Newman Plantation Store, Edwards, Mississippi

Here is another old-fashioned country store near Utica and Edwards, Mississippi: the former Newman Plantation store.  It is at the corner of Newman and Canada Cross Roads.

Map of Edwards and vicinity, with other historic stores shown (from ESRI ArcMap software)

I have little any information about the store's history.  Unlike the nearby Yates store, no one came by to chat on this quiet Sunday afternoon.  The store had the long overhang typical of early gasoline stations.  According to Tidbits and Treasures, written by Mary Landin, "Newman  Plantation covered a large area around Newman, which is the crossroads of two historic county roads that did not used to have names. No Newmans ever  lived on what is now Newman Road, because their homes face what is now  called Canada Cross Roads. When the county named them, they named the one that the Newmans thought should have been named Newman Road, Canada Cross  Roads, which is a misnomer in itself, and named the road that went to Edwards  from Newman, Newman Road."  Ms. Landin is a local historian and advocate of small-town living.

The store is locked and protected with bars, but I was able to take one photograph through the dusty glass.

Interior of abandoned Newman country store

Look at the old cash register on the shelf in the lower left. And is that a hot water radiator on the far wall?

I took these photographs taken with a Panasonic G3 camera with 9-18mm Panasonic lens or a 1949-vintage Leitz 5 cm ƒ/2 Summitar lens. The Summitar lens has been in the family since my dad bought it new.

Yates Country Store, Utica, Mississippi

Country stores once abounded in rural Mississippi. In an era before everyone owned their own car, rural people walked or rode a carriage to the country store to buy seed, tools, groceries, books, a newspaper, candies, or to make a telephone call. In 2011, I wrote about the Betigheimer store on Hwy 27, long gone. This one is near Utica: the W.B. Yates store, at the junction of Old Port Gibson and Cayuga Roads.

W.B. Yates store, Old Port Gibson Road

This is a rather basic cinder-block structure with the squared-off front that is so common on stores and commercial buildings in early-20th century rural areas.  The grey paint makes the place more severe, but the Coca-Cola sign adds a splash of red.

I could not go inside, and all the windows were blocked with plywood.

While I was putting my tripod away, an elderly gent came by to talk. He was a relative of the Yates family. He said the present store was built in 1947 (that explains the post-war cinder blocks). The original store was across the street where a post-war suburban home now sits. Mr. Yates died in 1986 and Mrs. Yates operated the store for two more years. She died tragically when she was hit by an 18-wheeler.

The name Cayuga, as in Cayuga Road, is an Indian name. The European settlers to this area came from upstate New York, where Cayuga Lake is the longest of the glacial-derived Finger Lakes. This is different than Cuyahoga, which is the name of the river that flows through Cleveland and debouches into Lake Erie.

The gent had some other interesting stories. Nearby is Charlie Brown Road. People kept stealing the sign, and the highway department could not figure out why. He convinced them to print a sign "C Brown," and the theft problem ended.

These are digital images from a Panasonic G3 digital camera and a 1949-vintage Leica 5cm ƒ/2.0 Summitar lens, tripod-mounted. My father bought the Summitar and its accompanying Leica IIIC rangefinder camera new at the Post Exchange on Guam. Stopped down to ƒ/4.0 or so, this lens equals many contemporary optics.

Update December 2019: A cabinet-maker and carpenter is using the Yates store. We chatted for a few minutes, and he said he was very busy with projects. Good news!

W.B. Yates Store (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM camera, 80mm ƒ/2.8 Planar-CB lens, yellow filter) 

Abandoned Corner Store, North Mill Street, Jackson, Mississippi

In the previous post, I showed a photograph of North Mill Street taken from the Fortification Street bridge. A few blocks south, at the corner of North Mill and West Monument Streets, sits an abandoned brick store. It has been empty and decaying for at least a decade.

You can see the faded Dr. Pepper logo and remnants of other signs. In the second photograph, you can see the Fortification Street bridge in the distance.

This was address no. 703.  The store served the once-vibrant residential community just to the east.  Once there were many more stores along Farish Street.

The manhole covers are really fancy here.  Complete with a presidential eagle.  We will cover more of downtown Jackson in future articles.

Photographs taken with a Sony DSC-W7 compact digital camera.

Update April 18, 2015: the store has been demolished. I do not visit this area often, so I do not know how long it has been gone.

Fortification Street Oil Mill, Jackson, Mississippi

Fortification street in Jackson runs east-west and crosses over the railroad yards on a long bridge in West Jackson. Just south of the bridge is a hulking complex of steel buildings and pipes, remains of the oil mill.  I think it has been out of operation for at least a decade, but I could not find much information on the complex.

Farish Street, view north

The mill is just north of Farish Street, once a vibrant African-American community.  I assume many of the inhabitants may have worked at the mill.  The view above is from Farish Street looking north.

The Fortification Street bridge usually has pretty dense traffic, but last week, one lane was blocked off with traffic cones.  I pulled in and took some elevated views of the mill.  I saw a guard and some trucks entering, but it was unclear what activity was happening.

Regular readers of this blog know I like the stark geometric shapes in industrial sites.

This is the view north along the railroad tracks.  These are active.  Years ago, I took the train from Chicago to Jackson, and the Amtrak came into town by this route.

This is the view south along Mill Street.  It was quiet on a work day, but there was much more activity decades ago.  We will explore this neighborhood more in future articles.

All 2013 photographs taken with a Panasonic G3 digital camera, files processed in Photo Ninja.

Possible Repair of the Hinds County Armory, Jackson, Mississippi

The last time I inspected the Hinds County Armory in 2010, it was a wet mess with rain pouring through the decayed roof and soggy debris and mud on the floor.  It was a disgrace.  The Preservation in Mississippi blog documented in 2009 how the armory had been shamefully neglected.  But possibly this historic building will not succumb to the elements.  In July of 2012, the Mississippi Department of Archives and History secured a $600,000 grant from the Federal government to complete some critical repairs and preserve the historic Gothic Revival building.  According to WLBT News, the funds will be used, ""Initially to stabilize it, put a new roof on it and then stabilize the walls and then the funds will allow to clean the inside of it and on the outside of it make it look like a handsome building again," said H.T. Holmes, the Director of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History."

Hinds County Armory, northeast corner.

The shell was sober and sturdy.  Note the Gothic architectural details like the arched doors and the roofline with a pseudo-parapet.

I sneaked (snuck) in and watched workmen tearing out the roof and debris.  This is a major effort.  Will $600,000 be enough to clean out the debris, stabilize the shell, and install a new roof?  We hope so.  At least we have not lost this handsome building.

Photographs taken with a Panasonic G3 digital camera, with RAW files processed with Photo Ninja.

July 2, 2013 Update:  This morning, a fire broke out in the armory.  Cause and extent of damage are still unknown,

Photograph by Joe Ellis, Jackson Clarion Ledger newspaper.  Here is the article. Fortunately, the damage was not too severe.

The Mississippi Delta 16: Highway 1

Highway 1 is the westernmost highway in the Mississippi Delta, running along the mainline levee in some places and connecting small farming towns as it traces its lonely path from a junction with US 49 south of Tunica through Greenville and south on towards Onward. This will be a short tour going from north to south.

It is quiet near Rena Lara, about an hour north of Greenville.  Even on a Saturday evening, there is little traffic.  Summer must be blazing hot.

The day had been gloomy and overcast, with snow flurries.  But just at dusk, the sun burst through and illuminated this odd little taco stand with an burst of  brilliance.  This was at the junction with Alligator-Hillhouse Road.

Proceed south, and you reach Beulah.  It is really quiet there, and this handsome St. Peters MB Church is on a side road.  The day I stopped, a gent told me the bell came from an old steamboat. This photograph is a scan of a Kodachrome 25 slide taken with a Leica camera.

We will stop in Benoit in a future article.  Just a bit north of Greenville is a cluster of houses called Lamont. This small church was on the east side of Hwy 1.

We will also leave Greenville for a future article.  Highway 1 leading south out of town is the "strip," with gasoline stations, shops, fast food poison emporiums, and miscellaneous buildings. There is really not much of interest to see except for the occasional shed.

About 10 miles south of Greenville, some deserted farm worker houses still stand. This one has the classic shotgun shack proportions.

This cottage must have been in use within a decade before I photographed it in 2005.  Was the child who owned this bicycle sad to lose it?

Finally, just off 1 on Hwy 14, west of Rolling Fork, is this old store. It has been empty since the mid-1990s, when  I first started driving this way. This temporarily ends our tour of the Delta. Greenville and Rolling Fork will be the subjects of future articles. (March 2014 update: the store is gone.)

The black and white photographs were scans of Kodak Panatomic-X film, shot through a Fuji GW690II 6x9 medium format camera.  I developed the Panatomic film in Agfa Rodinol developer at 1:50 dilution.  I processed the 2013 digital images with Photo Ninja software.

The Mississippi Delta 15: Sherard

Continuing our tour of the Mississippi Delta:  drive west out of Clarksdale along Highway 322 (also called Sherard Road), and at the junction of 322 and Highway 1 sits a cluster of houses, trailers, and an abandoned cotton gin.  This is (or was) Sherard.

On 322, here is another small church.  I assume the Pastor's home is attached to the back.

The gin is abandoned. That's sad because I am sure it was once one of the major sources of revenue in a small town.

The J.F. Sherard company's buildings were at the junction of Highways 322 and 1.  A Google search lists the company as a supplier of farm equipment with a current address in Clarksdale.  The buildings were sound, so probably had not been empty for too many years.

The tiny steel shed was rather neat.  It is hard to tell what it might have once housed.

All photographs taken with a Panasonic G1 digital camera with Panasonic Lumix 20 mm f/1.7 lens.