The S.O. and I set out on a car trip today. We just arrived at our hotel. We spent the day looking for my Grandmother’s house that was located in a very small town in southwestern Georgia. ( About 3+ hours driving from Shopping Mall). We found the house-but the intervening of 40+ years had not been kind. For one thing, the trees that were once small saplings then-are huge now. Thus, what had once been a huge open space of land-is now an overgrown thicket.
Will post some pix tomorrow when I can get to a means of downloading from my camera. Only brought the I-Pad and forgot to bring the camera card adapter.
A couple of other quick observations. While life in Shopping Mall may be a downer many times-it is damn near rapturous compared to what we saw driving through Boaz, Gadsen, and Anniston Alabama. They are worlds apart from Shopping mall and not in a good way. And between the towns? Well-every stereotype has a slim basis in fact. The one about cars on jacks in redneck’s lawns I think was formed by observing the houses along US 431 heading south. One long junkyard.
Second, southwest Georgia, north of Columbus-has a lot of roads that don’t seem interconnected at all. Thank God for GPS!
Finally, a special thank you to the ladies at the county court house, who took time to help us, when we came in with less than an hour till they finished work, to find titie histories, marriages, births and deaths. The lady behind the counter even called the owner to see if she would mind me taking pictures of the outside from on the property. That’s a small town to be sure! ( I had taken some pictures from on the street-till the Sheriff came along and “suggested” I not do that. Guess he thought I was casing the place. He was nice about, and once I explained what I was doing and showed some ID, he explained that they had been having some “trouble” in this area, so they are trying to be very vigilant.
All in all an interesting day.
Where in SW GA. we lived for 17 years in Americus- about 65 mile SE of Columbus.
My grandparents home – where I was born- in rural NE GA has burned but property remains in family so I was able to take Dianne there. Amazing how the farm looks so much the same yet so changed at the same time.
Far a real flavor of the mobile homes you noticed check out great mobile home of Mississippi at http://www.drbukk.com/gmhom/park.html.
Small towns are the same everywhere. Several yeats ago my wife was in Paradise, MT looking for family connection in the local cemetary. An older gentleman asked what she was looking for. She told him family names. Not only did he direct her to the graves he took her to the home of one of her great uncles she did not realize was alive or where he lived.
Glad you got to visit. Looking forward to the photos.
Hamilton GA.