Remember When: Dancing, quick sand, and a bumpy ride for baby

By Guest Columnist Mary Jane Boutwell

An early memory was going to Pickens to visit kinfolk. Uncle John D had a grocery store - Piggly Wiggly - on the Main Street in Pickins. There was a community center, and, occasionally, after the cows were milked for the night, the family got dressed and went up for a get together and square dancing. The adults were in the large room, where the small band and caller were. We kids were in the small room that was open to the larger room.

I have always thought the dancers were a regular happening, but my family did not go often. The building is now gone. Does the community still have get-togethers like that? The last time Bobby Heath and I spoke, he was still going to the Cameron Community for supper and visiting.

My family went because we had lived in the Camden Community and still had and have kinfolk around there.

On the way just past the turn to Camden, there were several “barr” pits (short for borrow) on the property where other kinfolk had a new wooden building that was a store and a home. These were not the same family members that had stores in and around Canton.

The original old store right on 51 had burned. My parents ran a rolling store from our home on Poor House Creek outside Camden.

One of Maw’s (my mother) stories was about her coming into Pickens in the rolling store in a heavy rain. She did not make the curve, and the rolling store tumbled down the embankment. The baby, my next older brother, was lying on the seat asleep, and he bounced all over - unhurt, but probably crying.

Going north of Cail on 49 West, there’s a sand pit. The construction company used sand in the building of the road. The sand pit had a spur to back into it to run the rail case in to be loaded with sand and used and make the concrete.

One day, they left the car on the tracks over the sand. The next day, there was no Hopper button rail car. No recovery – it is still there.
Quicksand and Sunflower County? Today, the pit is filled with algae, green water and sand trees. The name for the “barr pit” is actually a borrow pit. They borrow the dirt, maybe even gravel, to build the road.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Mary Jane Boutwell is a passionate historian and is thrilled to share stories about way back when.