There has always been some sleight of hand during the history and evolution of Landfall.

Until now. 

Today, Landfall sits along the Intracoastal Waterway, tucked inside the northeast corner of Wilmington’s city limits, without illusions. The 1,533 homeowners really have settled down on 2,200 acres that includes two championship golf courses, seemingly endless nature trails and 4.5 miles of waterfront. There no longer is an obsession in literally “keeping up with the Joneses,” or stooping to the deceptive devices it required.

Actually, no one kept up with Pembroke Jones. Jones, a Wilmington industrialist with a keen eye for making money and an imaginative flair for spending it, began collecting the land and then building an estate, party palace and hunting grounds at the beginning of the last century around where Landfall now sits.

The estate was fashioned in part with gates and buildings designed by Jones’ son-in-law, John Russell Pope, when he wasn’t busy designing the Jefferson Memorial or the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. 

And the parties – either at the Joneses’ mansion (where Airlie Gardens is now) or their nearby Pembroke Park and Lodge (modern-day Landfall) – were legendary.

As told in a history book written and published in 2001 by the Country Club of Landfall Communications Committee, Jones had lavish soirees not just for adults, but also for children, where things were not always what they seemed. At one birthday party, each child received a yellow canary in a cage. But as each bird bathed in its cage the next day, its yellow dye drained off to reveal a simple brown sparrow.

Things continued to take illusionary turns long after the lodge and its glorious surroundings suffered in ruin from neglect and disrepair. The building burned down, trespassers stole materials and underbrush crept around the Temple of Love – a columned gazebo that was the centerpiece of the lodge’s garden.

By the 1970s, the land had descended into the hands of Jane Pope Akers, the granddaughter of the patriarch Jones and daughter of the designer Pope.

According to local historian Susan Taylor Block, Akers had become a fast friend of Jacqueline Bouvier. Jackie married Jack, and the president would later name Aker’s husband, Anthony, ambassador to New Zealand. After Camelot and the Kennedy administration dissolved, Jane and Tony Akers decided to spend more time in Wilmington and rejuvenate Landfall. But a heart attack felled him just before plans were unveiled in 1976. Jane Akers went to Florida, remarried to become Jane Akers Ridgway and abandoned her hopes for reinventing the land. 

This also was when Bill Saffo and his buddies, as teenagers growing up on Wrightsville Beach, had their first experience with Landfall, long before Saffo would become mayor of Wilmington in 2006.

“We used to sneak into the remains of the old hunting lodge,” he remembered. “There were no fences or guards. It was just open rural land that ran from Howe Creek all the way over to Eastwood Road. All of us used to go back and walk in there. It was like we had our own Appalachian Trail.”

Saffo also remembers seeing Jane Akers often enough: when she would return for visits to Wilmington, she took up residence at the old Heart of Wilmington Hotel on Third Street, which was owned by Saffo’s father, Dokey.

Finally, she sold the land to J.P. Goforth, a Chapel Hill developer with tons of energy but no “off” switch, in 1984. He bought it for somewhere north of $30 million with what some believe was somewhere south of 5 percent of that. But he found a handful of people to lend him money to match his vision for what would be called Landfall. 

Goforth’s marketing plan, however, was out of step with the times: selling 60-foot lots to only local homebuyers. When he would run out of funds to complete one house, he simply would borrow money for the start of the next one. He sold lots on a handshake, according to the history book, with the congratulatory remark: “You get a membership with that.” But a membership to what: the association, the golf course clubhouse, ownership in the community?

While the lawyers tried to figure it all out, Goforth folded, selling his dream to businessman and philanthropist Frank H. Kenan in the fall of 1989. The following spring, Goforth committed suicide. His death came after a Chapel Hill district attorney said a state criminal probe was to begin “into allegations that Goforth and his companies defrauded customers, business associates and employees in various deals,” according to an Associated Press report. A Wilmington Morning Star article also quoted Goforth’s defenders insisting there was no “wrongdoing” there.

The tricks and winks ended as the Kenans, de rigueur, put things right. In partnership with Weyerhaeuser, the wood and pulp conglomerate, Kenan’s new marketing plan fit changing times: lots, at minimum 75 feet wide, and homes surrounded by lakes and parks were sold to anyone from anywhere to coincide with a national second-home buying boom. Landfall was on its way as homebuyers began arriving from 40 states and 20 countries.

Marking the sendoff 25 years ago was the opening of the championship Pete Dye golf course, christening Landfall and setting the tone for a community that would pride itself on maintaining its cache and championing its stability. 

No, club memberships are not free today, and brown sparrows need not fear a yellow paint job. Things are as they seem.

And that’s pretty good, says Austin Newsom, who has been living with Landfall from 1987 to its current configuration. 

Newsom and his wife, Gladys, North Carolina natives who were retired from Washington, bought one of the first lots in 1987 in the Prestwick neighborhood, one of 24 sub-communities inside Landfall.

“It was a patio home,” Newsom said, “and it probably was just a 60-foot lot. But we lived there for 25 years, and it always has been a wonderful place. The diversity is appealing. All types of people and lots of different income levels. Makes it nice.”

Newsom, 87, and his wife sold their patio home in May and moved to a retirement community to take advantage of the “life care.” But the Newsoms were there at the beginning, back when he could shoot in the 70s on the Dye course. That also was back when Goforth’s vision for Landfall might have faded to black.

“Look, Goforth was a one-man operation, and he had a lot of vision,” said Newsom, who knew the Chapel Hill developer. “But he was overwhelmed – in over his head.

“I can’t tell you how fortunate we were to have Frank Kenan and his family buy Goforth’s interest in it before Goforth passed away. Kenan had a serious interest in making Landfall what it is today. And I’m very glad we have a beautiful chapel in Landfall with Frank Kenan’s name on it.”

By the mid-1990s, the city of Wilmington annexed Landfall and areas around it.

“I’m sure the folks in Landfall weren’t happy about it, but whoever is,” said Jim Wallace, president of Intracoastal Realty. “With its underground facilities and roads, the city didn’t have to take on much. It was a plum that was just sitting here.”

Wallace doesn’t live in Landfall but owns three lots there and has a sports membership at the country club. He described the development as a unique place.

“When Landfall was starting in the mid-1980s, some of my agents worried that it would hurt values of others home, like on Wrightsville Beach,” Wallace said. “But the exact opposite happened. It was a terrific plan, and it has developed a terrific brand in an unusual setting, with a buffer of Wrightsville Beach on one side and Figure Eight Island on the other. It actually raised property values outside Landfall and brought new people here from all over.

“At first, you know, as a gated community, a lot of local folks took a wait-and-see attitude because it was a new upscale community with people from the Northeast. But that’s changed, and it’s the high-end portion of our county, at the top of three key areas: downtown, then the [New Hanover Regional] hospital area and then the Landfall corridor.”

Saffo said Landfall has transformed Wilmington and the county.

“We bought a lot there in 1997 because I wanted to get back closer the beach. And we built our home on it in 2003; it’s like being at the beach without living right on it,” said Saffo, who owned residences from South Oleander to Treybrooke developments before he and his wife, Renee, built a home in Landfall three years before he became mayor.

He said the development’s impact extends beyond its borders.

“The people who lived there in the beginning through today have brought great ideas and energy and new businesses to our area,” Saffo said. “And, yes, the property tax revenue is enormous. There would be no Riverwalk, for instance, without the annexation of Landfall. Plenty of other greenways and general amenities that make Wilmington what it is today come from that revenue.”

Connie Majure-Rhett, president of the Wilmington Chamber of Commerce, said numerous business-related groups around the Cape Fear region have benefited from the diverse intellectual largesse of Landfall residents. 

“I don’t see how you put a literal dollar figure on the impact of Landfall. It goes way beyond that to talent,” she said. “The talent of the people who live and their giving to the community of their time and expertise … and the national media attention [Landfall] brings because of its golf and tennis tournaments.

“But Landfall’s just one piece of it. Wilmington needs affordable housing, and it needs Landfall, and it needs everything in between.”

Larry Clark, dean of University of North Carolina Wilmington’s  business school, guides and directs many of these programs and lauds the contribution of Landfall’s experienced business executives.

“This past year we celebrated our 10th anniversary of the Cameron Executive Network [CEN], which is our unique mentoring program within the business school, which several Landfall residents help us create,” Clark said. 

“We are fortunate to have many experienced executives who live in Landfall that are involved in the future of our students as members of CEN. CEN has grown to a membership of over 200 executives and at least a third of the membership resides in Landfall.”

One financial barometer is literal: The Landfall Foundation has raised almost $2.27 million since 1995 and awarded grants to nonprofits ranging from the South Brunswick Interchurch Council to Cape Fear Clinic for diabetic patient support. The awards for 2012 were announced this month.

Earlier this year, as Landfall was beginning to celebrate its 25th anniversary, Austin and Gladys Newsom were moving out just as John and Sandy Dorland, retired school teachers from Connecticut, were moving in.

They bought a corner lot where Moss Trail and Deer Island Lane intersect. Their lot went well over 120 feet, and the four-bedroom home they built was more than 3,000 square feet. And it continued the cutting edge evolution of Landfall as John Dorland had solar panels installed on the south-facing roof, which covers 65 percent of their electric bill and 85 percent of their water bill.

“Which is good,” he said, “because club memberships definitely are not free. They don’t come with the lots today.”