Return to Country Stores in Central Mississippi and Louisiana

Introduction

Years ago, rural residents depended on a country store that was close enough to reach on foot, wagon, or horse. These stores provided for most of their needs, such as groceries, seed, tools, sewing supplies, and hardware items. Today, most have closed and people drive to the supermarket or Walmart. We have lost part of our 19th and 20th century cultural background. Here are some country stores in central Mississippi and one in Louisiana. I have photographed some of them before but wanted to revisit them and see some new ones.  

Florence

Most of the scenery along Hwy 49 between Jackson and Hattiesburg is boring strip mall Americana, very uninspiring. But a few traditional stores linger in dilapidated strip malls like this one in Florence.  

D'Lo

D'Lo is a small town a short distance off Hwy 49 southeast of Jackson. It is mostly known for the water park, but there is an old commercial strip downtown. Most of the stores are closed.

Satartia

Satartia is a village off MS Route 3 between Vicksburg and Yazoo City. The last time I photographed the little store in Satartia, a fluorescent light was on inside, but I did not see any commercial activity. This is a 4×5" Tri-X frame taken with a 135mm Schneider Xenar lens.

Utica

This is the Harris Carmichael store on Hwy 27. The building is in good condition but I do not know when the business closed.

Edwards

This is the Morning Star Store on Old Port Gibson Road at the junction of Adams Station Road (GAF Versapan film). It has been closed for years.

This store is on Military Road near Edwards. Based on the size of the pine tree, I think there has not been any activity here for years. This a Panatomic-X photo taken with a Hasselblad and the 50mm ƒ/4 Distagon lens.

This is the Watley Store at 116 Bill Strong Road in near Edwards. 

Burk's Gro is on Cook Road west of Edwards. The day I took this picture, a guy came up to me and asked what I was doing. Duuh, taking a photograph. 

Midnight

Not much is left of this store on old US 49E in Midnight (name of the town). This is a Hasselblad exposure with the 80mm Planar lens.

Polkville

Vicksburg

This may not quite qualify as a country store. Let's call it a country liquor store. I seldom see cars parked outside and am not sure how much business it gets. 

Tallulah, Louisiana

This is the former Poboy Don's on Route 602 east of Tallulah, Louisiana. I recently biked by the store when some gents were repairing it to use as a hunting lodge. They said the building was post-World War II vintage. I photographed it years ago when it served po-boys (see Country Stores 15).  

Thank you all for riding along for this quick overview of country stores. There are many more in Mississippi and Louisiana, but I need to end this article. 

Optical Treasure: 1960s Jupiter-8 Lens from the Soviet Union

This will be a short review of my new/old Jupiter-8 50mm ƒ/2 lens from the Soviet Union. It was made for use on Soviet thread-mount cameras, like the FED, but uses almost the same 39mm thread as the original Leica bodies as well as most Japanese post-war rangefinder cameras.

Jupiter-8 lens mounted on my 1949-vintage Leica IIIC camera

Coated front element of Jupiter-8, probably 1962 construction (note: scratch-free and clear)

Many film photographers love the rendition from the classic Zeiss Sonnar 50mm ƒ/2 lens. Dr. Ludwig Bertele at Zeiss Ikon, the German optical giant, first formulated this lens in 1929. The name comes from the word “Sonne,” meaning Sun. Zeiss sold it with their magnificent Contax rangefinder camera in the 1930s and later. This competed with Ernst Leitz's popular Leica thread-mount cameras when equipped with their 5cm ƒ/2 Summar lens or the later 7-element ƒ/2 Summitar lens. 

After WWII, the Soviets packed up and moved remnants of the Zeiss factories, tools, machinery, glass, and technicians to the Soviet Union and painfully began to rebuild their home optical industry. They largely copied the Zeiss optical designs but made minor changes over the years and coated the glass surfaces to reduce flare. They renamed these new lenses Jupiter (ЮПИТЕР). The 50mm ƒ/2 version is the ЮПИТЕР-8. They produced these lenses from the early 1950s until about 1991, when the Soviet economy collapsed. The Jupiter-8 was the standard lens on many Zorki, FED, and Kiev cameras, which were made in the millions. The Soviet lenses had aluminum mounts instead of the superior brass/chrome mounts of the older German production. The Internet is full of detailed reviews of the Jupiter-8, so I will not repeat the same material. 

Recently, the Lomo company reintroduced the Jupiter-3, which is the 50mm ƒ/1.5 model. Note that Zeiss still sells a modern ƒ/1.5 Sonnar lens, an amazing testament to a long-lasting design (but the current lens is significantly different then the original).

Eighty years after the original design, photographers still like the way the Sonnar reveals details on film. Original 1930s and 1940s German examples are seriously expensive. As an alternative, I decided to try a Jupiter-8 and found one from a seller from Arizona. He said he bought it decades ago along with a set of Soviet thread-mount cameras. Arizona - that suggests dry and no fungus. This one was a Version 2 (design PT3060) from 1962 production (earlier is better for Soviet optics). The lens was clean and the coating almost perfect, but it was need of re-lubricating, as do almost all of these old Soviet optics; after all, they are 50+ years old. 

This lens uses a filter mount thread of 40.5mm. This was common for German lenses in the post-war era. I already had a 40.5mm Series VI filter adapter, allowing me to use my Series VI filters. Note that some Japanese lens makers used a filter diameter of 40.0mm for their ƒ/2 or ƒ/2.8 rangefinder lenses. Why did they do that? Was it to sell brand new filters and accessories to buyers of Japanese lenses? Yes, of course!

Here are some Jupiter examples, both when mounted on a digital camera and when used with film on my Leica IIIC and Leica M2 cameras.

Fuji Digital

I attached the Jupiter-8 to my Fuji X-E1 digital camera using a Leica thread mount-Fuji-X adapter. On all of these scenes, I set the Jupiter at ƒ/5.6 and mounted the camera on a tripod to eliminate vibration. This digital camera has an APS-size sensor, so a 50mm lens provides a field of view similar to a 75mm lens on a 35mm camera. Click any frame to expand to 1600 pixels wide.

 

Approaching storm, Kansas City Southern rail yard, Levee Street, Vicksburg (ƒ/5.6)

After the storm, Levee Street, Vicksburg

Kansas City Southern rail yard from the Yazoo Canal levee, ƒ/5.6

Washington Street view north

Pine Street cottages photographed from Belmont Street

Shed on Yazoo Canal levee (no longer extent)

Panatomic-X Film 

I loaded Kodak Panatomic-X film in my Leica IIIC. I thought it appropriate to expose an old-fashioned film in an old camera body mounting an old lens. The package proved to be compact and convenient to use, but I do wish the Jupiter had click-stops on the aperture control. I exposed the Panatomic-X at EI=20, so most photographs required a tripod. I used a Gossen Luna Pro Digital light meter in incident mode for most measurements.

Sondheimer, Louisiana (1/10 ƒ/11.5, medium yellow filter, tripod-mounted)

1101 N. Chestnut Street, Tallulah, Louisiana (1/10 ƒ/8.0)

PoBoy Don's, LA 602 east of Tallulah, Louisiana (1/100 ƒ/4.0, hand-held)

Footbridge from Avenue B over Stouts Bayou, Vicksburg, Feb. 15, 2021 (1/10 ƒ/11.5)

Acadia Place, Vicksburg, Feb. 15, 2021

Kansas City Southern rail tracks at Maloney Circle, Vicksburg National Military Park (1 sec. ƒ/16)

Fairground Street Bridge (¼ sec ƒ8; click to see 2400 pixels)

Fuji Acros 100 Film

Old bus, Moseley Gap Road, Vicksburg (¼ sec. ƒ/16)

Ford Fairlane, Mt. Alban Road, Vicksburg (1/10 sec. ƒ/11.5)

I also finished a roll of Fuji's superb Acros 100 film with the Jupiter-8 lens. Being an ISO 100 film, it is easier to use out in the field than the slow Panatomic-X film (but the examples above are tripod-mounted). 

Kodak BW400CN Film

Tripp's Store, Mount Carmel Road, Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Barn off Greensboro-Chapel Hill Road, Snow Camp, North Carolina (1/100 ƒ/11.5, yellow filter)

Greensboro-Chapel Hill Road, near Snow Camp, North Carolina

I have mixed feelings about Kodak BW400CN film. For these scenes, it worked well. At other times, it looks grainy and gritty. Possibly it does not age well. Regardless, I have used up my last three rolls and will not search for any more.

Leica M2

Farm, FM665 near Alice, Texas (Acros film, 1/60 ƒ/8, medium yellow filter)

I mounted the Jupiter-8 on my Leica M2 using a genuine Leitz thread-mount to M adapter. The fit is perfect, and the rangefinder shows infinity exactly when the lens is set at ∞. The lens is light and convenient, and I can mount Series VI filters using a Tiffen 40.5-VI mount. I like the "look," and the background is smooth. This may be the "bokeh" about which so many internet warriors argue. I guess I have sufficient bokeh..... 

Comments and Summary

 

This old Jupiter-8 is a nice lens, and I like the results on both a digital camera and on black and white film. I think it sings with film. I do not see any obvious barrel or pincushion distortion, and exposure is even across the frame. At apertures wider than ƒ/5.6, sharpness falls off at the corners. On the scale of web pictures, the falloff is barely visible. I do not see (or do not know what to look for) the unique Sonnar rendition in these examples, but my photography friend in the UK said the special magic is at ƒ/2. This Jupiter has less field curvature then my 1949 Leitz Summitar lens. 

The Jupiter has an aluminum body, which is conveniently light weight. The finish is not up to German or Japanese standards, but at least on my sample, the numbers are perfectly legible. No issues.

Many photographers have written about focus shift with Sonnar lenses. I have not seen it yet, but have not taken close-focus photographs at wide aperture. This lens and my Summitar both focus perfectly at infinity using the same Leica-Fuji X adapter on my Fuji X-E1. Therefore, I assume that the Jupiter-8 is correctly adjusted for infinity on a Leica thread-mount camera. Close-up, it may back focus a bit, but I will need to test some more (one day in my non-spare time). UPDATE: I sent it to Mr Brian Sweeney, a Soviet lens expert in the USA, for a cleaning and adjustment for correct focus on Leica cameras.

 

I have also used one of the superb 1960s Canon 50mm ƒ/1.4 lenses. The Canon was more uniform across the field and may have displayed marginally better resolution. The mechanical construction was much better, typical Japanese excellence and precision from the 1960s. Its downside for me was the size of the overall optic. It blocked too much of my viewfinder of my little Leica, and the auxiliary 50mm finder was clumsy. 

 

In summary, the Jupiter-8 lens works well and has a nice rendition on film and digital. It is conveniently compact. When I use my little IIIC camera, I just may end up taking both the Jupiter and Summitar 50mm lenses in my camera kit.

Country Stores 15: Poboy Don's, Tallulah, Louisiana

Just east of Tallulah, Louisiana, LA route 602 takes a wide swing through the farm country south of Interstate 20. An old country store sits at the corner of Montrose Road and 602. It was an active little shop and snack bar in 1989 when I took some photographs on 4×5" Fujichrome 50 film. I do not know when the store closed, but my Tallulah friend said he remembered eating there about 20 years ago.

In recent years, my friends and I have been biking on 602 because it passes by ponds with plenty of birds and alligators. But the old store has been closed at least since 2015.

June 11, 2022 Update: While biking on 602, I saw two fellows repairing the siding. They said they will convert it into a hunting camp. One of them said his grandmother built the store in the early 1950s.

Vermilion flycatcher, an occasional and rare winter visitor, LA route 602 near Mound

Smooth bike riding on LA 602 and very little traffic.

Summer wildflowers on LA 602.

I took the 1989 frames with my Tachihara 4×5" camera and 180mm Caltar IIN lens on Fujichrome 50. A generous friend gave me an Epson 3600 Photo scanner, which has a light cover large enough for 4×5, so I am slowly scanning old transparencies and black and white negatives. The 2017 black and white frames are from a medium format Hasselblad with Tri-X professional 320 film.