Woodson Suspension Bridge

Last year while researching another bridge over the Clear Fork of the Brazos River, I read about a suspension bridge near Woodson.  I spent a lot of time in Woodson, as my grandmother and other family lived near or in Woodson.  I was successful on my efforts to find it this trip.  The Woodson bridge is one of 7 remaining suspension bridges in Texas, and was built in 1896 by the Flinn Moyer Company of Weatherford, Texas.

The towers rest on stone piers and the cables are made of galvanized steel wire strands wrapped in strands.

I have details (and detail pictures) of the bridge from historican Dr. Mark M. Brown, and will post the rest of the story later this week.  In 1995, the Texas Senate passed a resolution directed to the TX Department of Transportation to restore and maintain the bridge; the 1996 study was apparently the end of the effort to preserve the bridge and it now sits deteriorating.

Dad told me a story about the building of the suspension bridge over the Brazos at Newcastle when he was a boy.  They held a "bridge dance" to celebrate the opening of the bridge and the bridge began swaying due to the movement of all the people on the bridge.  He said he was not on the bridge, just a young boy watching as they lived near the river.  Everyone was ordered off the bridge, and that was the end of the bridge dance.

Lafayette County Courthouse, Lewisville, Arkansas

Lafayette County courthouse in Lewisville, Arkansas was built 1940-1942 as part of the Works Progress Administration.  WPA funded 40% of the $100,000 project (Arkansas Historic Preservation Program).  Architects Clippard and Vaught's design

...reflected a restrained reinterpretation of Art Deco style typical of WPA courthouses.  

Lafayette County was named in honor of French Marquis de Lafayette.  In 1905, the state legislature altered the pronunciation to "luh-fay-ut" to be "less French-sounding."  Oxford, Mississippians can probably feel right at home here.  While driving through, I found myself wondering how Arkansas residents pronounced it...and now I know.

The main street through downtown Lewisville was also paved as a WPA project.

On vacation this week

I'm on vacation in West Texas this week, where broad band high speed is more than likely the stripe painted down your pick up truck and the way you drive.

I had the greatest trip down, cutting across the Mississippi and Arkansas Deltas.  Total freedom, and great little towns in which to take photographs!

I'll see you soon!

Youth Day in Mound Bayou

 Yesterday was our monthly youth day in Mound Bayou.  During the summer, our graduate class will be working with us several times each month, and 23 students joined us for the day.  We had three options yesterday: art, dance, and adventure.  One group opted to lead the adventure activities, and began the day with a Web of Life exercise.  It's about the connection and relationship, and what each of us brings to a community to make it stronger...and what happens when we lose those connections in the web of life.

 Art has been one of their favorite activities.  Creative work is powerful--not just for the one doing the creating, but those who view the work of art, and take some meaning from it for themselves.  Since our first youth day in the community, back in October, it has been fun seeing the things that these young people value, as demonstrated in their art.  Regular readers may recall the walking tour we did through the community, and photographing it through the eyes of these young people as they shared what was important to them.  Not surprising, and a validation of who I have come to see these young people are, it was about relationship--with each other, and with the community itself.

 In addition to art classes, dance work was one of the activities on the list for what they wanted to do this summer.  One of the graduate students is a Zumba instructor, and she had quite a group going with a variety of dances.

We will be setting up an Art Gallery in order to display the photography and painting that the students produce over the summer.  We'd like to share some of their vision with the community members as well.  I'll take you on a tour of the gallery once it's ready for the public, and you can see the finished products!

We had another first yesterday, when we had five young children join us.  One of the teenagers had called to ask if she could bring her younger siblings, and of course, this being all about inclusion, Mrs. J told them yes.  When they walked in, without my saying a word, three of the students invited them to join in the art work, and there they sat working on their own drawings...which they wanted to take home to show their family.  We had not expected younger kids, so our door prizes were not appropriate for their age.  Undaunted, my friend whipped out her stash of dollar bills and we held a separate drawing for door prizes for the younger table.

Some of the graduate students had been with us before, on prior youth days, and in the two classes I have taught there when we stay in the community for a week.  Some were not concerned about what the day would bring because that is just the nature of who they are.  A few were a little anxious about how they would be received by the youth and the community, and not sure what I expected of them.  What I always hope it offers is the opportunity to see that even when you plan, things happen and you have to adjust.  You have to be willing to make mistakes and for something to fail, but just as important, you have to be willing to succeed.  I tend to believe that it always turns out.  When we are in it with heart, for the relationship, not in it for the technique and the daily headline, it does always turn out.  Kind of like our work for 6 years in Riverside.  We may not always see the end results, but one thing we do know is that sowing the seeds is the beginning step...nurturing the growth all along the way is a process.  Working in communities is not about a photo op and saying "Look what we did."  If it matters at all, it's about saying "Look what you did."  As Si Kahn used to say, "What about the potlucks?  What about the music?  What about the photo albums?"  Keeping a record of what we do is part of the process: it is about documenting the history of our work together and our relationships.  We are blessed to be able to work in this community, and it never fails that on our trips back home, Debra and I are talking about that blessing, and what it means to us.  There is something about sitting down with one another that strengthens us as we walk this road in our lives, and sustains us as we continue walking down the road.

Remember the 125th Anniversary Celebration during the week of July 8-14!  We hope to see you there.  The brochure with the list of events is posted below.

For more information, check the Official City of Mound Bayou Facebook page, or City of Mound Bayou website.

125th Celebration of the Founding of Mound Bayou

Founded by former slaves I. T. Montgomery, Benjamin Green, and other progressive pioneers on July 12, 1887, Mound Bayou will celebrate its 125th birthday July 8-14, 2012.  We invite you, your family, former Mound Bayouians--and the entire state of Mississippi--to join in the celebration!

July 12, 1887, the town of Mound Bayou was founded.  125 years later, Mound Bayou celebrates its rich heritage and the legacy of its founders, while looking forward to the promise of an even brighter future.

There are many ways for you or your company to contribute to Mound Bayou's monumental historic occasion.  Join us, by becoming a sponsor, through a financial contribution, or placing ads in our souvenir book. 

The Special Events Committee continues to work toward making the 125th Anniversary Celebration memorable.  Please take a few minutes to look at the brochure, consider the level of support you can provide, and join the community for all or part of the week.

You can see updates on the 125th Celebration and progress on the Taborian Urgent Care Center at the following links:

City of Mound Bayou website

City of Mound Bayou Facebook

Taborian Urgent Care Center website (Note: the Taborian website is still under construction and is a work in progress right now)

Taborian Urgent Care Center Facebook

Mound Bayou "The Jewel of the Delta" Believing in Our Past to Motivate the Future. 

Mound Bayou 1937: 50th Anniversary Celebration

Today, I was in Research "hog heaven"--sitting at an antique library desk in the Archives and Special Collections, searching the souvenir booklet from the 50th anniversary of the founding of Mound Bayou.  One of my favorite pastimes from years ago--pre electronic age--was being in the stacks and thumbing through references, taking notes in my meticulous printing, spending an afternoon in some corner of the library.  While I was unable to obtain what I was there for (apparently the copy machine in archives is as old as some of the items in the collection, and today was on the blink), I had fascinating discoveries that kept me there for 2 hours.  I reluctantly departed then, and only because I had class to teach.

Last summer, doing my first research on Mound Bayou, I discovered photographs taken in 1939 under the WPA program, and thus in the public domain.  I searched to locate information about the buildings in the photographs, but could not turn up anything.  I was elated today to see the answers to my questions in the 1937 souvenir booklet.  Not these photos (since they were taken 2 years after the 1937 celebration), but other photographs and descriptive information in the history of Mound Bayou yielded the information to those heretofore unanswered questions.

 The First Baptist Church, one of the first brick churches in the county, was constructed in 1905.

The Bethel A.M.E. church's third building was constructed in 1918 at a cost of $30,000.  It had a pipe organ and a central heating plant. 

Smith and Smith was a grocery store, and C. L. Keys was identified as the proprietess.  The ad in the celebration program read:

Staple Groceries---Kansas City Meats Swift & Co.

We Carry a First Class Line of

DRY GOODS, SHOES, & NOTIONS

"Nothing Cheap but the Price, Nothing High but the Quality"

Stop at the Best Hotel for Colored in the Delta

Mound Bayou, Miss. 

D. S. Lee & Co. was located on the corner of Green Street.  Kansas City meats were seemingly particularly valued in the Delta (or perhaps just available due to the rail lines from Kansas City).  D. S. Lee & Co. advertised:

STAPLE GROCERIES-KANSAS CITY MEATS

Our Motto: Courteous Service

MOUND BAYOU, MISSISSIPPI 

W. T. Brown, the first licensed resident embalmer in Mound Bayou and now a successful undertaker in Chicago, Illinois, will soon erect a modern establishment here to be operated by Joseph Crossley, a local youngster and graduate of Bolivar Training School now in Chicago preparing to take an examination of the Illinois State Board of Embalming.  Mr. C. M. Powell has under construction a building that will be the new home of the local branch of the Powell and Powell Undertaking Company of Chicago, Illinois, and Mound Bayou, Mississippi.  

 This building was photographed (as were the others) in 1939, so I presume it to possibly be the building under construction during the 1937 celebration.  The Powell funeral home was also mentioned in the 1962 celebration of the 75th anniversary of the founding of Mound Bayou, though it was most likely not this building.  Most of the downtown burned in 1941 and this building may not have survived the fire.

The city of Mound Bayou celebrates its 125th anniversary of the founding this July 8-14, 2012.

Fraternal Tombstones

Until my work in Mound Bayou and introduction to the Knights and Daughters of Tabor fraternal organization, I had not really thought about the number of such organizations, nor the numbers of black fraternal organizations that emerged to meet the burial, insurance, or social support needs of African Americans.  Most of us are familiar with the Masons, and probably Knights of Pythias and Odd Fellows, but until recently, I was unaware of specific black fraternal organizations.

 One such organization was the Grand United Order of Odd Fellows, to which I was introduced by Blake Wintory from Lakeview Plantation in Arkansas (see the blog here).  This tombstone illustrates the three interlocking rings that were part of the GUOOF design, with the "all-seeing" eye above the rings.

 Another early version of the GUOOF marker is illustrated in this obelisk marker, with the same design of eye and interlocking ovals.

Early graves of African Americans were frequently marked only with fieldstones, or with homemade concrete markers.  This was one of many graves we discovered that was marked only with a stone.

 Many graves were marked by a slab of concrete over the grave.  Some had impressed decorations on the slab, such as the one above, and a type of handle on the side of the slab.

 Others were plain, and all were generally marked with a small metal marker indicating on the name of the deceased.

In some instances, the name was etched into the wet cement by hand, and no other marker was present. Curbing was often placed around older graves as well.