Mr. Post and Third Party Politics

During the 1890s the following ad/article appeared in The Sun, a paper in Kansas City.

Driven From Sea to Sea!

A real story of today, illustrating the fate of the disinherited, by C.C. Post, ex-editor of the Chicago Express…..The author of the above book is now sojourning in Douglasville, Georgia, where he went after inspecting the over-advertised land of Florida and he is so well satisfied with the climate, the price of land, the water, the scenery, the products, the people and the prospects in general that he is naturally desirous to see a nucleus of his northern friends gathered about him.

So, C.C. Post was sojourning, was he?

To sojourn means to stay somewhere temporary, but for someone who intended to stay in Douglasville temporarily Post certainly stirred things up.

By the time he and his wife, Helen Wilmans Post had fled the town he had the place turned upside down, and made Douglasville the hotbed of third party politics.

If you are coming into the story late you can catch up by reading parts one and two here and here.

Post wasn’t just a muckraking journalist and novelist. He had been involved in politics for some time before arriving in Georgia, and he was hardly the sort to let a little thing like being a Yankee in the deep south keep him from dabbling in politics again.

However, he underestimated the good people of Georgia….and the even better folks of Douglas County as Joseph S. James was quoted in The New South in 1902:  [The Democratic Party] has in the past withstood all assaults upon it. If you are a friend to it you will do well to try to reform your own actions to its policy or, at least, stay in its lines. The history of it is all those who undertake to burst it usually get bursted themselves.

In other words…don’t trifle with the party….the ONLY party in Georgia per the time period, AND whatever you do….don’t try to split the party by instituting a third party.

Here’s how it all went down……

When we last left Mr. and Mrs. Post she was busy with her “mental science” making a living selling information that more than like was simply not true while her younger husband, C.C. Post busied himself by becoming involved in the power structure of the town. During the late 1880s and through the turn-of-the-century the power structure was headed up by Joseph S. James and Dr. T.R. Whitley. Mr. Post had several business dealings with both men and had bought some land from Dr. Whitley where a grand mansion was built along Chicago Avenue.

So, when did the love affair with the Posts begin to go sour?

Things took a nasty turn as C.C. Post returned to politics. He soon became involved with the Farmer’s Alliance. I encourage you to take a couple of minutes and read through the New Georgia Encyclopedia article regarding the Alliance here.

Farmers did have a legitimate gripe. The landowners were getting wealthier while the farmer was getting poorer.

But wait….weren’t the landowners and the farmers the same people?

No….not necessarily. Because the economy had been destroyed following the Civil War many planters could no longer work their fields. They divided their land and allowed others to work their fields for a fee…..a fee based on the production and sale of the crops. What developed was basically another form of slavery as small-time farmers owed larger and larger amounts to the landowner and often also ran up huge bills with merchants for supplies and staples. Sometimes the merchant and landowner was the same person which meant they had even more leverage over the farmer.

Post used his prior experience with the Grange movement in Indiana to become a lecturer for the Farmer’s Alliance. Per Fannie Mae Davis in her book From Indian Trail to I-20, Post had convinced ten of the twelve members of the Douglas County Democratic Executive Committee to defect to the Farmers Alliance by 1891. Only J.B. Duncan and J.H. McClarty remained Democrats, and they were referred to as the ‘Lone Fishermen.’

Soon Post was traveling the state, and he soon moved up in the ranks of leadership in the Farmer’s Alliance.

Now, in the beginning staunch Democrats like James and Whitley along with men involved in state politics allowed the farmers to have their Alliance without grumbling too much. They felt that if they pushed back too hard the Democratic Party would splinter, and they wanted to avoid it, but that’s exactly what the Alliance leadership including C.C. Post wanted and began calling for.

A third party…..the Populist Party. If you haven’t already clicked through to the New Georgia Encyclopedia article I linked to above now might be a good time.

Staunch Democrats would have none of a third party. They had suffered the indignities of having carpetbaggers and scalawags control the state legislature during Reconstruction. They had finally gotten themselves back in control, and weren't going to let a bunch of farmers led by a Yankee create a third party.

During the spring and summer of 1892 things really heated up.

Politicians like John B. Gordon and W.J. Northern looked upon some of the wants an needs of the Alliance with favor, but were adamantly against a third party. Gordon had returned to the Senate and Northern, past president of the State Agricultural Society had been elected governor.  Even the President of the Georgia Alliance from 1888 to 1892…..Leonidas F. Livingston would not jump the Democratic Party ship for the Populist Party.

Post and his Alliance cronies continued their fight, however. They crisscrossed the state speaking to groups of farmers at barbecues, in churches and even in fields if need be.

The Constitution had a field day with the political fracas reporting every move C.C. Post and the third party men made, but it was clear they favored the Democrats more. On April 1, 1892 the Constitution wrote concerning the third party….“a new party, gathering strength from men who have had no experience in the management of party politics. It is blundering along in the darkness, bungling things as it goes, and when they get through with the job, a pretty mess they will have.”

While most third party gatherings were simple speeches where converts were or were not made before heading off to the next town some of the gatherings were more interesting.

So, what about Douglasville?   Did Post ever speak here?

Of course he did.

In April, 1892 a great meeting between the Democrats and the third party men were advertised for Douglasville….on the thirteenth, to be exact. Both sides advertised the event heavily. The Constitution advised,“This is Post’s home, and is regarded as the home of third partyism in Georgia. Douglasville will be alive with people to hear the political issues of the day discussed. One of Atlanta’s best brass bands will be furnishing the music.”

The day after the even the Constitution published a lively account that was furnished by The New South paper from Douglasville, no doubt since it was written with a more Democratic slant.

 The article began rather dramatically…….

Not since the flaming torch was applied to the city of Moscow and Napoleon’s army began its disastrous retreat to the…waters of the Beresina in the bitter days of 1812 has such a signal rout been given to men as that which marked the flight of Post and his third party followers today.

See, dramatic. Right?

The article continues....This day’s business will go to history.

Unfortunately, it didn’t, and I doubt that even a handful of Douglas residents know about it.

The article continued....It’s parallel has never been known to Georgia politics. Never ever amid the exciting times of warfare between the old whig and democratic parties has the instance been known when one party after lining its forces for a battle on the stump gave up the fight and beat a hasty and sudden retreat before a single speech was made or a single orator introduced.

Never!

And yet this is just what the third party people did here in Douglasville today.

Congressman Livingston was invited to Douglasville to speak on behalf of the Democrats.  He returned to Atlanta from Washington D.C. for that very purpose. Committees from each side met on the morning of April 13 and decided how the debate would unfold.

Congressman Livingston would speak followed by C.C. Post on behalf of the third party.  Then a host of others would speak as well from each side. Livingston would respond again at the end of the day.

The stage was set.

The Constitution article goes on to say....Hundreds and hundreds of people [went to Douglasville] – not alone from neighboring regions, but from all parts of Georgia – to participate in the political sensation that was promised. Newspaper correspondents came by the dozen representing all the leading daily journals of the state.

The train arrived carrying the speakers, and even though the agenda and rules for the debate had been agreed to earlier in the day, as soon as Post alighted [from the train] and sought his committee on arrangements a sudden change of the program was demanded.

Post did not want to allow Livingston to have the final say. He wanted equal time man for man.

By this time the crowds had already arrived for the debate and were pressing upon the courthouse in downtown Douglasville. The People’s Party Paper advised there were four People’s Party men in Douglasville for every one Democrat stating....They left their plows sticking in the furrows and came by scores and by hundreds….They filled the courthouse, they overflowed and filled the town….a great sea of people.”

The event changed, however, from the debate the crowds were expecting to see to two separate meetings…. each competing for the crowd.

Joseph S. James stood on the courthouse steps and welcomed the throng of visitors who had come to listen to the debate and he assured the people they would witness an orderly and fair minded gathering…

 

 

Livingston and E.P. Howell led off the Democratic speeches from the courthouse steps

while Post led his supporters away. It is estimated around 500 people had left the courthouse with Post and marched across the pedestrian bridge over the railroad and down Strickland Street.

Railroad bridge?

Yes!

During Douglasville’s earliest days up until the 1930s there was a wooden bridge up and over the tracks so people could safely cross from Broad Street over to Strickland.  The picture I’ve posted below is actually from the 1920s, but you can see the bridge very clearly.  I’ve written about it here as well.

The People’s Party Paper advised it was County Alliance president J.W. Brown who suggested to the third party followers they should adjourn to the Alliance Warehouse on Strickland Street.

The paper advises someone yelled...."Cross over the railroad bridge so everybody can see,” and the surging crowd turned aside at the intersection of the street and crossed the high bridge over the railroad, thus making their numbers apparent to every onlooker.

Two blocks further down the street stands the Alliance Warehouse and when the head of the marching column reached here they looked back and saw the crowds still surging across the high bridge, where every moment fresh squads of twenty, fifty, or one hundred of those who had wanted to hear what the excited and now dismayed Democratic leaders were saying, turned away from the courthouse on the hill with cheers for Watson, Post and the party of the people, joined the marching columns headed to the warehouse.

The Constitution article stated....Many had apparently left the courthouse under the impression that all the speakers were going to the warehouse….[Post] naturally took in hand the direction of affairs, and had half a dozen bales of cotton rolled out in front of the warehouse. The idea was for the ladies to sit on the bales, but they were provided with other seats, and the men mounted the bales…

Couriers kept going back and forth between the courthouse and the warehouse to report what was going on at the other meeting…The composition of the crowd at the warehouse kept changing composition as folks would venture to the courthouse and reinforcements would come down.

The gentle breeze wafted the hearty democratic cheers over to the warehouse and the burst of enthusiasm up there came down like the rattling of distant guns. Now there  would be a tremendous roar as if from a whole battery. Then there would be the rattle of musketry as volley after volley of applause greeted the telling of the speeches.

The people’s party cheered , too, and in defiance, but their hurrahs, mingling with the odor of the phosphate were mostly borne by the zephyrs over towards Cobb County.

After the meeting a young planter, who had gone from Lithia Springs said, ‘I had thought there would be a much larger gathering of third party folks. They cannot carry Douglas County.

….and after their first success, they never did.

Next week I’ll publish the final installment of the “saga” of the Posts.

See installment four here.

Go back to installment two here.

Go back to installment one here.

When Mr. and Mrs. Post Came to Town

Thank you so very much, Dear Reader, for indulging me while I took some time for family, friends, and little frivolity during the holidays.

I'm looking forward to bringing you many more bits of Douglas County history in 2013.

During our last visit I had begun the story of the very interesting tale of C.C. and Helen Post who entered the Douglasville scene in the late 1880s.

The late Douglas County historian, Fannie Mae Davis used the words visionaries, social reformers and even eccentric to describe the Posts, and it's clear from my research they brought Douglas County to the forefront of a very tumultuous time in Georgia's political history. Personally, I'd like to add the word nefarious as well to the descriptors....

When we last left Mr. and Mrs. Post she had decided to take classes regarding Christian Science with Emma Curtis Hopkins. See my first post regarding the Posts here if you need to refresh your memory or need to catch up on the story.

During the time Helen was taking the classes poor Mr. Post suffered from what has been described by some sources as a weak physique while other sources mention the word "consumption".

In case you are not aware consumption refers to what we know today as tuberculosis.

Helen promptly introduced her future husband to Christian Science doctrine. After their marriage she advised anyone who would listen that she had cured him. Mr. Post agreed with her and encouraged her to share her healing powers with others.

At this point the story shifts from Chicago, Illinois to Douglasville, and if you are like me you have to wonder what prompted the Posts to move from a large city such as Chicago to little old Douglasville. In fact, a Constitution article concerning the background of Mr. and Mrs. Post refers to Douglasville as a mere hamlet, possessing but one grocery store and a blacksmith shop.

Indeed...not exactly a spot where a muckraking political journalist/novelist and a newspaper/healer might end up.

Mrs. Post advises in her book The Search for Freedom concerning the move south saying, "Some three years after my marriage to Mr. Post we came south. We were on a search for conditions. We hardly knew what the conditions would be; but we had worn out the old ones, and ha been worn out in them until a complete change became imperative.

Indeed, Mr. Post was a very sick man. He had worked too hard at the desk, and death threatened him in the shape of consumption. When we left Chicago not one of our friends expected to see him alive again....

...We went to Douglasville, Georgia and there, in a little country hotel, we fought the battle with death, and won the victory. As health began to be established in Mr. Posts' wasted frame...."

However, the Haymarket Riot in Chicago might have prompted their move. The riot occurred in May, 1886....six months before the Posts arrived in Douglasville.

The whole affair started out as a peaceful march by workers demanding an eight hour day. However, when police tried to get the crowd to move along someone threw a bomb into the crowd. After the blast and the gunfire that erupted several policemen and civilians were killed or wounded. The eight organizers for the march were prosecuted and convicted of conspiracy. They were branded as anarchists and sentenced to death. During the eight weeks after the riot a red scare ensued.

The Posts were known supporters of the labor movement, and Mr. Post's co-workers at the paper didn't take kindly to it when they learned Helen Post had sent money to those on trial to help with their legal bills. It could just be that Chicago had gotten a little uncomfortable for Mr. and Mrs. Post.

At any rate...Helen sold her paper...The Woman's World to fund the move. She wrote, "I soon grew tired of the whole matter, especially as it took up my entire time and there was no money of any consequence in it; and we needed money...Mr. Post had been unable for months to earn anything with his pen. It was quite a long time before he recovered his mental vigor sufficiently to enter the field of literature again."

The Posts arrived in Douglasville in January, 1887 with what probably amounted to the clothes on their backs and two hundred dollars between them.

During the move C.C. Post had encouraged Helen to figure out a way to share their experiences with Christian Science and his "cure" with the public. After thinking on it a bit Helen decided she could fashion the philosophy into her own dogma stating in her book, "It's hallmark was the claim that humanity was nourished by an inferior fountain of thought and will which represented one's inner divine power."

She improved upon the "one's inner divine power" principal an became the self-appointed founder of "Mental Science".  Please understand I am in no way discounting Christian Science in any way, and don't wish to make a judgment on it.  The problem has to do with how Helen Wilmans Post perverted the thoughts behind Christian Science and eventually twisted her "Mental Science" to such an extent she was committing fraud.

While in Douglasville...perhaps during their stay at the hotel in town on Strickland Street Helen Post wrote her series of lessons. Between herself and her daughter Ada, Helen handwrote six copies of the lessons, placed an ad in The Woman's World and upon receipt of $25 a copy of the lessons would be mailed to the customer. The customer then produced their own handwritten copy of the lessons and mailed them back to Helen.

Later, Helen was able to print the lessons, and the cost was reduced to $20 for each client.

Apparently the venture was an immediate success and started gaining Helen Post attention as well as a fat bank account. She an Ada began work on their next project....a paper clients could subscribe to called Wilman's Express.

Four years later in a Constitution article dated February 15, 1891 in which Helen was interviewed regarding her business she advised that the paper was printed by the New South in Douglasville and brought in close to twelve to fourteen thousand dollars a year in subscriptions. She advised that the paper had circulation of 30,000, but close to 50,000 were printed each month. During those years when the population hovered around 1,000, I venture to say that Helen Wilmans Post was the number one customer at the Douglasville post office!

By 1891, there were two "Mental Science" courses offered....a beginners and an advanced. Mrs. Post estimated that over 5,000 had been sold. This means that in the four years she had been living in Douglasville Mrs. Post had made close to $100,000 with her course...and let us remember that this was prior to income tax!!!

Fannie Mae Davis advises the Posts were "promptly welcomed into the social and power structure" of Douglasville.

Helen Post advises in her book...."a wild curiosity was manifested to find out what cured [Mr. Post].

It was believed that I possessed some secret power that was denied to others, and I become a marked individual in the community. Especially the Negroes were affected by Mr. Post's cure, and they came to me with their complaints and begged to be cured also."

Some of her words might offend us today, but we need to remember this particular book was written in 1898, and opinions and the manner in which they were expressed were much different.

Helen continues...."but soon there was another class [who came]. Southern society is divided into three classes; the Negroes, the poorer class of white people who are tenants on the land they planted, and the upper classes who are property owners, and in every way superior to the others.

I only had a short experience with the middle class when the more intelligent and refined people began to crowd all the others out."

Apparently, Mr. Post had recovered enough by March, 1887 to get out and about. Helen writes, "....He wished for some ground in which to dig and plant. He had been brought up on a farm, and it was strange to see how he really longed to come into close relationship with old mother earth once more."

Mother Earth was the last thing on C.C. Post's mind...he missed politics and had set about working on his way into making the right friends in Douglasville.

By March, 1887 Mr. Post had become very friendly with Joseph S. James and Dr. T.R. Whitley and was named the president of the Douglasville Canning and Preservation Company. I wrote about it here stating that the goal of the [company] was to provide a market for area farmers plus provide an incentive for the farmers to plant more fruits and berries.

It wasn't just about providing a market. The business was a farmer cooperative and a main tenant of the Farmer's Alliance....a political concern Post was heavily involved with before he ever reached Douglasville, and that eventually would turn the town's political structure upside down.

The Posts eventually bought some land described as "adjoining the town", and "began to improve it."

The land in question happened to be four lots belonging to Dr. T.R. Whitley.  They set about using some of the money Helen had earned from her mail order business building a home....a home Fannie Mae Davis advises was so fine and impressive the street it was on became known as Chicago Avenue.

A Constitution article from 1891 states, "...just on the outskirts of Douglasville....is one of the handsomest residences in the state. There lives Colonel C.C. Post and his wife...The home is one of elegance, unsurpassed by many city palaces."

The home is gone now but this picture taken before the house was torn down in the 1950s clearly shows that Helen Post must have been doing well.

In fact, once the house was built Helen expanded her business. She established the Wilmans Metaphysical College which offered classes leading to diplomas an advertised "Lovely accommodations for a limited number". Tuition was $50 and board cost seven to ten dollars a week. The petition for the "college" was filed by Joseph S. James.

Who knew that such as "college" ever existed in Douglasville?

C.C. Post's name also appears on letter head for the Douglasville Mineral Land and Improvement Company as vice president. Joseph S. James was listed as president and
H.H. LeVan was listed as secretary.

An article in the Constitution dated February 16, 1889 advises a syndicate of northern capitalist had purchased 3,000 acres of land near Winston in the red belt section of Douglas County on the Georgia Pacific railway, and that the land contained large deposits of magnetic iron ore. Joseph S. James, who by that time was an ex-Senator stated they would commence removing the ore within 30 days.

And these northern capitalist? The article states among the purchasers were C.C.Post and Mr. LeVan of Minneapolis who also had moved to Douglasville.

A northern capitalist who had arrived in town nearly dead and with as little as $200.  You have to smile, right?

While I have found no verification to date, Helen Post advises that her husband was elected to the Douglasville town council on two separate occasions while they lived in town.

....and Helen wrote of the people of Douglasville once more after she had a little more money:

"We had money to spend on the effort to assist others. The people about us - though not understanding our ideas in the least - were strongly attracted to us, and we loved them in return."

C.C. Post expanded his growing group of friends and associates to those in Atlanta eventually. By June, 1890 he helped form the Northern Society.  I shared a little about this group here.....

The Northern Society was a group of northern-born folks who made Georgia their home and wanted to promote the benefits of their adoptive home for families and businesses.

C.C. Post was heavily involved with the group and managed to get the city of Douglasville to help him put on the very first convention for the Northern Society attended by hundreds from around the state.

And then by 1891 C.C. Post was a lecturer for the Farmer's Alliance, and that's when things began to get a bit dicey for Mr. and Mrs. Post....for Douglasville.....and the state of Georgia.

Tune in next week!

Go back to Part one here.

Part three can be found here.

Part four can be found here.

From Military Road to Bankhead Highway

The year is 1917 and you are heading up Bankhead Highway heading west.    Try to follow these directions:

Once you reach Lithia Springs go straight through by taking the right fork and crossing the rail road.   Cross the rail road again.   Take a left and go straight ahead.

Yes, that’s right….you crossed the railroad track twice.

Once you reach Douglasville follow the road by crossing the rail road track not once but twice.  At the fork take the right side not once, not twice, but three different times.

Yes!  There were three forks in the road.

Then as you approach Winston turn left around the post office.   Do NOT go down the hill to the station, but DO go down a rough steep grade and take a right under the rail road.   Cross the rail road tracks and take the right fork.

Yes, there used to be a post office stop in Winston.

At Villa Rica go two blocks from the station and take a left…..then the right fork……….and here’s where the trip takes a fun turn………….ford the creek.   It’s a good size and has a smooth sand bottom….deep to the left.  Cross the wood bridge.   Then cross the rail road and take the left fork (the right side takes you to Cartersville).

Head down the long steep grade and manage the very rough dangerous curve.  Cross a wood bridge at the bottom.  Go under the rail road track and take the left fork.  Make sure it’s the left because if you take the right you head out towards Cedartown and you might not realize it until you have traveled the entire 26 mile route.

I find the numerous forks in the road to be interesting, and the fact that you could go “under” the railroad in so many places very fascinating.   

This route would not have been titled Bankhead Highway, however…..not in 1917, but it would have been referred to as the Military Road, and the road would have been dirt as it was not paved until the 1930s.

You can read more about the Military Road here.

During the summer of 1917 the Studebaker Corporation gave the folks at the Atlanta Constitution a car which became known as the “Dixie Rover”.  The car along with her driver Ned M’Intosh completed a series of eleven road tours in Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee in the interest of better roads and better motoring conditions.   M’Intosh was staff correspondent for the Constitution and was secretary for the Georgia State Automobile Association.  He traveled over some of the best roads and some of the worst roads in the south.  Some of the roads had never even had a car on them. 

 M’Intosh also road the proposed routes for the proposed Bankhead Highway, and the above directions were published in an article he wrote concerning the route.

In June, 1917 M'Intosh advises the importance of Bankhead Highway by writing.....Certainly it is a prize worth fighting for, because it is to be a great trunk highway, not only between Atlanta and Birmingham, but between the west coast and the Atlantic with the rapidly increasing use of motor vehicles, the development of such a highway is inevitable.   It is not difficult to forsee the day when passenger traffic between Atlanta and Birmingham will be carried on almost solely by automobile.  

The advantages of a town being located on the main highway now will therefore grow most appreciably in the immediate future, and there is apparently no limit to the possible development of automobile traffic.  

When word was handed down that Congress was going to appropriate money to building a national highway from coast to coast routes were proposed and group were set up to boost or support the road.   In November, 1916 the Atlanta Constitution reported a group of highway boosters would hold a meeting in Douglasville.  At that time five counties - Douglas, Fulton, Cobb, Haralson, and Cobb - were planning on having the new Bankhead Highway pass through their borders, but the legislation wasn't a done deal.  

Douglasville's own Dr. T.R. Whitley was a delegate to the Bankhead Highway Association and along with other delegates was responsible for the final route the road would take.  In fact, it can probably be argued rather successfully Dr. Whitley's position as a delegate helped Douglas County greatly.  The purpose of the meeting was to discuss methods for delegates and supporters for building even more support for the road to be routed through their particular area.  

By February, 1917 more meetings were being held.  The picture I've posted below is from the Atlanta Constitution.  From left to right you see Dr. T.R. Whitley, who was a member of the board of directors for the Bankhead Highway Association; Mrs. T.R. Whitley; ex-Mayor J.H. Van Hoose of Birmingham, and J.A. Rountree, the secretary for the Bankhead Highway Association.

Dr. Whitley was interviewed for the Constitution article dated May 11, 1917 which discussed how the labor was to be performed on the road.  

At this time World War I was still underway and many German prisoners of war housed at Fort McPherson, per this article.  Dr. Whitley referred to these prisoners in his remarks and discussed how he thought it would be a good idea for the prisoners to work on the new road.

By May, 1917 Dr. Whitley advises the road had already been surveyed and the section from Fort McPherson to the Chattahoochee River was in good shape, and some of the road on the other side of the river was complete "with the exception of some eight miles that would have to be built."  The eight miles was later identified in the article as the stretch between the river and LIthia Springs.  The work was needed in order to correct several bad grades.

   

Regarding the German prisoners working on the eight mile stretch Dr. Whitley advised, "The Germans must be worked somewhere, and there will be no additional expense in working them on the roads and the government has mules enough now doing nothing to work the roads."

So, far I've found no absolute proof that German POWs worked on Bankhead Highway through Douglas County, but it certainly is possible.

In June, 1917 M'Intosh drove the propsed routes and reported their condition to Atlanta Constitution readers.   There was the route we are familiar with today west to Birmingham, but there was also a route where the road would have been routed through Cave Springs and Rome, and per M'Intosh it was the most preferable even though it was longer.

M'Intosh gave reports concerning all sections of the proposed roadway saying, "The present condition of this road, in the stretches which have been allowed thus to wear out and run down, is but one degree removed from unimproved dirt road.   ...Such a road condition is hardly a criterion of the people who have made such citiies as Birmingham and Gadsden."

He also wasn't very impressed with the proposed route through Cobb County saying, "As has been said before a very considerable amount of work is needed.  The strange part about this Cobb County road is that perhaps the worst part of the road lies between Marietta and the Chattahoochee River bridge, a stretch of road which is more traveled perhaps than any other stretch of the same length in Georgia."

"Regarding the road from western Cobb County line to Douglasville, M'Intosh reported the road was in pretty good  condition, but from Douglasvillle to Villa Rica  the drag is again badly needed.   

What's a drag?

Basically it's a device that can be pulled behind a team of mules, and it  helps to even out the road. The drag I pictured above shows one being used in Minnesota.

Of course, once he crossed the Alabama line the road conditions worsened per M'Intosh...."After one crosses the state line into Alabama, the road is an unspeakable route, it winds back and forth all over the face of the earth and goes up and down small knolls without the back and forth all over the face of the earth and goes up and down small knolls without the remotest semblance of grading with such frequency that it all but makes one sea sick."

Well, it was Alabama, right?

Not only did M'Intosh call for the drag to be used more often he also called for installing sign posts at every cross road and every fork of main roads and street corners in towns.

Think about that for a minute....he was calling for road signs....something we take for granted today, but back then it wasn't immediately done because there wasn't a real need until roads had automobile traffic.

You might be thinking....dirt road and no road signs, yet......no traffic lights, and this was true......there were no stop signs or traffic lights at this time, but even without traffic lights to delay drivers it would have taken you right at ten hours to travel by car from Atlanta to Birmingham.

Yes!   Ten hours.  M'Intosh reports he left Atlanta at six in the morning and didn't reach Birmingham until close to four in the afternoon.

I don't think I would have wanted to reach Birmingham that much to endure a ten hour trip.

1902: It's a Marathon Commencement

As I write this my daughter is off to her last official day of high school.  It’s all downhill from here. The next few days leading up to Friday’s commencement ceremony will be filled with graduation practice, but her thirteen years of academic classes including kindergarten are over for her.

For the first time in twenty-two years I will not have to worry with excuse notes, teacher conferences, or deal with report cards. I will never be a room mother again, a PTA officer, or participate in a school fundraiser as a parent.

No more homework wars or the never-ending battle to get someone out the door before the tardy bell sounds. No more agonizing fraction lessons or mad dashes to the drug store for glue or poster board when a forgotten project is suddenly remembered at 9:30 at night.

Fairly soon back to school clothes shopping will be replaced with dorm room shopping, and she will be making that trek for school supplies on her own, in our immediate future is the commencement exercise–the graduation ceremony.     

My son’s graduation ceremony a few years ago was the first one I had experienced since my own in 1980, and I have to be honest here–the overall atmosphere had changed.

Back in my day–gee, did I really use that phrase?  Well, back in my day I remember my own ceremony being a bit reverent, fairly quiet and you could just sense the importance of the occasion. In fact, all of the graduations I went to as a young girl were rather sedate rites of passage whether they were held in a gymnasium, on a school lawn, or auditorium.  My sister’s graduation in 1974 was held at the old Municipal Auditorium in Atlanta where Georgia Championship Wrestling made its home for a while. Her ceremony was nothing like a wrestling match. I remember a stern admonishment from my mother regarding talking and fidgeting, so I had to forget thoughts of a takedown or a half Nelson pin.

Nowadays most graduation ceremonies are held on the school’s football field because of the large number of graduates and guests. While the atmosphere is still thick with the knowledge that an important milestone has been reached, and there is some seriousness to the occasion, the events are also loud with bullhorns, bells, whistles, cat calls, and sometimes it’s a little hard to hear your child’s name being called. Parents jostle for the perfect camera angle, people stand in front of the bleachers blocking your view, and if you don’t arrive at least three hours early grandma won’t get a seat.

Turn back the dials on my own version of Douglas County’s Way Back machine, and we might be attending the graduation exercises for Douglasville College.

Douglasville College was in existence from 1888 to 1914, and was founded at the insistence of Dr. T.R. Whitley, a citizen of Douglasville who wanted to educate his children locally. He was strongly opposed to boarding schools as the only means of providing higher education for youth. Unfortunately, his ideas were slow to catch on as many members of the town council were afraid to allocate any money for the school because they feared the idea would be unpopular with citizens.  They were wrong, of course, and pretty soon Douglasville College was built and opened where the armory sits along Church Street.  When I toured the Old Courthouse Museum several weeks ago I snapped an image of Douglasville College drawn by Steven Garrett and provide it here with this article...

THANK YOU for visiting “Every Now and Then” and reading the first few paragraphs of “1902: It's a Marathon Commencement“ which is now one of the 140 chapters in my book “Every Now and Then: The Amazing Tales of Douglas County, Volume I”. 

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