Mississippi muse: Having fun on the family farm in Collins

Visitors can tour three historic cabins at Mitchell Farms in Collins, Miss. Below, visitors play with the family dog in corn pool, and Nelda Mitchell captivates visitors with tales of her family on a tour of one of the cabins. Photos by Bill Gossy

Visitors can tour three historic cabins at Mitchell Farms in Collins, Miss. Below, kids play with the family dog in the corn pool, and Nelda Mitchell captivates visitors with tales of her family on a tour of one of the cabins. Photos by Bill Gossy

By Marlene Greer, Correspondent

Cotton may once have been king for seven or so generations of Mitchells, but today, the family farm in Collins thrives on peanuts, corn, wheat, soybeans, and a bit of history and agritainment.

Owners Dennis and Nelda Spell Mitchell, their son Don and his wife Jo Lynn, have turned a portion of the farm into a learning and play zone for kids and families with an animal barn, wagon rides, hay bale maze, sand mountain, rope swings, mini old west town, and corn pool.

There’s a whole lot of running, jumping and rolling going on around the farm, thanks to Jo Lynn’s desire to be with her family.

Mitchell Farm Corn Pool Reduced

“I worked as a sales rep and traveled around the state,” Jo Lynn said. “I wanted to come home and work at the farm, but I knew I didn’t want to drive a tractor. I had to find a way for me to work on the farm and make an income for the farm.”

Dennis and Nelda, both from farming families with roots in Mississippi going back to the early 1800s, moved to Collins in 1960 to begin farming. He worked the farm while she taught first grade. Don now manages the farm, but all participate.

Speaking with any member of the family, you come away with how much they love their farm.

“I’ve always wanted to farm since I was 2 years old playing with my tractors in the sandbox,” Don said. “I like the challenge, because most of the time every day is different. There are always hardships with farming, but the challenge keeps you motivated. This is all I know and this is all I’ve ever wanted to do.”

In addition to the kids play area, three historic log cabins full of period furnishings, antiques, and Nelda’s beautiful wood carvings and art pieces are open to visitors. The couple have been avid collectors for decades.

Mitchell Farms Nelda Reduced

“Dennis and I both enjoyed looking at other peoples restored log houses, antiques and things they had preserved,” Nelda said. “It was a fascination for both of us. That got us started trying to preserve what was around us. We just hated to see old things left to deteriorate.”

And of course there’s the farm store, where visitors can purchase fresh sweet corn, peaches, tomatoes, homemade jams and jellies, canned goods and peanuts.

– Mitchell Farms, 650 Leaf River Church Rd., Collins, Miss. Admission $8 weekdays, $10 weekends. For more information, visit www.mitchellfarms-ms.com.

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Mississippi muse: Families enjoy funky cabins at Neshoba County Fair

Colorful cabins line the narrow streets at the Neshoba County Fairgrounds. Photo by Marlene Greer

Colorful cabins line the narrow streets at the Neshoba County Fairgrounds. Photo by Marlene Greer

By Marlene Greer, Correspondent

Take a small, narrow cabin with a front porch, paint it a wild combination of colors, leave the inside unfinished (except a bathroom), stack wall-to-wall bunk beds in every room, invite 30 of your closest family and friends, and you’re ready to celebrate Mississippi’s Giant Houseparty, aka the Neshoba County Fair in Philadelphia.

Every summer, county residents and their extended families gather at their fair cabins for a week of front porch cooking, eating, sitting and talking while enjoying the usual trappings of a county fair — horse racing, concerts, car shows, carnival rides, arts and crafts, and loads of food. It’s one big family reunion.

“People in our town, instead of coming home for the holidays come home for the fair,” said Philadelphia native Jo Ann Tinsley-Rounsaville. “It’s a chance to see old friends growing up and old friends made over the years. Each cabin is unique in the same way families are. But we are all tied together with love, fellowship and friendship.”

The first fair was in the summer of 1889 and lasted only a few hours. When the fair transformed into a multi-day event, people began to arrive in covered wagons and started building small cabins on the fairgrounds. The first cabins were single-story, but later grew to two and three stories.

Today, there are about 600 colorful cabins crammed next to one another on narrow lanes. Some cabins are unfinished inside with Army-style barracks and others are what locals call “up to snuff,” meaning they have all the amenities of a home.

Jo Ann Tinsley-Rounsaville (second row, second from left) and her family at their fair cabin, the "Plez-zure Palace," named after her father, Plez, who built the cabin in 1966.

Jo Ann Tinsley-Rounsaville (second row, second from left) and her family at their fair cabin, the “Plez-zure Palace,” named after her father, Plez, who built the cabin in 1966.

Fair cabins, Tinsley-Rounsaville explained, are a family treasure passed down the generations. Her father built a cabin at the fair in 1966, when she was 7 years old. Growing up, she and her three older brothers spent a week every summer in the cabin during the fair. Now she takes her grandchildren to the same cabin.“I’ve never missed one fair,” said Tinsley-Rounsaville. “The only way you miss a fair is if you are in the hospital or dead.”

If you want to check out these funky cabins, the tourism office plans to host a tour at this year’s fair. Or, as Kaye Rowell, tourism director for the county, advises, just walk up to anyone and say this is your first time at the fair and ask to see their cabin. “Anyone will let you in.”

The fair runs July 25-Aug.1. Admission is $15. For information, visit www.neshobacountyfair.org.

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Mississippi muse: Pottery with a special connection

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At top, many McCarty pottery pieces carry their signature snake-like line which represents the Mississippi River.  Lee McCarty greets visitors at his studio in Merigold, Miss. Photos by Bill Gossy

At top and below, many McCarty pottery pieces carry the couple’s signature mark – a snake-like squiggly line representing the Mississippi River. Above, Lee McCarty greets visitors at his studio in Merigold, Miss.                                 Photos by Bill Gossy

By Marlene Greer, Correspondent

Lee McCarty was the chemist, his wife, Pup, the artist. For more than half a century, the husband-and-wife team molded Mississippi’s native clay into beautiful handmade pitchers, dinnerware, platters, coffee mugs, candlesticks, vases and a hodgepodge of animals and fish.

Pup passed away in 2009, and Lee, at age 91, carries on with the help of brothers Stephen and Jamie Smith, whose parents were best friends of the McCartys.

“I’m here working every day,” Lee explained to a couple of tourists visiting his shop in Merigold. Though today, with an inquisitive writer as a customer, he did a lot more talking than working.

The McCartys’ unique style of pottery incorporates all the two loved about their home state. Everything is handmade using native clay from a site near Shuqualak. Lee creates the formulas for all the glazes. And most pieces carry their signature mark — a snake-like squiggly line representing the Mississippi River.

“Not only have they created wonderful pieces of art, but they’ve done it with such a connection to the Mississippi Delta,” said Stephen, who handles the business end of the business. “They’ve made art part of the culture.”

Lee was born and raised in Merigold; Pup in the small town of Ethel. The two met while in college, married and returned to Merigold to start their lives as artists. In 1954 the couple moved into the old mule barn on the farm owned by longtime family friends Albert and Margaret Smith and gradually turned it into their home and studio, where Lee still works today.

McCarty Pottery 2 reduced

McCarty pottery has a rustic look and earthy appeal. The work comes in three main glazes —cobalt blue, jade and nutmeg — with dinnerware being the most popular. The waiting list for dinnerware is close to two years, Stephen said.

A piece of McCarty pottery is practically a staple in Mississippi homes.

“The other day a lady came into the store with her daughter, granddaughter and great-granddaughter,” said Stephen. “They all had their own collection of McCarty. She let her great-granddaughter buy her first piece of McCarty. Here we’ve created this wonderful piece of art and made it a part of their family.”

McCarty pottery can be found in stores throughout the state. But it’s at “the barn” where you can catch Lee at work and maybe get a tour of the couple’s lovely gardens.

– McCartys, 101 Saint Mary St., Merigold, Miss.; mccartyspottery.com

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Mississippi muse: Visiting the Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale

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At top, visitors check out the graffiti on the porch and entrance to Ground Zero Blues Club. Above, vintage sign, posters and guitars adorn the club's stage. Photos by Bill Gossy

At top, visitors check out the graffiti on the porch and entrance to Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Miss. Above, vintage signs, posters and guitars adorn the club’s stage.                         Photos by Bill Gossy

By Marlene Greer, Correspondent

Driving up to Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Miss., you might think you ended up on the wrong side of town. The old brick building, with a flashy neon sign and well-worn couches on a graffiti-covered porch, has the look of a dive, and it doesn’t improve once you enter. Every inch of wall space and tabletops are covered with graffiti.

Co-owned by actor Morgan Freeman and local attorney Bill Luckett, Ground Zero Blues Club opened in May 2001 in an abandoned cotton warehouse. Vintage signs, posters, photos and even guitars plaster the walls. It’s dark, rank (smoking is allowed) and loud.

But then that’s what you might expect from a “juke joint.”

Juke joints started as hole-in-the-wall, backwoods clubs where the songs of the Mississippi cotton fields morphed into the sounds of the Delta Blues. The joints — any crumbling barn or falling down plantation building would do — were places where rural laborers came to enjoy some liquor, dancing and good music.

Clarksdale, at the crossroads of highways 61 and 49 (the location of Robert Johnson’s famous “Crossroad Blues”) in the Mississippi Delta, was at the epicenter of the Delta Blues. The city was the home of such blues legends as Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Ike Turner and Sam Cooke.

“The club’s location makes it unique; it’s ground zero for blues music,” Luckett said. “And the old building fits the character of a juke joint.”

Even with the graffiti. Luckett explains how it got started.

“On opening night, there was this really cute girl dancing barefoot on the bar. Morgan and I went over to her and told her if she came in again we’d reserve this spot for her. I took out a magic marker and outlined her feet on the bar. On one foot I wrote ‘reserved for’ and on the other foot I wrote her name. From there it took off. Before long we had people marking their reservation with body parts everywhere. Whole bodies are outlined on the floor.”

Visitors can catch some of the area’s best blues musicians at Ground Zero every Wednesday through Saturday. And if you visit Clarksdale in the spring, you can join in celebrating the city’s blues heritage at the Juke Joint Festival.

While you’re in Clarksdale, stop at the Delta Blues Museum across the street from Ground Zero for a look at blues history, including Waters’ cabin where he lived during his days as a sharecropper.

– Ground Zero Blues Club, 387 Delta Ave., Clarksdale, Miss. Cover, $3 to $7; groundzerobluesclub.com

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