Syracuse, New York is hometown to Tom Cruise, Grace Jones, and Jake, who says his ancestors were Greek fishermen. Every now and then he’ll offhandedly mention “Uncle Ari and Aunt Jackie.”
Jake sniffs at my Southern heritage, informing me that his parents contributed to programs for eradicating hookworm, pellagra, and illiteracy in Mississippi. He came to Jackson over two decades ago as the result of a convoluted series of circumstances I’ve long since quit trying to unravel. He stayed because he likes the weather; his recollections of lake-effect snow are unbelievably horrific. Even after twenty-plus years here, people still ask him where he’s from. It drives him nuts.
Generous soul that I am, in an effort to reciprocate his family’s (likely fictitious) charity, I had to learn how to make good Yankee baked beans using the sturdy pots he brought back from Maine last year, which of course had been made by exceedingly sweet people in a religious community near Bangor. (No, I didn’t go; he was meeting his mother to visit an aunt, and I was better off here with weed and cable.)
I breathed deeply and put my gloves on. Then I took a pound of dried navy beans, a cup of diced ham with rind, and a half cup of sorghum molasses and threw it all into the (unquestionably gorgeous) 2 quart pot with a cup of chopped onions and a bay leaf. I covered them with water, seasoned with a teaspoon of black pepper and a heaping tablespoon of dry mustard. I water to the rim , covered the pot, and put it into a 250 oven for four hours.
The beans were rich and buttery, and the mustard cut the molasses enough to let the beans make a statement. Jake credited the results to the pots, so I whacked him with a wooden spoon. Twice.
You met your last boyfriend at Waffle House. You manscape with a hunting knife. You cheer for the NASCAR driver with the cutest jumpsuit. You wish the Indigo Girls would “shut up and sing.” You keep a colorful stash of Speedos in your bass boat. You go commando in your overalls. You always request “Boot Scootin’ Boogie” at the gay bars. You attend Gay Rodeo events to find a personal trainer. Your pickup truck horn plays “I Love the Nightlife.” You smoke Mistys because you like how the slim box fits into your Wranglers. You tailgate at Barbra Streisand concerts. Your mullet has frosted tips. You root for the hillbillies in Deliverance. You wish R.J. Reynolds would make Cosmo-flavored dip. The Gay River Expo disqualified you for using a trolling motor. You think Kid Rock is sexy. You’re saving up to buy a Pensacola timeshare. Your Pride float spends the rest of the year on cinder blocks in your front yard. You carry a camo-patterned man purse. You were once thrown out of a leather bar for violating the dress code. Your Miata has Truck Nutz. Your commitment ceremony was catered by KFC. Your personal scent is buck lure.
I recommend 21/25 ct. shrimp. Boil, peel, and if you’re the persnickety type, devein.
For five pounds of shrimp, mix well a cup of rice vinegar, a cup of vegetable oil, a small jar of capers (with liquid), two tablespoons of good Italian herb blend, and a tablespoon of coarse black pepper. Add with two small white onions, very thinly sliced, two fresh bay leaves, and a cup of diced sweet peppers.
Toss until shrimp are coated, cover and chill overnight, stirring occasionally. In season, add diced ripe summer tomatoes before spooning over leaf greens and drizzling with marinade.
North Jackson Barbie This princess Barbie is sold only at Maison Weiss. She comes with an assortment of Kate Spade Handbags, a Lexus SUV, and a cookie-cutter house. Available with or without tummy tuck and face lift. Workaholic Ken sold only in conjunction with the augmented version.
Ridgeland Barbie The modern-day homemaker Barbie is available with Ford Windstar Minivan and matching gym outfit. She gets lost in parking lots and is the alumna of an off-campus sorority. Traffic-jamming cell phone sold separately.
South Jackson Barbie This recently paroled Barbie comes with a 9mm handgun, a Ray Lewis knife, a Chevy with dark tinted windows and a meth lab Kit. This model is only available after dark and must be paid for in cash (preferably small, untraceable bills) unless you are a cop…then we don’t know what you are talking about.
West Madison Barbie This yuppie Barbie comes with your choice of BMW convertible or Hummer H2. Included are her own Starbucks cup, credit card, and country club membership. As optional items, BIG sunglasses and white tennis hat to wear while driving the SUV at unsafe speeds. Also available for this set are Shallow Ken and Private School Skipper. You won’t be able to afford any of them.
West Pearl Barbie This pale model comes dressed in her own Wrangler jeans two sizes too small, a NASCAR t-shirt and Tweety bird tattoo on her shoulder. She has a six-pack of Bud Lite and a Hank Williams Jr. CD set. She can spit over 5 feet and kick mullet-haired Ken’s ass when she is drunk. Purchase her pickup truck separately and get a Confederate flag bumper sticker absolutely free.
East Pearl Barbie This tobacco-chewing, brassy-haired Barbie has a pair of her own high-heeled sandals with one broken heel from the time she chased beer-gutted Ken out of Millington Barbie’s house. Her ensemble includes low-rise acid-washed jeans, fake fingernails and a see-through halter-top. Also available with a mobile home.
Fondren Barbie This doll is made of tofu. She has long straight brown hair, arch-less feet, and Birkenstocks with white socks. She prefers that you call her Willow. She does not want or need a Ken doll, but if you purchase two Fondren Barbies with the optional Subaru wagon, you get a rainbow flag bumper sticker for free.
Belhaven Barbie This mature Barbie is the only doll that comes with support hose, hair toppers, and a membership in the neighborhood improvement association. Package also includes a vintage SUV, a variety of “fur babies,” and Pompous Ken. Options include a golf cart and the Martha Stewart kitchen collection.
West Jackson Barbie This Barbie now comes with a stroller and infant doll. Optional accessories include a GED and bus pass. Gangsta Ken and his 1979 Caddy were available, but are now very difficult to find since the addition of the infant
Flowood/Rez Barbie This doll includes a Chevy Tahoe with multiple private school stickers, Closeted Ken, 2 Whining Wendy, and an incontinent shih-tzu named Rags. She has highlights from Ms. Ann’s, a mega-church membership, and an I-phone with matching earbuds. Kroger buggy with pineapple optional.
McDowell Road Barbie/Ken This versatile doll can be easily converted from Barbie to Ken by simply adding or subtracting the multiple snap-on parts.
Many years ago at a conference for Southern fiction at Ole Miss, I took umbrage at the inclusion of Bobbie Ann Mason’s splendid novel In Country because the author is from Kentucky, which I do not consider a Southern state. Kentucky was in the middle border during the Civil War, not a member of the Confederacy, nor are Missouri, West Virginia, Maryland, or Delaware.
When a family from Kentucky moved to my very small rural Mississippi town in the early 60s they were of course welcomed and quietly became members of standing in the community. With them they brought Swiss steak, which my adolescent mind tagged as a Yankee recipe. For some reason the Swiss designation slipped right over my little provincial Southern brain, probably more because for obvious reasons Switzerland held far less significance than THE NORTH. Anything Yankee was automatically suspect, and as such Swiss steak entered the nether category Reserved for Further Observation.
“To swiss” refers to processing for cotton fabrics for a smooth texture. Some food writers have taken a leap of faith and declared that because the cooking process renders a tough cut of meat smooth/tender, in English-speaking countries beef stewed with tomatoes is often called “Swiss,” but the ease and appeal this dish is world-wide.
Bread and fry thin trimmed cuts of top round until browned. Drain and place in a casserole with your favorite tomato sauce, and mild peppers. Bake covered at a medium temp until tender. Serve with buttered noodles or potatoes.
Mississippi stretches from the foothills of the Appalachians to the Gulf of Mexico, and her western border, her namesake, is one of the greatest rivers in the world. The state provides both residents and visitors with a wide range of natural environments: shady alluvial swamps, sunny beaches and barrier islands, rolling wooded hills, spacious piney woods and open prairies, all the home of a rich spectrum of living creatures. While this selection of materials does not claim to be definitive, it was created by Mary Stripling, who is uniquely qualified to make such a list of guides to identifying plants and animals in Mississippi.
Mary is now enjoying retirement, but as the librarian at the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science in Jackson from 1978-2010, she interacted with biologists in every realm of nature. Mary has been an avid birder and leader in the Jackson Audubon Society since the mid 1980’s, and has traveled extensively on birding ecotourism trips to destinations like New Zealand, Kenya, the Amazon and Central America, as well as to birding hot spots in North America. In each case she has used a field guide appropriate for each area. She has also utilized most of the other guides on the list while pursuing butterflies, dragonflies, turtles, freshwater mussels, insects, etc. and by helping museum guests identify all the various critters they find in the field or their backyards.
“Over the years there has been an explosion of nature field guides for North America, the eastern United States, Mississippi and surrounding states,” Mary says. “I’ve consulted with the biologists and botanists at the museum regarding the most accurate guides for each discipline. Some books included in the list are not field guide size such as Sibley’s Tree Guide, Fishes of Inland Mississippi and Birds of Mississippi, but all serious naturalists should study guides at home; you should be prepared to know what you might encounter before going into your own backyard.”
Mary includes asterisks by the titles most necessary for a Mississippi nature library. “These books will give you the most bang for your buck; for the most part the list is of selected general field guides, is not inclusive and does not include specialty guides such as guides for tiger beetles, wasps, warblers, hummingbirds, hawks, etc. I’ve included a few animal sound CDs for learning bird and frog songs and two are unique to Mississippi (the Mississippi bird and frog songs recorded by Bill Turcotte).” Mary was responsible for updating the original Mississippi bird and frog cassettes to CDs and revising the accompanying booklets. “No attempt has been made to include mobile digital apps for plant and animal identification, even though in the past few years apps have made a huge impact on nature watching. They are wonderful devices to take to the field especially for compactness, ease of use and for accessing sounds.”
But, she adds, “It is always great to curl up in your easy chair and enjoy a good read with your favorite field guide to get ready for your next outing.”
For a fuller appreciation of our state’s natural environments and their denizens, the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science in Jackson offers an absorbing collection of informative displays as well as exhibits of living plants and animals. As a center for research and support, the Museum helps to preserve and protect the swamps, the barrier islands, piney woods, prairies and living things that Mississippi calls her own.
VENOMOUS ANIMALS AND POISONOUS PLANTS
Common Poisonous Plants and Mushrooms of North America Turner, Nancy J. and Szczawinski, Adam F. Timber Press; 1991
A Field Guide to Venomous Animals and Poisonous Plants, North America, North of Mexico Foster, Steven; Caras, Roger A.; National Audubon Society; National Wildlife Federation, and Roger Tory Peterson Institute. Houghton Mifflin; 1994 (Peterson field guide series).
*Poisonous Plants and Venomous Animals of Alabama and Adjoining States Gibbons, Whit; Haynes, Robert; and Thomas, Joab L. University of Alabama Press; 1990
Poisonous Plants of the Southeastern United States Everest, John W.; Powe, Thomas A., and Freeman, John Daniel. University of Florida, Florida Cooperative Extension Services, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences; 1996
*Venomous Snakes of Mississippi, [pamphlet] Terry L. Vandeventer Mississippi Museum of Natural Science, 1994 (free)
BIRDS
Birds and Birding on the Mississippi Coast Toups, Judith A.; Jackson, Jerome A., and King, Dalton Shourds University Press of Mississippi; 1987; 303 p.
*Birds of Mississippi William H. Turcotte and David L. Watts University Press of Mississippi, 1999
*A Field Guide to the Birds of Eastern and Central North America, 6th ed. Roger Tory Peterson & Virginia Marie Peterson Houghton Mifflin, 2010. (Peterson Field Guide Series)
Guide to Birding Coastal Mississippi and Adjacent Counties Toups, Judith A.; Bird, Jerry L., and Peterson, Stacy Jon. Stackpole Books; 2004; 168 p.
Mississippi Bird Watching: A Year-Round Guide Thompson, Bill. Cool Springs Press; 2004; 165 p.
*National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America Dunn, Jon L. and Jonathan Alderfer. National Geographic; 6th Rev Updated edition, 2011; 576 pages.
*Peterson Field Guide to Birds of North America Lee Peterson and Roger Tory Peterson (Peterson Field Guide Series) Houghton Mifflin, 2008
*The Sibley Field Guide to Birds of Eastern North America David Allen Sibley Knopf, 2003
*The Sibley Guide to Birds, 2nd ed. David Allen Sibley Knopf; 2014
BIRD SOUNDS
*Backyard Bird Song [CD] Richard K. Walton and R. W. Lawson (Peterson Field Guide) Houghton Mifflin Co, 1991
*Birding by Ear: A Guide to Bird-Song Identification – Eastern and Central North America [CD] R. K. Walton and R. W. Lawson (Peterson Field Guide Series) Houghton Mifflin Co, 1989
Prothonotory warbler (photo by Bill Stripling)
Mississippi Bird Songs [CD] William H. Turcotte Mississippi Museum of Natural Science, Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, 1985, 2008
TREES
A Field Guide to Eastern Trees: Eastern United States and Canada Petrides, George A.; Wehr, Janet, and Petrides, George A. Houghton Mifflin; 1988; 272 p.
Identification of Southeastern Trees in Winter Preston, Richard Joseph North Carolina Agricultural Extension Service; 1976; 113 p.
Mississippi Trees Hodges, John D.; Evans, David L.; Garnett, Linda W., and Mississippi Forestry Commission. Mississippi Forestry Commission; [200-?].(This book is free and updated every few years.)
Native Trees for Urban Landscapes in the Gulf South Brzuszek, Robert F. Crosby Arboretum; 1993; 11 p.
*Native Trees of the Southeast : an identification guide Kirkman, L. Katherine; Brown, Claud L., and Leopold, Donald Joseph. Timber Press; 2007; 370 p.
*The Sibley Guide to Trees Sibley, David. Knopf, 2009; 426p
*Trees, Shrubs, and Woody Vines of Louisiana Charles M. Allen, Dawn Allen Newman, and Harry H. Winters. Allen’s Native Ventures, 2002
*Trees of the Southeastern U. S. Wilbur H. Duncan and Marion B. Duncan University of Georgia Press, 1988. Reprinted, 1992.
Trees of Mississippi : and other woody plants Dukes, George H. and Stribling, Bob. Poplar Petal Pub; [1997?]
WILDFLOWERS, MUSHROOMS, FERNS AND OTHER PLANTS
Common Poisonous Plants and Mushrooms of North America Turner, Nancy J. and Szczawinski, Adam F. Timber Press; 1991; 311 p.
*A Field Guide to Southern Mushrooms Nancy S. Weber and A. H. Smith University of Michigan, 1985
An Illustrated Guide to Tidal Marsh Plants of Mississippi and Adjacent States Lionel Eleuterius Pelican Press, 1990
Louisiana Ferns and Fern Allies (out of print) John W. Thieret University of Southwestern Louisiana, 1980
*Louisiana Wildflower Guide Charles Allen, Ken Wilson, Harry Winters Allen Native Ventures, 2011
A Mississippi Woodland Fern Portfolio George H. Dukes, Jr. Poplar Petal Publishers, 2002
Mushrooms of Mississippi: and Other Fungi and Protists George H. Dukes, Jr. Poplar Petal Publishers, 2000
*Native Shrubs and Woody Vines of the Southeast : Landscaping Uses and Identification Leonard E. Foote and Samuel B. Jones Timber Press, 1989
*Trees, Shrubs, and Woody Vines of Louisiana Charles M. Allen, Dawn Allen Newman, and Harry H. Winters. Allen’s Native Ventures, 2002
Southeastern Flora www.southeasternflora.com A superior, searchable website done by John Gwaltney, Southeastern Flora is an online resource to assist you in identifying native or naturalized wildflowers you may find in the southeastern United States. Currently there are over 1,980 species listed on this site and over 41,400 pictures to help you identify what you’re looking for. You can easily identify trees, shrubs, vines, and herbaceous plants without knowing how to read a plant identification key. Simply define a few traits about your specimen, and the visual photo search results will help you narrow your selection to the exact species. Note the Plant Picks List, which is a valuable aid.
*Wildflowers of Mississippi S. Lee Timme University Press of Mississippi, 1989
Wildflowers of the Natchez Trace S. Lee Timme and Cale C. Timme University Press of Mississippi, 2000
REPTILES AND AMPHIBIANS
The Amphibians and Reptiles of Louisiana Dundee, Harold A. and Rossman, Douglas A. Louisiana State University Press; 1989; 300 p.
*A Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of Eastern and Central North America Roger Conant and Joseph T. Collins (Peterson Field Guide) Houghton Mifflin, 1998
*A Guide to Mississippi Frog Songs, [CD] William H. Turcotte MS Depart of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, 1988
Mississippi Herpetology Ren Lohoefener MS State University Research Center, 1983 (Out of Print)
*Salamanders of the United States and Canada Petranka, James W. Smithsonian Institution Press; 1998, 587 p.
*Snakes of eastern North America Ernst, Carl H. and Barbour, Roger William. George Mason University Press; 1989; 282 p.
Snakes of North America: Eastern and Central Regions Alan Tennant and R. D. Bartlett Gulf Publishing Company, 2000
*Snakes of the Southeast Whit Gibbons and Mick Dorcas University of Georgia Press, 2005
*Turtles of the United States and Canada Ernst, Carl H. and Lovich, Jeffrey E. 2nd ed. Johns Hopkins University Press; 2009; 827 p.
*Venomous Snakes of Mississippi, [pamphlet] Terry L. Vandeventer Mississippi Museum of Natural Science, 1994 (free)
FISH
*A Field Guide to Freshwater Fishes : North America North of Mexico. 2nd ed. Brooks M. Burr, John Sherrod, Lawrence Page, E. Beckham, Justin Sipiorski, Joseph Tomelleri (Peterson Field Guide) Houghton Mifflin, 2011
*Fishes of the Gulf of Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, and Adjacent Waters H. Dickson Hoese and Richard H. Moore Texas A&M University Press, 1998
*Inland Fishes of Mississippi Stephen T. Ross University Press of Mississippi, 2001
MAMMALS
A Field Guide to Mammals of North America Fiona A. Reid (Peterson Field Guide) Houghton Mifflin, 4th ed., 2006
Black bears
*Handbook of Mammals of the South-Central States Jerry R. Choate, J. Knox Jones, Jr., and Clyde Jones Louisiana State University Press, 1994
Mammal Tracks and Sign: A Guide to North American Species Mark Elbroch Stackpole Books, 2003
The Marine Mammals of the Gulf of Mexico Bernd Wursig, Thomas A. Jefferson and David J. Schmidly Texas A & M University Press, 2000
Mississippi Land Mammals: Distribution, Identification, Ecological Notes James L. Wolfe Mississippi Museum of Natural Science, Mississippi Game and Fish Commission, 1971 (free)
*The Wild Mammals of Missouri C. W. Schwartz and Elizabeth R. Schwartz University of Missouri Press, 2001
INVERTEBRATES (divided into categories)
»Beetles
*Beetles of Eastern North America Arthur Evans Princeton University Press, 2014
»Butterflies & Moths
Butterflies and Moths. 2nd ed. Carter, David J. and Greenaway, Frank. (Smithsonian handbooks series) New York: Dorling Kindersley; 2002; 304p.
*Butterflies and Moths : a guide to the more common American species Mitchell, Robert T.; Zim, Herbert Spencer; Latimer, Jonathan P., and Nolting, Karen Stray. Rev. and updated ed. St. Martin’s Press; 2002; 160 p.
*Butterflies of Mississippi: a field checklist Mather, Bryant and Dingus, Eve. Mississippi Museum of Natural Science; 1994. (free)
Butterflies of the East Coast : an observer’s guide Cech, Rick and Tudor, Guy. Princeton University Press; 2005; 345 p.
Butterflies Through Binoculars Jeffery Glassberg Oxford University Press, 1993
*Caterpillars of Eastern North America: A Guide to Identification and Natural History David Wagner (Princeton Field Guide series) Princeton University Press, 2005
The Common Names of North American Butterflies Miller, Jacqueline Y. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press; 1992; 177 p.
*A Field Guide to Eastern Butterflies Paul Opler, Vichai Malikul, Roger Tory Peterson (Peterson Field Guide Series) Houghton Mifflin, 1998
*Peterson Field Guide to Moths of Northeastern North America David Beadle and Seabrooke Leckie (Peterson Field Guide Series) Houghton Mifflin, 2012
*Peterson First Guide to Caterpillars of North America Amy Bartlett Wright (Peterson First Guides) Houghton Mifflin, 1998
»Dragonfiles And Damselflies Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East Dennis Paulson (Princeton Field Guide Series) Princeton University Press, 2012
*Dragonflies Through Binoculars: A Field and Finding Guide to Dragonflies of North America Sidney W. Dunkle Oxford University Press, 2000
Stokes Beginner’s Guide to Dragonflies and Damselflies Blair Nikula and Jackie Sones Little, Brown and Company, 2002
»Insects *A Field Guide to Insects: America North of Mexico Richard White, Richard White, Donald Borror, Donald Borror. (Peterson Field Guide Series) Houghton Mifflin, 1998
*National Audubon Society Field Guide to Insects and Spiders Milne and Milne Knopf, 1980, 1996 992p.
*National Wildlife Federation Field Guide to Insects and Spiders of North America Arthur V. Evans Chanticleer Press, 2007, 496p.
»Spiders Common Spiders of North America Richard A. Bradley University of California Press, 2012
*A Guide to Spiders and Their Kin Herbert W. Levi, Lorna R. Levi, Nicholas Strekalovsky. Golden Guides from St. Martin’s Press, 2001
These place names were collected from the Mississippi Atlas & Gazetteer (DeLorme: 2004), pages 25 and 31; the text is from Keith Baca’s Native American Place Names in Mississippi (University Press of Mississippi: 2007).
Note that the gazetteer was my only source for the place names, and that I only referenced those in Calhoun County, Mississippi. If you want to know the interpretations of other Native American place names in other areas of the state, then you can probably find Baca’s book at your local library. The references in the text refer to works that provided the translations/interpretations for specific words.
Some of you might find all this unnecessarily tedious and more of you will find it predictably pretentious, but my skeptics are legion. The only name I did not find is Oloucalofa Creek, which is crossed by County Roads 284 and 283 in the northwestern corner.
Kittahutty Creek
SW Pontotoc/NE Calhoun counties. Crossed by Miss. Hwy 32 nine mi. NE of Bruce. Halbert (1899, p. 73), using Choctaw vocabulary, derives this name from kitti, “mortar” (a bowl-sha0ped container for pounding or grinding corn into meal), and hutta, “white”. Halbert offers no explanation for the adjective, but Seale (1939, pp. 109-10) speculates that it refers to a mortar made of white stone (white or bleached wood, more likely). It should benoted that this creek is located at least partially within historically Chickasaw territory, and while Chickasaw kitti’, “mortar” is very similar to the Choctaw word, the only recorded Chickasaw term for “white” is tobbi’. Also, the first two syllables of the name resemble not lonely kitti/kitti’, but Chickasaw/Choctaw kinta, “beaver” as well.
Lucknuck Creek
N Calhoun County. Crossed by Miss. Hwy. 32 five mi. NE of Bruce, and by Miss. Hwy 9 one mi. NE of Sarepta. Perhaps a corruption of Chickasaw/Choctaw lackna, “yellow”.
Potlockney Creek
SE Lafayette/ NE Calhoun counties, local pronunciation unrecorded. Potlockney is a relatively recent corruption; this stream was formerly known as Pollocona, the derivation of which is uncertain. W.A. Read, using Choctaw vocabulary, suggested several possible sources of this name to Seale (1939, p. 153), but all are conjectural: poli, “flying squirrel” and yakni “country”; or poli, “flying squirrel” and okhina, “river; water course; stream”. (It should be noted that this stream is in historically Chickasaw territory; cf. Chickasaw lakna, “yellow”; yaakni, “country”; and pali, “flying squirrel”.
Sabougla Community and Creek
SW Calhoun/NW Webster counties. Crossed by Miss. Hwy. 9 two mi. N of Bellefontaine, and by Miss. Hwy. 8 seven miles E of Gore Springs. Cushman (1999, p. 491) claims that this name is a shortened form of (Chickasaw) “Siboglahatcha… [o]riginal, Is-su-ba-ok-la-hu-cha, Horse River People, i.e. [p]eople living on horse river.” (Cf. Choctaw isuba, “horse”, okla, “people” and hocha, “river”.) However, Halbert (1899, p. 75) states that the name is from shohboli’, “smoke” (cf. Choctaw shoblhi, “smoke;smoky; smoking”.
Shuttispear Creek (SHOOT-uh-speer)
N Webster/S Calhoun Counties. Crossed by Miss Hwy. 9 fie mi. S of Calhoun City, and by Miss. Hwy. 8 seven mi. SW of Calhoun City. From Choctaw shuti, “earthen pot” and probably ista pika, “a scoop” i.e. “pot scoop” or “ladle” (Seale, 1939, p. 167). There is an erroneous local tradition regarding this stream resulting from folk etymology; I have been told that long ago, the creek was the scene of warfare between two tribes. According to this tale, the warriors occupied opposite sides of the stream, “shooting spears across the creek at each other”, hence the name.
Skuna Community and River
S Pontotoc (q.v.)/NW Chickasaw (q.v.)/Calhoun/Yalobusha (q.v.)/Grenada counties. Crossed by Miss. Hwy 9 on s. side of Bruce. Skuna is apparently from Choctaw iskuna, “entrails; guts” (cf. Halbert 1899, pp. 73-74).
Topashaw Creek (TOP-uh-shaw)
NE Webster/SW Chickasaw (q.v.)/S Calhoun counties. Crossed by Miss. Hwy. 8/9 two mi. S of Calhoun City,and by Miss. Hwy. 341 six mi. W of Woodland. Possibly a variant of Topisaw (cf.), although Seale (1939, p. 198) speculates that “it is highly probably that there is a connection between Sopashaw and Taposa, the latter being the name of a tribe which formerly lived on the Yazoo River.” The meaning of the tribal name Taposa is unknown (Swanson 1969, p. 192).
Pierre Magnol was born in 1638 to an apothecary’s family in Montpellier. He enrolled as a medical student at the University of Montpellier in May 1655.
By Magnol’s time, Montpellier was an important, long-established commercial and educational center. Montpellier was the first university in France to establish a botanic garden for medicine and pharmacology.
After receiving his degree (MD) in 1659, Mangol’s attention shifted to botany. In 1687, he became Demonstrator of Plants at the botanic garden. Magnol was appointed Director of the Montpellier botanic garden in 1696, later Inspector of the Garden until his death in 1715.
Magnol’s most important contribution is the concept of plant families. He developed 76 tables, which not only grouped plants into families but also allowed for easy and rapid identification, an important step towards a tree of life.
Magnolia as botanical nomenclature first appeared in Charles Plumier’s Genera (1702) for a flowering tree in Martinique. Much closer to home, William Sherard, who studied botany under a pupil’s of Magnol (Tournefort,) adopted the name Magnolia in the taxonomy of Mark Catesby’s Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (1730) for another flowering tree.
It’s almost certain Linnaeus never saw a specimen of Plumier’s Magnolia, if one even existed, and left with a scribbled description and a scrawled drawing, must have taken it—rather despite the yawning geographic disparity—for the same plant described by Catesby.
Things eventually ironed out. Initially, Linnaeus described a monotypic genus, with the sole species being Magnolia virginiana—which we know as the sweetbay magnolia—and assigned it five varieties. He later raised these to species status. The Madagascan plant Plumier described is now known as Magnolia dodecapetala.
The name Magnol now adorns a genus with anywhere from 210 to 340 species (we have 8 in the southeastern US), a family (Magnoliaceae) with two genera, Magnolia and Liriodendron (tulip trees), and division (Magnoliids) with more than 10,000 species.
My dad had a soft touch for door-to-door salesmen. I can still see him laid back on the couch in his boxers listening to some guy spell out his hard-luck story. I doubt if any of them left without an order and a couple of dollars in their pocket. We had three sets of encyclopedias and all kinds of serials put out by national publication like Time/Life or the Reader’s Digest. Our home was full of books full of words and pictures, and I spent hours poring over them when as a boy.
It wasn’t until a decade after he died that I began to explore the other books, the old faded covers and the tattered paperbacks. There I found the father I didn’t know, a man beyond my comprehension as a child, and certainly beyond mine as an old man. Still the books set a mold of time, of place, and more so of my father, the contours set by such as a raggedly paperback edition of Greek poetry in English translation in which I found underlined the epigram of Simonides that Senator John F. Kennedy cited in his speech at the Syria Mosque in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in October, 1960: “Passerby: Tell Sparta we fell faithful to her service.”
Jess Jr. had a professional connection with the Kennedys, since in his capacity as District Attorney for Lafayette County in 1962 he had to juggle the political ramifications of a grand jury indictment against James J.P. McShane, who led the federal agents who escorted James Meredith, the first African American student at University of Mississippi. The indictment was eventually revoked.
He had a copy of C.H. Cramer’s Royal Bob: The Life of Robert Ingersoll. Ingersoll, an American lawyer, Civil War veteran, political leader and orator during the Golden Age of Free Thought (roughly from 1875 to 1914), was noted for his broad range of cultural activities and his defense of agnosticism. Another book relating to Jess Jr.’s political leanings on a more local level is Kirwan’s Revolt of the Rednecks: Mississippi Politics, 1876-1925, a solid nod to his political roots in the hills of north Mississippi.
One of the most puzzling yet astoundingly revealing works I found among my father’s books was Richard Brautigan’s first novel. A Confederate General from Big Sur, published in 1964. Jess Jr. was a student of the Civil War not only as a Southerner but as a politician since its ramifications were being felt with intensity in his lifetime.
In Brautigan’s novel, which takes place in 1957, a man named Mellon believes he is a descendant of a Confederate general from Big Sur, California. There is no proof of his existence, although Mellon meets a drifter who has also heard of this general. Mellon seeks the truth of his own modern-day struggle in the United States in light of the Confederacy’s past struggle with the Union. Most likely, my father picked this book up on the basis of its title alone, but I like to believe he read it in its entirety.
He had Faulkner’s A Fable and The Town, two very divergent works; Jess Jr. knew Faulkner’s attorney Phil Stone and might have met the writer, but I feel he read Faulkner’s works more out of a desire to understand how this man from Lafayette County came to win a Nobel Prize than for any other reason. His copy of Welty’s Golden Apples, I found puzzling, but then he kept his ear to the ground and would have heard of Welty’s rising star.
I like to believe he was just a man who liked to read, and words became a part of who he was, but Jess Jr. could well be considered a learned man. As such, he was quite different from his peers, who included the political lights of his day as well as an across-the-board array of businessmen and dignitaries.
With a handful of books for a thread, so he will always be a maze to the man I am, but not to the boy I was who loved him with every fiber of my being.
