2021 Mid-State Road Trip - Central Mississippi (Hopewell and Crystal Springs)

Last May, mid-COVID, I was bored, restless, and grumpy. My wife and I had not been far afield in over two years. Walking and bicycling were getting boring. It was time for another road trip to central Mississippi.

Utica

Harris Carmichael Store, MS 27 (50mm ƒ/2 Summicron-DR lens)

Porch at Harris Carmichael Store

The Harris Carmichael Store is on Hwy. 27 near Utica. Mr. Carmichael died in 2005, and I do not know if the store operated after that date. It is is good condition, so someone maintains the property.

Hopewell and Vicinity

I had driven on Hopewell Road before while driving from Mendenhall to Crystal Springs. I saw some old buildings that were worth another visit. I returned on May 20 with Royal Gold 25 film in my Leica and looked around. The unincorporated community of Hopewell, in Copiah County, is pretty quiet.

House, Tillson Road off MS27, Crystal Spring (35mm ƒ/2 Summicron lens) 

Fixer-upper house, 1148 Hopewell Road, Hopewell (25mm ƒ/4 Color-Skopar lens)

Fixer-upper house, 1162 Hopewell Road, Hopewell (25mm ƒ/4 Color-Skopar lens)

Fixer-upper, Hopewell Road, Hopewell 

Come on, give me some tender loving care, Old River Road, Hopewell

The red door, Hopewell Road (1/2 sec. ƒ/11, 50mm Summicron-DR lens)

Where is my VCR? Hopewell Road near MS 27, Crystal Springs (1/8 ƒ/16, 50mm Summicron)

How do you really think? Hopewell Road near MS 27, Crystal Springs (50mm Summicron)

These are negatives from the long-discontinued Kodak Royal Gold 25 film. I knew that it had been frozen since new and felt confident that it would be viable. I exposed it at Exposure Index (EI) = 16 in my Leica M2 camera. For many frames, I used my Leitz 50mm ƒ/2 Summicron-DR lens and tripod-mounted the camera. This was the Type 2 Summicron from the 1960s, a superb optic that many film photographers still use. I scanned the negatives with a Plustek 7600i film scanner operated with Silverfast Ai software.

My previous experiments with Ektar 25 film, which was the same emulsion, were less successful, most likely because the Ektar was even older. For current use, buy the modern Ektar 100 film.

The Mississippi Delta 37: Tchula

Tchula is a tiny town in Holmes County, Mississippi, on US 49E a few miles south of Itta Bena. I wrote about Itta Bena in The Mississippi Delta 27 but had never driven 49E further south to see that stretch of the Delta. I decided to explore on a blazing hot 2020 summer day.

Former road bridge, Front Street, Tchula (Tri-X 400 film, Fuji GW690II camera, green filter)

Entering town from the south, I turned onto Front Street. A bridge formerly connected to Cooper Road, which follows the Tchula lakeshore. 

Front yard, Front Street, Tchula

Background

Tchula is rough, just gruesome. I found a long article in The Guardian. "Poorest town in poorest state: segregation is gone but so are the jobs. In his second dispatch from the US’s most deprived communities, Chris McGreal visits Tchula in Mississippi, where crime is high and opportunities are few". 

A 2019 article in The Guardian describes how little help was forthcoming after flooding in that year. 

“It was so painful to visit homes today and see what we saw. No one should have to live like this in the richest country on earth,” Barber told the crowd at the Good Samaritan Ecumenical church.

“But there must be, and will be, a movement of people who say, ‘That is wrong, and we can’t stand for that any more.”

Mississippi Today featured a 2019 article on flooding and neglect of the inhabitants, "Living Day to Day: Surrounded by water and ignored by powerful officials, Tchula and its people fight for survival"

A somber 2015 article in The Atlantic, titled "How White Flight Ravaged the Mississippi Delta," describes the horrors of poverty, segregation, racism, and the flight of wealth to other places. Tchula now is the fifth poorest town in the country, according to the 2015 Atlantic article.

The Mississippi Center for Investigative Reporting documented how Covid devastated Holmes County when it was already off the cliff with no safety net.

2020 Photographs

No more lunches at Speedy's, Tchula

Main Street view west, Tchula

Main Streeet view west, Tchula (Fuji X-E1 digital file)

I stopped on Main Street and went into the food store. Everyone was very friendly, and everyone was wearing a mask, even kids on bicycles. The local folks were more rigorous with their masks than Vicksburgers (or MAGA rally attendees at the White House). Trains occasionally thunder through town at high speed.

Former gas station, Main Street

Back lot of former commercial building, Jefferson Street, Tchula

Many of the former commercial buildings are no longer used. The vines shows abandonment.

Juke joint, US 49E, Tchula (Tri-X 400 film)

US 49E, view north, Tchula, Mississippi (Tri-X 400 film, Fuji GW690II, yellow filter)

This has been our short visit to Tchula. Type "Mississippi Delta" in the search box for other examples of Delta towns. 

All photographs with one digital exception were from Kodak Tri-X film via my Fuji GW690II camera (the "Texas Leica") with a 90mm ƒ/3.5 EBC-Fujinon lens. Praus Productions in Rochester, New York, developed the film in Xtol developer. I scanned the negatives with a Minolta Scan-Multi medium format film scanner.

The Mississippi Delta 28: Tutwiler

The small town of Tutwiler is in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, northwest of Webb on U.S. 49E. The view from 49E is a bit discouraging - a closed garage, a fast food joint, not much else. I came through late one day in 2014 and had only a short time to look around.

Hancock Street was once the commercial center. Now it is pretty discouraging. These are the typical square-front commercial buildings from the early 20th century that you see in many Mississippi towns.

The railroad once came through Tutwiler, as with all Delta towns. The triangle-shaped building above  fit a triangle-shaped lot between Hancock and Front Streets. The tracks are still present and, I was surprised, not completely rusted. Some traffic must occasionally run here.

The funeral home that prepared Emmett Till's body in 1955 is on Hancock Street. Sadly, the back of the building has collapsed.

The side streets in town are also discouraging. It is hard to see these communities collapsing.

A political note: both of Mississippi's United State Senators support the border wall. So, they think $5 billion would be well-spent to build a wall along the Mexican border, but meanwhile towns in their own state (communities that are largely African-American) are rotting and collapsing. I wonder if $5 billion could improve the infrastructure, open public health clinics, repair bridges, clean trash, repair drinking water piping, and upgrade schools in the Mississippi Delta? For shame. A pox on you corrupt and cowardly politicians.

These images are from a Fujifilm X-E1 digital camera, with frame size set at 1:1 ratio.

1950s Excellence: the Leitz 50mm ƒ/2.0 Type 2 Summicron-DR lens

Leitz 50mm ƒ/2.0 dual range Summicron lens in original box. 

Introduction 

Leica's 50mm Summicron lenses have been famous for optical and mechanical excellence for over 60 years. Leica's term Summicron means a lens with maximum aperture of ƒ/2.0. They have been improved over the decades and are still in production - how many other consumer products have lasted over a half century? Even more amazing, a new lens will fit on a 50-year-old Leica M body, or a 60-year-old lens will work on a brand new film or digital body. When you consider the longevity, Leica lenses are reasonable price, despite the hatred (= envy) from many modern digital users.

A convenient summary with photographs of the different versions is on Ken Rockwell's site.

5cm ƒ/2.0 Summitar lens in extended (ready to photograph) position

Summitar

Ernst Leitz produced the predecessor lens, the 5cm Summitar, from 1939 to 1953, with 170,761 units total. War-time lenses were uncoated, but from 1946 on, they were anti-reflection coated. Eastman Kodak and Zeiss had coated optics for military use during World War II, but coating all air-glass surfaces on general civilian optics became widespread only after the war. The Summitar had a complicated design of 7 elements in 4 groups. Human computers using mechanical calculators and trigonometry tables must have made a heroic effort to compute the ray paths. The Summitar's central sharpness is superb, but the edges fall off and there is field curvature. This can be used creatively, and regardless, "sharpness" is not normally the factor that makes a photograph successful. For examples, please look at some of my 2017 Nepal articles. In 1953, the Summitar lens cost $158 in USA.

Summicron Type 1

E. Leitz introduced the first Summicron, the Type 1, in 1952. It was an update of the Summitar, also mounted in a collapsible barrel. This lens was also manually computed, although surely the workers used electrical tabulating machines. The first electronic computers after World War II were used for ballistics analysis, atomic weapons research, rocket trajectories, and military optics. The 1953 USA cost for the Summicron was $183.

A note on collapsible lenses: When the E. Leitz company introduced its first camera in 1923, it used perforated cine film but doubled the frame size to 24×36 mm. All other cameras then used much larger roll film or individual sheet film. So the new small image surface became known as miniature format. The cameras were intended for travel or adventures like mountain climbing. Therefore, the manufacturers wanted to make the cameras compact and portable. One way to do that was to build a lens in a barrel that could collapse into the body. As the years went by, cameras grew larger and heavier (like automobiles or, most grotesquely, American SUVs). The Zeiss Contarex of 1960 had grown to 910 grams for just the body. The Nikon F with its metering head was a big package, as well. And today, the digital single lens reflex (DSLR) in "full frame" size is a bulbous thing graced with a protruding penile lens that points at its subject like a cannon. Just tell DSLR users that they really have the miniature format.

1963 Type 2 Summicron lens with single focus range.

Summicron Type 2

E. Leitz introduced their Type 2 Summicron in 1956. It was in production until 1968. To improve the precision of the glass alignment, Leitz mounted Type 2 optics in a rigid barrel. It was a masterpiece of mechanical precision and elegance, but the construction of brushed chrome over brass made it heavy. This lens was also hand computed.

Leitz began computer-aided lens computations after about 1960 at their factory in Midland, Ontario, Canada, under the guidance of Dr. Walter Mandler (from Erwin Puts). It is an interesting history of international competition about this time. Japanese optical companies such as Canon, Nikon, and Topcon were also exploring new lens designs with the aide of early computers. They were able to market lenses with almost as refined optical characteristics as Leica but at lower price. The brilliance of the Japanese companies was to bring superb optics to a wide audience at reasonable price.

Leitz made two versions of the Type 2 lens. One had a single focus range covering 1m to infinity. The photograph above shows a 1963 lens that I bought from a friend in town. It was available in M-mount  (63,055 units) as well as the 39mm thread mount (1160 units; now a rare collector item).

1967 Dual range Summicron without goggles.

Dual range Summicron with goggles attached on the flat plate. The lens has been extended to its closest focus distance.

The second version had a dual focus range and is known as the DR. The normal range was 1.0 m to infinity. But if you wanted to focus on a closer object, you slid a spectacle viewfinder attachment onto a flat plate on the top of the lens. The goggles depressed a button, which let the lens focus from 0.48 to 0.88 m. The goggles correct the parallax of the rangefinder view. It was a clever way to let a rangefinder camera focus more closely than the normal 0.8 or 1.0 meter. A reflex camera does not have these limitations, but in the 1950s, most miniature camera photographers were still using rangefinders. Total production was 55,145 units.

Note: the goggle units varied slightly in design over the production period. You must have the correct unit for your lens for it to mount and focus correctly.

My stepdad bought the DR in the pictures above in 1966 or 1967. This lens and M2 camera took family pictures in Greece and traveled to Asia, Africa, the Indian Ocean, and North America. Now it photographs urban decay in Mississippi and Louisiana. This one has pristine coating.

I could not find a complete Leica price booklet from the 1960s, but I found a few prices in US $ for M2 body and lenses:

• M2 w/50mm ƒ/2 rigid Summicron 423.00
• M2 w/50mm ƒ/2 DR Summicron 465.00

Optical unit and focus mount of Summicon-DR lens. Serial numbers must match.

Special note: the optical unit can be unscrewed from the focus unit. If you buy a used DR lens, the serial numbers must match. Do not accept an unmatched lens. 

I also have a Type 4 50mm Summicron from 1984 or 1985 production. I will write about it in a future article. It is mounted in a lighter weight black alloy barrel as opposed to the gorgeous brushed chrome of my DR unit.

Examples with Kodak BW400CN film

On a recent day trip through rural Mississippi south of I-20, I grabbed a roll of Kodak BW400CN. I have had mixed results with this film in the past. Sometimes it looks muddy, but sometimes I like the tonality. Could there be differences in the C-41 chemistry? Regardless, here are a few samples from my Leica M2 and the 50mm Summicron-DR. I was surprised how the film renders green as quite light, but only for long exposures in settings such as dense underbrush. I do not recall seeing this before. The BW is pretty grainy, but I like the effect. (Click any picture to enlarge it.)

Abandoned farm house, Rte 18 in Brandon, Mississippi.

Remains of a gasoline station, Raleigh (with polarizer filter).

Big Smittys, MS Hwy 149, Mendenhall. This is a former Pan-Am filling station. 

Main Street, Mendenhall. Polarizer used to darken sky.

Shop on MS 28 east of Georgetown.

Historic Crossroads Store on Old Port Gibson Road, Reganton.

References

Laney, D. 1994. Leica Camera and Lens Pocket Book, 6th Edition revised and updated, Hove Collectors' Books, East Sussux, UK, 142 p.

Other

An interesting 2007 article about Leica cameras is in The New Yorker, September 24, 2007 issue, Candid Camera, The cult of Leica.

Update Dec. 2020: Here are silos in Delta, Louisiana, taken with long-expired GAF Versapan film. Click to enlarge.

Silos, Levee Road, Delta, Louisiana (GAF Versapan film, Summicron-DR lens, orange filter)

Failing Quickly: the Susie B. Law House, Foote, Mississippi

Dear readers. in my last article, I was happy to report how a Victorian-era house in Vicksburg was finally being repaired and saved. But in the small town of Foote, along the shore of Lake Washington north of Glen Allen, the news is much worse. The Susie B. Law House on Lake Washington Road Eastside has deteriorated badly. Some of the roof shingles have fallen away, and in the wet and rainy climate of the Delta, roof leaks lead to rapid rot and deterioration of wood structures. I could already see some eaves rotting away.

Trees have fallen on the driveway and not been cleared away. Whoever owns the house had not obviously done any cleaning or repair in several years.

I wrote about the Law house in spring 2014. It was neglected then, but not as overgrown and was mostly intact. Also, back then, the roof was mostly intact. I fear the worst for this once-handsome example of a Sears Roebuck kit house.

Another piece of bad news for preservationists: just to the north, the brick walls of the once magnificent Italianate mansion known as Mount Holly sit unchanged and abandoned since the 2015 fire. Status: unknown.

The black and white 2014 photograph was taken on Panatomic-X film with a Fuji GW690II camera.

Small Towns in Mississippi: Return to Coles on MS 33

If you drive south to Baton Rouge, the woodland route on MS 33 and LA 19 is much more interesting than the four-lane US 61. One of the little towns you drive through in the Homochitto National Forest on MS 33 is Coles (don't blink or you will miss it). The little town consists of a few houses and an abandoned store. I have taken digital snapshots here before but wanted to try some fine-grain film with my Rolleiflex.

An old house at 5599 MS 33 has a shaded porch and some of these old-fashioned steel porch chairs. They remind me of Adirondack-style chairs from cabins in northern New York or New England. The house is secure but appears to be unused.

The lady in the photograph is Mrs. Merit Arnold. She is standing in front of the former store, which was also her brother's home. He was murdered by a person who lived across the street. On the day of the funeral, the Houston, Texas, police called to say they had apprehended the suspect. Mrs. Arnold said the house is empty and deteriorating. Her father or uncle built some of the lumbering railroads in the area in the early 20th century.

Former store at corner of MS 33 and McDowell Road, Coles, Mississippi (Tri-X 400 film, Rolleiflex 3.5E Xenotar camera)

A couple of miles to the north in Crosby, heavy pilings testify to the fact that a railroad once crossed Foster Creek.

A few miles further north in Garden City (just south of Knoxville), I saw an old-fashioned cottage or farm house off the road. Very simple and traditional.

Across the street: one of those great Mississippi yards filled with old cars, metal debris, and other photogenic junk. There is plenty of subject matter here: you just need to slow down and look around.

Photographs taken with a Rolleiflex 3.5E twin-lens reflex camera with a 75mm ƒ/3.5 Xenotar lens using Kodak Panatomic-X film, exposed at ISO 20 (all frames tripod-mounted). The photograph of the old store was on Kodak Tri-X 400 film.