When I moved my family back to Greensburg from the big city 4 years ago, EVERYBODY asked if I was crazy. Our friends in New Orleans queried, “Greensburg… is that in Mississippi ?” Friends and family in Greensburg asked,“What could you possibly want to live here for ?” Well, I’ll tell you like I told them.

It all started with a cartoon. Hayden, my son, was about 4 when we were watching TV. The farmer pig was shucking corn and Hayden asked me what the pig was doing. My child, the great-grandson of people who made a living at farming, did not know about shucking corn. It hit me like a bushel of snap beans. Hayden didn’t know about that, either.

Back in Greensburg, I quickly realized that the place I was nostalgic for wasn’t quite what it used to be. Most people I had been friends with as a kid had done just like me; they had moved on to bigger and better things. The hectic pace of life just didn’t make such things as community Little League or wading in the pool at the park possible anymore. Many of the historic buildings were threatened, abandoned or just plain gone, as were the old people who sang loud and heartily in the churches and who planted gargantuan gardens every summer.

So, I set about to recapture some of it, if only on film. The photographs in this column will all have been taken in St. Helena Parish and will be accompanied by some relative story. The first: a tractor fender and wheel in honor of all the farming families that once populated these piney, rolling hills. I hope that in this column you might recognize a bit of yourself and your surroundings. The Greensburg and St. Helena that I hope you will remember.

27 October 2004 : Posted 26 August 2016