Life In the Slow Lane

With all new tires, we headed to Greensboro, the site of the first Woolworth sit-ins against segregation in public accommodations.    On February 1, 1960 Four African-American students from NC A&T College  sat at the lunch counter, each ordering a coffee and a donut. They were refused service and refused to leave until closing (5:30). The next day 60 more students joined them, then there were hundreds. The students were polite and non-violent; hecklers pulled their hair and threatened them. Several whites were arrested. The protests continued until July, when the local Woolworth manager relented, mostly because the store was losing money and so his salary had been cut. News to me was that this segregation was not due to Jim Crow laws, but "merely" local racism. The local store manager could, and did, change the rule, without needing authorization from any government, and probably not even corporate . Woolworth did not change the policy company-wide: Jackson Mississi...

 All the snow is gone! Besides the weather, we had some adventures. We went off to drive, without Boma, the "Devil's Triangle", a 44 mile scenic drive in the steep hills. We decided to take a short cut, actually a scenic detour, before we got there. It started out as a well-graded two lane gravel road. About 10 miles in it degraded to a less well-graded, one lane road. Beautiful scenery. No problem. The puddles in the road got more serious, so I would get out to test their depth. Always less than six inches, no problem.  A tree had fallen across the road, so I broke off some branches to make it easier to pass. No problem. A convoy of serious ATVs, all encased in mud, with winches, shovels, etc. passed by on a nearby trail. They waved and looked at us a little funny.  Another few miles, and we are almost back to the paved road of the Devil's Triangle. The "road", now a rough trail, dropped off steeply. It had been paved decades ago, so hunks of asphalt were b...

Got out the winter coats for four inches of snow. Tonight is supposed to be even colder, down to 12˚; it's already 14.9˚.  We are in Rocky Top in eastern Tennessee, next to the town of Clinton. The town song: Rocky Top  by the Osbourne Brothers. It is one of the ten official songs of Tennessee. In a weird twist, the town was named for the song, in 2014. Welcome to Clinton TN This mural graces downtown. The leftmost picture is the Norris Dam, the first Tennessee Valley Authority project, and location of our campground and snow. The rightmost panel commemorates their desegregation issue in 1956.  The Clinton High School became the first integrated high school in the South . This happened the year before the Little Rock (1957)  Little Rock Nine . Clinton (population 4,000 then) was about 90% White and 10% Black Following the 1954 Brown vs Board of Education decision and a subsequent case in Tennessee, the school board integrated the high school. Twelve African Ameri...

These crossed railroad tracks were probably the most significant do-or-die location during the Civil War But first, Yet Another Trivial Accomplishment! We ascended the highest point in Mississippi, Mount Woodall,  803 feet, woo hoo!  Mississippi is 47th highest. On a barely-researched whim we stopped at Corinth, Mississippi. Corinth's military importance was because two major railroads, the Memphis and Charleston Railroad, running east-west across the whole Confederacy, and the Mobile and Ohio Railroad, the only north-south line, crossed there. These railroads were essential for Confederate army supply lines.   War stories are usually big on valiant actions, heroes and sometimes cowards, and medals of honor. Traditional wars depended on killing the enemy one by one, up close and personal, with a sword, spear, bayonet, musket or arrow. Death tolls were usually low. The Civil War was the first "modern" war. New long distance weapons, such as rifles and rifled cannons s...

Some readers contacted me about Mississippi ratifying the 13th amendment only in 2013. Mississippi only removed the "redneck swastika" from their state flag in 2021. A personal pet peeve is the misuse and ignorance of the Confederate Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia. This flag is square and never was the flag of the Confederate States of America This flag is rectangular and was never used during the Civil War. The "redneck swastika" was resurrected by the KKK and fraudulent "Lost Cause" after Reconstruction as a symbol for White Supremacy, ignorance, and racism. Below is the original state flag of Mississippi from 1863-1895. Note the Battle Flag was not part of this flag during or after the Civil War. There was no state flag before this. None of the rebel states had the Battle Flag as part of their state flags during the war. The Battle Flag motif was added to state flags after Reconstruction. Original Mississippi state flag, with magnolia...