Vacation, Day 3, 10/23/2009, Part 4

I took all of these photos in the Fondren neighborhood in Jackson, Mississippi, from my brother's vehicle as he slowed down a little bit. The gray, overcast skies lent a hard edge to everything, as well as somewhat washed out colors.

Here's a bit about the neighborhood, found on the Web site Fondren Renaissance dot org: Jackson’s historic Fondren Arts District is in the middle of everything. Unique restaurants, shopping and urban living combine to create a vibrant place to live, work and play.

Located between Northside Drive on the north and Woodrow Wilson on the
south, and between Interstate 55 to the east and Mill Street to the west, Fondren’s central location offers something for everyone – from fine dining to soda fountains, chic fashion to cherished antiques, still life to live music. If it’s
happening, it’s happening in Fondren.

Fondren Corner, a building I like a whole lot, not only for its design and those wonderful aluminum-looking letters, but also for its mixed use. See the railing around the roof? One night I got to go up there to a party--what a blast! And a splendid view! I called both of my sons who already were living in Portland and asked them to guess where I was. Silly, I know, but I was some kind of tickled to be up there. Thank goodness Lamont and Leland willingly put up with my idiosyncrasies! I just had to tell them that I could look down onto the shopping center nearby and see the loading dock of the Rainbow Natural Grocery--a business which includes High Noon Deli & Bakery and High Noon Cafe--places where they used to work. At the far left of the photo is the end of the building where I used to be privileged to set up my photographs for sale, on a couple of tables during the monthly Arts, Eats & Beats event, held in those days April through September. Mama used to go with me--we loved every second of it, seeing friends, laughing, talking and sometimes selling a photo or two.




From the "About Us at Fondren Corner's Web site: Fondren Corner is a mixed use development featuring shopping, dining, office and residential spaces in the heart of Jackson’s Historic Fondren Arts District.

Conveniently located minutes from downtown Jackson, Interstate 55, and the metro area’s medical corridor, Fondren Corner also serves as the central hub for a host of cultural events including Fondren After 5, Fondren Unwrapped, and Arts, Eats & Beats.

Located in what was once Jackson’s first “suburb,” the Fondren Corner area is becoming well know for its trendy retail shops, vintage clothing stores, antique merchants and interior design firms, award-winning restaurants, fine arts galleries and an increasing number of art studios.

Cups, in the same shopping center as Rainbow. Vividly I remember sitting there inside the railing around the outside dining area with Mama, on a sunny afternoon four or five years ago--we'd been to Rainbow to visit the guys. She had her cup of regular coffee and a muffin that I shared. I don't drink coffee, and I can't remember what I had to drink--seems like I had some sort of chocolate bar I'd bought in Rainbow. We watched people walk by, vehicles drive by, and after a while, she said, "It's hard to believe we're in Jackson." Love it!


From the "About Us" section at Cups' Web site: CUPS is a family owned and operated business. We live right here in Jackson, so we know our customers because they are our neighbors. We try to keep as much of the money we make in the community by roasting our own coffee, baking much of our pastries and purchasing as many items as possible from local sources. A couple of these items include our wildflower honey (harvested in Florence, MS). We also purchase our disposable utensils through a program run by Whitfield State Hospital.

We support our community through various charities and community services and activities. We support local artists by providing gallery space at no cost and no commission at seven of our locations.

Our managers and baristas are friendly, knowledgeable and highly motivated to serve you the finest products in a courteous, efficient and friendly manner.

Almost next door to Cups is this building which is home to the Jackson Free Press, my hometown's award-winning alternative newsweekly. That description doesn't do justice to this enterprising, eye-opening, truth-and-justice-seeking, think-global-shop-local, Jackson-Mississippi-loving organization, peopled with folks whose creativity and love of a good time are legendary. I ought to know--I used to be one of them! What a great time I had, writing, proofing, copy editing, and photographing for the JFP. I owe a great deal of my continuing creativity and curiosity to being associated with the JFP, probably a good deal of my sanity, to tell you the truth. Just go up the stairs--the offices are down the hall on the right.


Another nearby shopping center, one of my favorite signs in the neighborhood.


More about Fondren on another vacation day post when I was driving myself. I promise I stopped to take the photos!

Vacation, Day 3, 10/23/2009, Part 2

After lunch, which many Southerners call dinner, we made a stop at the Fred's Store in McComb. Why, we wondered. Milton's answer was something along the lines of, "If I get what I want, I'll show you. I'm going to see if I can get something for free." Huh? All I can say, is come back later on, and I'll show you just what he ended up getting for free.

I couldn't resist these clouds disappearing into the distance like a row of giant gray Twinkies on a clear plastic cookie sheet. We rode north up I-55 towards Jackson, Mississippi, our ultimate destination Miss Eudora Welty's house in the Belhaven neighborhood.


An interesting highway sign, Calling Panther Lake.


I have never seen this before. I thought highway signs got printed/worked on/whatever in a shop somewhere and were merely installed alongside the highway.


Almost there.


I can't count the times the I've driven to Miss Welty's house before she died in 2001, just to park out front and sit there for a few minutes, quietly thinking about her being inside the home she so dearly loved. "Hi, Miss Welty," I'd say out loud before starting the car to drive home. Now I would walk through her front door in a little over an hour. Awesome.

I had knocked on the front door once in 2004, not too long after I'd interviewed master gardener Susan Haltom for the Jackson Free Press, the alternative newsweekly in my hometown. (See the article below.) I wanted to make sure it would be OK for me to take Mama for a quick look at the garden. Miss Welty's niece Mary Alice came to the door and graciously said that it would be OK. What a privilege.

A close-up of the sign out front of Miss Welty's house. I took these photos from Kay's truck as we waited first for the arrival of my brother. He was to pick up Mama and take her to the hotel to get her settled while I toured the house.


Go to Eudora Welty House to take the virtual tour of the house and the one of the garden. Here's the article I wrote for the Jackson Free Press in 2004, about the revival of the Weltys' beloved garden and the woman tasked with making it ready for the public.

Susan Haltom

by Lynette Hanson
April 7, 2004

Can you even imagine your first job right out of the University of Mississippi being curator of exhibits at the Old Capitol? And then, almost 20 years later, when you’re back with the Mississippi Department of Archives and History—part time—being asked to go check on Miss Welty’s yard? And having that turn into a 10-year-long odyssey of cohesive research and tireless effort that culminated this past weekend with the opening of the garden at Eudora Welty’s Belhaven home?

That’s just what’s happened with Susan Haltom, 50, since she graduated from Ole Miss in 1975. The mother of three sons now lives on 13 acres in Ridgeland where her family settled 15 years ago after travelling around the country during her husband Jim’s medical training.

Haltom vividly remembers talking with Miss Welty back in 1994. “We were in her living room, and it was so poignantly sad when she said, ‘I can’t bear to look out the window and see what’s happened to my mother’s garden.’”

With the help of volunteer labor—people still volunteer to weed today—the honeysuckle and poison ivy were pulled off the beds. “Then we just watched,” she said.

Essentially, the same thing is still happening—the uncovered garden is there for us to watch, just the way Miss Welty and her mother used to do. Visit now and enjoy the pale lavender azalea, beside the arbor entrance to the garden, and the aptly named Lady Banks rose. She’s at the east end of the 50-foot trellis separating the upper and lower gardens and resembles nothing more than the muted yellow hoop skirt of a Southern belle, gently rippling in a spring breeze. Splashes of color are everywhere—lavender verbena, red poppies, blue ragged robins, white spirea and sweet alyssum, jewel-bright phlox and larkspur.

“When we restored the garden, we kept it true to the spirit of the place—a term people use in the study of her literature but we can appreciate in the garden, too,” Haltom, now a full-time garden designer, says. The time period selected for the restoration is 1925 to 1945, the first 20 years the Weltys lived in the house.

As we sat in the arbor at the center of the trellis, Haltom looked around for a moment and said, “I wish she could look out and see it now.”

Come back tomorrow for how we met up with my brother, H, a quick driving tour of parts of downtown Jackson, and all about our hotel and then our supper with H and his sweet wife, V.

Here's what moved.

A cafe moved, but not just any ol' cafe. It was the Virginia Cafe. I stepped back to get the entire unlit neon sign.


Here is what will be at its site, instead.

And this on the World Wide Web, with a photo of the new location.

The first visit Mama and I made to Portland, in the summer of 2004, Lamont and Leland and the two of us walked from the Benson Hotel on Broadway to the Virginia Cafe. The guys thought we'd enjoy ourselves there since it struck them as much like the Cherokee, a beloved restaurant in Jackson, Mississippi. The guys were right on all counts--the food, the ambience, the fun we had at the Virginia Cafe.

Several years ago the Cherokee moved from one side of I-55 North to the other, taking its menu and ambience to a larger location. The guys, who used to work there, got to see for themselves when they came home to move us up here in June, 2006. The long-time establishment remains one of Jackson's favorites, winning and/or placing in multiple categories in the Jackson Free Press' yearly Best of polls.

Here's one of my favorite shots I took of the Cherokee's neon sign.


Have you witnessed the move of an icon in your city? How did everyone react to the move?