This house is being deconstructed. Below is a view from seven years ago. For years, it’s been a landmark in my travels around home.
↧
Shotgun House, Irwin County
↧
Country Store, Brooks County
I photographed this old country store, which sits beside a field on Troupville Road, in 2010. For five years I wondered about its identity and fate. Grant Mishoe wrote to say it was still owned by descendants of the family who built it and it’s still standing. From the late 1800s until it closed it sold dry goods and various sundries, from boots to jeans and feed to turpentine.
It was amazing that the old signs were still intact. The thermometer was for some sort of snake oil (i.e. quack medicine) for the kidneys. There were also insurance signs from the Southern Agriculturist, as well as several signs for Dental Snuff.
↧
↧
Folk Victorian, Pulaski
↧
Vernacular Farmhouse, Candler County
↧
Cracker Style Tenant House, Candler County
This is located near Pulaski.
↧
↧
Authentic South, Candler County
In this beautiful Southern yard, of the nearly forgotten but not-so-distant past, I always see a happy, well-fed cat. The house always seems to be begging to have its picture made. A very authentic place it is. In a different version of this photograph that I posted on my personal Facebook page, I called the image “Southern History” because I think in this yard is as much Southern history as you’ll find in any museum. These are the places from which I learn the most.
↧
Upper Lotts Creek Primitive Baptist Church, 1881, Bulloch County
I rarely pass this church without wanting to stop and photograph it. It’s one of the most historic in Bulloch County, and without a doubt, one of the most beautiful Primitive Baptist churches I’ve ever seen.
National Register of Historic Places
Visit this link for the history:
↧
Mystic High School, 1928
Grier & Biggers, Architects – McCowan Brothers, Builders
G. Morgan Copland was the first Principal. Members of the Board of Trustees were: J. B. Morgan, Chairman; John M. Willis, Secretary-Treasurer; M. G. Hogan; Warren Fletcher; and W. A. York. It has since served as the home of Irwin Academy and Grace Christian Academy. Mr. Foster Goolsby served for many years as headmaster of Irwin Academy.
↧
Lieutenant R. W. Clements House, Irwinville
Built after the Civil War (likely 1870s) by 1st Lieutenant Reuben Walton Clements (1836-1899), this plantation house remains one of Irwinville’s most prominent landmarks. Clements was commissioned 1st Lieutenant of the Irwin Volunteers, Company F, 49th Regiment of Georgia Infantry on 4 March 1862 . Though he resigned on 30 July 1862 due to measles, he re-enlisted as a private in Company H, 4th Regiment of Georgia Cavalry (Clinch’s,) on 2 March 1863 . He surrendered at Tallahassee on 10 May 1865. [Ironically, this was the same day Confederate President Jefferson Davis was captured by Union troops on nearby property also owned by Clements. That property today is home to Jefferson Davis Historic Site] R. W. Clements’ son, James Bagley (Jim) Clements, resided here for many years. He was the author of History of Irwin County (Atlanta, Foote & Davies, 1932). Clements was a member of the Irwin County school board, an appointed and elected judge, and subsequently served in the Georgia Houses of Representatives and the Georgia State Senate.
↧
↧
Atwood House, 1880s, McIntosh County
This important historic house is a remnant of a lost era on the coast. It was built by the Atwood family, who operated the nearby Cedar Point Seafood Company, a local icon for many years. It was an instant favorite and its charm is barely expressed by something as simple as a photograph. It’s part of a tight-knit neighborhood that keeps a watchful eye on it, but luckily, it’s also video-monitored just in case. I’m unable to give directions to the house, out of respect for the neighborhood and the owners. Thanks to Bill Bolin for the background information and to Quincy Roberts for bringing it to my attention.
Many of you are already followers of Vanishing Coastal Georgia, so you will have already seen this there. To the thousands of new followers who have come to my work primarily via Facebook, I hope you’ll take the time to check it out, as well as Vanishing North Georgia.
↧
Toby’s Motel & Grill, Alapaha
Built to lure travelers off busy US Highway 82 (likely in the 1940s), Toby Powell’s Motel & Grill is still relatively intact. The eclectic architecture of the office/restaurant at first appears to be a crumbling facade, but it was built that way! For a time after its original use was supplanted, it served as a grocery store and Virginia’s Beauty Lounge.
Below is a contemporary postcard view.
↧
Log Tobacco Barn, Bulloch County
I found this old log tobacco barn with a bit of its tar paper siding still intact on Old Groveland Road near the Bulloch-Bryan county line. It probably dates to the late 1930s. There was an old sign propped against it, advertising a tent revival by the Christ Gospel Church dating to 2012.
↧
Red Hill Primtive Baptist Church, Bulloch County
This historic “old line” congregation dates to 1902.
↧
↧
Abandoned Farmhouse, Bryan County
This is located near Beautiful Zion Cemetery.
↧
Movie Set, Groveland
I took a turn off a dirt road at Grovelnad a few years ago and stumbled onto a fascinating collection of buildings. Though I was unsure of their purpose at the time, Bill Warnell, wrote in January 2012: Both Glory and East of Eden filmed scenes here. The buildings are original structures used in farming. Both movies painted the houses/barns for their purposes. The buildings last served as the town of Darien in the movie Glory. The movie called for the town to be torched by “the 54th” after they pillaged it as part of the War of Northern Aggression! Most of the buildings are still used for storage and can be seen from Hwy 280 but are ALL on private property. The Warnell family has long been associated with Bryan County. They lived in Groveland until moving to Pembroke in 1927. Daniel Brooks Warnell is the namesake of the UGA School of Forestry, one of the best-known in the nation, and the Mary Kahrs Warnell Forest and Education Center, named for his wife, is an excellent resource near Guyton.
To learn more about the Warnell family and their historic operations in Bryan County, visit the Mary Kahrs Warnell Forest & Education Center:
http://warnell.forestry.uga.edu/kahrs/h/warnells.html
↧
Abandoned Store, Groveland
On 28 August 2014 Joe Driggers wrote to say that his grandmother, Laura Sauls Driggers Bland, used to run a small grocery store out of this building.
In January 2012 Janet F. Dubois of Winston-Salem NC wrote: I remember Groveland when I was a child. My grandfather used to live there and run a little store which I believe at one time was in one side of the joined together building. The store used to be one room on the side of his house. The house no longer stands as many of the other houses are gone too. I still travel through Groveland occasionally and remember so vividly that is where I was when the news of the Meldrim train disaster happened in 1959. I was 11 at that time. There is an old cemetery there behind all the old buildings for the film made there that my Grandmother was buried in…in the mid 20’s. My own mother lost track of the burial plot due to lost grave markers and the moving of the original fences. Oh how I wish we could have found it before she herself passed away. It was her dream to locate her mother’s grave and have it moved. Sad what happens to our cemeteries and landmarks…
↧
Hay & Livestock Barn, Tattnall County
This is one of the largest barns of this type I’ve found in South Georgia. It’s located near Cedar Grove Methodist Church.
↧
↧
Board-and-Batten Farmhouse, Tattnall County
This is located in the Atlamaha community.
↧
Vernacular Farmhouse, Tattnall County
I’ve photographed this house many times and in trying to locate it on the website, for my own comparison, came up empty. With well over 10,000 images on Vanishing South Georgia, it can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. But back to the house; it’s located at the corner of Greater Zachariah Church Road and Baxter-Durrence Road and was a rental property until recently. It’s an iconic vernacular style, popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries throughout the rural south. This one retains its original kitchen (later enclosed) but as you can see from the side view, the whole structure is in dire condition.
↧
Tenant Farmhouse, Alamo
These photographs date to 2012. The house was razed soon thereafter.
It was essentially a single-pen house with an added front room. The tar paper was a later addition.
↧