Donate to St. Jude

 

This week’s feature is on Sextus Shannon, a Plantersville resident who each year hosts a bike-a-thon fundraiser for St. Jude. This year was the event’s 17th year, and it has become one of the most popular events of the year in Plantersville. Lots of people riding bikes, walking, socializing, eating…just having a great time.

The photo that’s on the cover was, I have to guess, the 20th shot I took of him that day. He asked if I had big garden and if I needed all those pictures of him to keep the birds out of it. No, I don’t have a garden. Sometimes it takes shot after shot after shot before getting the right one.

Anyway, I wanted to post a link to St. Jude in case you’re interested in donating.

Graduation

Last night, my son Phillip graduated from Saltillo High School. The ceremony actually took place in Tupelo’s BancorpSouth Arena. Phillip was one of 140 seniors to receive diplomas in an hour-long ceremony. The decision to move graduation to the coliseum (along with the other Lee County Schools at Mooreville and Shannon) seemed like a good one from our end, though things seemed a bit bland. There needs to be some signs or school colors displayed in the arena area to give the ceremony that high school feeling. Posted are two photos of Phillip from graduation. I’m proud of his accomplishment, but most of all I’m proud that he was able to see through all that hair to receive his diploma and not trip over himself.

“Didn’t you used to … “

This week’s Lee County Neighbors featured stories on the Miller locksmith business in Tupelo, which has employed only family members since the ’30s, and the Lake Piomingo residential area northeast of Tupelo.

 While doing my interviews on the same day (hours apart) for these stories, I was asked “Didn’t you used to write sports?”  My past has caught up with me.

For those of you who know me only as the Lee County Neighbors guy, I’ll admit I did have a previous life at the Daily Journal as a sports writer. I joined the paper full-time in November 1985 on the sports staff. Bobby Harrison was sports editor at the time. Before that I had worked on and off for two years as a part-time sports call-taker on Friday nights and a “stringer” reporter covering games in the Oxford area. I worked in sports and even moved up to assistant sports editor until 1995 when I took over Neighbors for the first time. Two years later, I was back in sports for a year (1997-98 school year) before returning to Neighbors. And of course, I’ve bounced back and forth between Neighbors and Djournal.com since. I consider it a compliment when people remember my sportswriting days. 

Tough girls

You don’t want to mess with these tough girls. Looks like they’re ready to rumble. Actually, they’re members of Baldwyn High School’s sophomore team in the all-day powder puff flag football games May 11. The girls represent their grade as they meet other teams in a playoff format. The freshmen girls defeated the sophomores in the final.

Looking tough for the camera are, from left, Mallory Roberts, Whitney Turner, Kelsey Smith, Macey Murphy and Andrea Underwood.

It’s ironic that some of these girls also showed up, sans the eyeblack, in the YoungViews portion in the same edition (this week’s) of Neighbors. I didn’t realize when I gathered them together for this shot the school had already e-mailed their mugs for YoungViews.

Brice’s Crossroads

Edwina Carpenter, a longtime friend and fellow journalist, was the cover story in today’s Lee County Neighbors. She’s the curator of the Brice’s Crossroads Visitor and Interpretive Center in Baldwyn. Take time to visit the site and learn more about a key Civil War battle that took place in our backyard.

Come on, get happy

This is the mystery photo that appeared in the May 2 Neighbors. Click it to see a larger version of it.

 I asked readers to call in and share what they know about all these men and a lone little calf in the middle. And what’s the meaning behind the sign: “Today is Happy Day. Come in and get happy!”

I received a call from Billy Scott,  who said, “I know my cows, and that’s a Jersey calf in the picture.” Scott, who grew up on a farm in western Union County, has this theory about the photo and the story behind it:

In the 1930s, when Tupelo/Lee County was struggling to create new business and farming opportunities, a group of community leaders got together to decide what should be done. They chose to invest in the dairy industry. They raised about $2,000 to buy Jersey calves from the Isle of Jersey.  A calf that arrived in Tupelo is seen with the men, who Scott noticed were wearing suits (bankers and business leaders) or working clothes (farmers).  The man who knows his cows knew that Jerseys are preferred because they produce milk that make richer dairy products. The “Happy Day” was probably the day the calves arrived in Lee County, thus marking the beginning of the dairy industry in this area.

Scott wasn’t totally sure he was 100 percent correct on his theory, but he believed he was heading in the right direction. I think so, too. I plan to drop by the Lee CountyLibrary and check out their archives to find more information about it. I hope to run something in next week’s Neighbors about it.

Photos photos everywhere

In the years I’ve been doing Neighbors, I’ve had readers tell me they enjoy seeing the many photos we run. Photos of people, groups, events, etc. Photos that reflect the diversity of the county. They want to see just who’s in the paper.

Sometimes, our cup is overfloweth with photos. As of last Wednesday, I had 120 photos to choose from for this week’s edition. That’s enough to fill up two or three sections. Obviously, I’m limited to one section per week, so I have to decide which photos make the cut and appear in the section, and which ones are held for a week. It’s like being a sports coach who has to decide in preseason which players make the team. Sometimes you have to bump a good photo just because there’s little-to-no room for it. I don’t enjoy holding photos, but when you space is limited in the section there’s only so much I can get in.

If you check out this week’s section, avaiable in Wednesday’s Daily Journal, you’ll find a sea of photos featuring a wide variety of folks from within our county.

As for the ones who didn’t make it, they’ll get another chance. The process starts over later today. I’ll sit down and go through what’s submitted, what’s still waiting to be downloaded from e-mails and what’s planned for this week, and I’ll determine who makes the cut for the May 9 edition.

Restart

Due to tech problems, I had to kill off my original Neighbors blog. What you’re viewing now is Neighbors Blog version 2.0. I’m already liking this version better than the first.