildren within walking distance across the courtyard. When the grounds opened in 1982, Conway took the rare step of inviting the public inside. Visitors walked the gardens, explored an on-site museum of his career, and attended an annual Christmas display that lit the estate with more than 300,000 bulbs. The nine acres served as both his business headquarters and a multigenerational home. Each morning before meetings, he could walk across the path for coffee with his mother, while his grandchildren played on the lawns outside the family houses. To Conway, sharing his home with the fans who bought his records was simply an extension of the hospitality he practiced with his own kin. His chart records secured his standing in music history, but Twitty City reflected what he worked toward when the amplifiers were turned off. The daily routines behind those shared gates, and how the family managed the property across the following decade, remain a vivid window into the man behind the music.

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CONWAY TWITTY BUILT A RECORD-SETTING COUNTRY EMPIRE — BUT IN 1981 HE POURED $3.5 MILLION INTO KEEPING THREE GENERATIONS OF HIS FAMILY TOGETHER.

In 1981, at the peak of a historic recording career that produced fifty-five number-one singles, Conway Twitty broke ground on a project that puzzled many music industry executives. Rather than retreating behind secluded estate walls, the Mississippi native purchased a nine-acre plot off Music Village Boulevard in Hendersonville, Tennessee, to build Twitty City.

The multimillion-dollar complex was engineered from the beginning around family unity. After decades of relentless highway touring that had often kept him away from his children’s early years, Conway wanted a physical sanctuary where his entire family could live within walking distance across a shared courtyard.

The estate layout reflected that devotion. At the center stood Conway’s own residence, flanked by a home specifically designed for his mother, Velma Jenkins, alongside separate homes for his four adult children: Joni, Kathy, Jimmy, and Michael.

When the gates officially opened in 1982, Conway took the extraordinary step of sharing the outer grounds with the public. The complex included a showcase museum, recording facilities, retail gift shops, and an outdoor theater, quickly becoming one of the premier tourist attractions in Middle Tennessee.

Despite the daily flow of tour buses, the private residences preserved an everyday family routine. Each morning before business meetings at his production offices, Conway walked across the stone paths to drink coffee with his mother. In the afternoons, his grandchildren rode bicycles along the paved driveways connecting the houses.

Over the next decade, managing the nine-acre compound grew into a cooperative family enterprise. His children actively worked the grounds: Michael helped oversee stage logistics, Jimmy managed retail operations, and his daughters assisted with merchandising and visitor administration.

Each winter, that hospitality turned into a massive community event. The annual Christmas illumination featured more than 300,000 lights, life-size displays, and holiday music, drawing hundreds of thousands of visitors from across the country throughout December. Conway often walked the illuminated walkways unannounced, greeting families who traveled hundreds of miles to see the display.

Born Harold Lloyd Jenkins during the Great Depression, Conway never forgot the financial hardships of his childhood in Friars Point, Mississippi. He viewed his success not as a means of personal retreat, but as a resource to provide stability for his extended family and to thank the audience that made his career possible.

The complex operated until his sudden passing in June 1993 at age fifty-nine, standing through eleven years as an enduring symbol of a life anchored in kinship.

Music history preserves Conway Twitty through chart records, rich baritone ballads, and celebrated duets. Yet the true heart of his legacy remained that nine-acre Hendersonville courtyard, where three generations gathered under one sky.

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