Travel Archives

October 1, 2023

Coon Dog Graveyard, Alabama

I’m moving this from my bike blog and updating it.

Coon Dog Cemetery 10-10-2008

I like back roads

You never know what you’re going to find. When the boys were little, we took the less-traveled roads from West Palm Beach, FL, back home to Cape Girardeau, MO. Our path took us near Tuscambia, AL, where we stopped to visit Helen Keller’s home.

We probably had a tour book something like this one that led us from there to the Key Underwood Coon Dog Memorial Graveyard.

Finding it is an adventure

It’s seven miles west of Tuscambia on U.S. 72. Turn left (south) on Alabama 247, go 12 miles, turn right and follow the signs.

Trust me, anytime directions say “follow the signs” something is gonna get interesting.

We were pulling a small utility trailer

We were in a small Mazda 626 with two adults and two squirmy – “He’s Looking At Me” – kids and pulling a small utility trailer behind us when we made the turn onto a narrow gravel road. It was getting late in the afternoon and the road seemed to go along forever.

We’ve got company

I looked in the rearview mirror and saw a cloud of dust about a tenth of a mile behind us. I didn’t hear Dueling Banjos, which made me feel better, but figured I’d keep an eye on the mirror just in case.

We finally saw the sign and made the turn into the cemetery.

The dust cloud disappeared

While the wife and kids piled out of the car, I noted that the following cloud of dust was gone, but that the car hadn’t passed us. Oh, well, he may have pulled off.

The kids amused themselves by wandering around collecting chiggers and reading the stones.

Troop, owned by Key Underwood, was the first dog buried in the graveyard. On Labor Day, 1937, after being hunting companions for 15 years, it was reported that Underwood wrapped Troop in a cotton pick sack, buried him three feet down and marked the grave with a stone from an old chimney.

Visitors appear

About 30 minutes after we had gotten there, a car pulled in and a couple got out and walked up to us.

“We saw you pulling that trailer behind you and thought you might be conducting a burial, so we wanted to give you a little privacy,” the man said, respectfully.

We thanked them for their consideration and assured them that all of the folks who had arrived at the graveyard would be leaving with us.

Grave markers are unique

Some grave markers are commercial versions with professional sandblasted lettering like you’d find in a human cemetery, but most of them are homemade and reflect the personality of the dog and his / her owner.

Some are carved out of wood and are rotting away. Others are simply names gouged into cement or stone.

Bear was memorialized with a welding bead spelling out his name and dates on a rusting piece of sheet metal.

Nearly 200 dogs buried there

Underwood told a reporter that he had no intention of establishing a coon dog cemetery. “I merely wanted to do something special for a special coon dog.”

There are standards and rules

The hunter told columnist Rheta Grimsley Johnson in 1985 that a woman from California wrote him wanting to know why he didn’t allow other kinds of dogs to be buried in the Coon Dog Cemetery.

“You must not know much about coon hunters and their dogs, if you think we would contaminate this burial place with poodles and lap dogs,” he retorted.

Stipulations, even

“We have stipulations on this thing,” William O. Bolton, the secretary/treasure of the Tennessee Valley Coon Hunters Association, and caretaker of the Coon Dog Cemetery was quoted on the organization’s web page. “A dog can’t run no deer, possum — nothing like that. He’s got to be a straight coon dog, and he’s got to be full hound. Couldn’t be a mixed up breed dog, a house dog.”

It’s a beautiful and peaceful place

The cemetery is very well taken care of. We were a little disappointed to see that almost every grave was decorated with plastic flowers that looked out of character for the place. We assumed that they had probably been placed there as part of the annual Labor Day celebration since we visited in October and they looked fresh.

The celebration runs from 1 to 4 P.M. and includes music, dancing, food and a liar’s contest. Official Coon Dog T-shirts and camouflage caps are available.

The gravel road has been paved these days. If you are interested in going there, drop me a comment and I’ll give you the GPS waypoint for the place. I’ve seen at least three different locations shown for it on different maps.

Bug spray is advisable (mosquitoes were heavy late in the afternoon) and keep an eye out for ticks.

Be considerate

Oh, and if you see a car pulling a trailer turn in, give them a few minutes of privacy.

It’s the custom.

December 17, 2018November 28, 2021

Missouri Botanical Garden Glow

When Son Adam and Grandson Elliot visited St. Louis, it was convenient for us to see the Missouri Botanical Garden Glow because Brother Mark and his wife, Robin, live on Flora Place, right at the edge of the park. It was only about a two-block walk to get to the entrance of the Glow, which promised a million lights.

There were “picture frames” dotted about where you could stand in line to make “art.” There was a brisk wind blowing on our way to the display, but it died down to a chilly, but not horrible evening.

Click on any photo to make it larger, then use the arrows on the left and right to scroll through the top three pictures. To see ALL the photos, you’ll have to go to the gallery below.

Like a pig in a python

I didn’t shoot a lot of photos. The lighting was spectacular, but the crowds were so heavy that I felt like a pig in a python, being inexorably pushed forward.

If you would like to be IN that crowd, the exhibit goes on until January 1. You can get more info on their website.

Colors would change

Another challenge was that the lighting was constantly changing colors. You’d get ready to capture one effect, then, just as you were getting ready to press the shutter release, everything would change. That was great for watching, but hard to photograph.

At that point, you could either hope the right combination would cycle back through, or you’d start walking.

Gallery of lighting exhibits

Click on any of the gallery images to make it larger, then click on the left or right side of the picture to move through the gallery.

January 17, 2017February 27, 2021

My Blood Ran Cold

It was a balmy day on March 15, 2015. It was warm enough that my shirt was damp from exertion. Then, unexpectedly, my blood ran cold. I was frozen in place, transported through time and space to 50 years earlier. I was on the verge of a panic attack, something that has never happened when covering the most horrific scenes as a news photographer.

Let’s back up a bit.

Wife Lila is a quilter, so we made a side trip to Gee’s Bend Quilters Collective in 2008. I felt a sense of deja vu when we crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge leading over the Alabama River into Selma. I retraced that route with Road Warriorette Shari as a traveling companion in 2015.

About midway between Montgomery and Selma, we spotted a building with a bunch of tents pitched around it. It was the Lowndes Interpretive Center, which was hosting marchers re-enacting the Selma to Montgomery trek half a century earlier. (Click on any photo to make it larger.)

Bloody Sunday

Until 1965, only 2% of the black voters in Selma’s Dallas county were able to vote. In Lowndes county, the percentage was zero.

On March 7, shortly after a civil rights protestor had died after being shot, 600 non-violent protestors planned to march 54 miles from Brown A.M.E. Chapel in Selma to Montgomery to honor the martyr and to draw attention to voters’ rights.

Attacked by “lawmen”

Shortly after they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge, they were stopped by a line of state troopers, local lawmen and local volunteers. After being given less than two minutes to return to the church, the marchers were attacked with nightsticks and teargas. At least 50 protestors required hospital treatment.

John Lewis: “I thought I saw Death”

One of the protesters beaten on Bloody Sunday was Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, then a 25-year-old organizer with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. “I was hit in the head by a state trooper with a nightstick. I had a concussion at the bridge,” Lewis said. “My legs went out from under me. I felt like I was going to die. I thought I saw Death.”

The interpretive center had a profoundly moving video that gave the background of racial discrimination in the area and accounts of the three marches – or attempted marches – from Selma.

I was moved to tears by a woman who must have been very young on Bloody Sunday. She was speaking to a number of students and decrying the poor voting turnout in the country. She handed each student a pebble while saying, “I walked on these very rocks on that day. Now, I’m handing them on for you to carry.”

We found the march

Not far from the center, we ran into the marchers stopped at a convenience store. I managed to get in behind them and drove up the shoulder of the road until I ran into this trooper. He gave me a questioning look, but became friendly when I stepped out with my camera gear. “I thought you might have had some kind of emergency and needed to get by,” he said.

When I looked back at him protecting the marchers, I wondered if his father or grandfather had been in the group at the bottom of the bridge on Bloody Sunday.

A mixed group

The group was made up of a mixture of ages and races, ranging from a babe in arms to folks who were probably in their 70s. Sometimes singing would break out, other times the walkers were just plugging away.

“What mean these stones?

After we left the group (see more photos in the gallery), we stopped at the Bloody Sunday monument at the foot of the bridge going into Selma. I was surprised at the number of people who were there.

Inscribed on the rock are words from Joshua 4:21-22. “When your children shall ask you in time to come saying, ‘What mean these stones?’ then you shall tell them how you made it over.”

The words of the woman with the pebbles came flooding back to me.

A fairly steep climb

The bridge has a pretty steep grade to it. You can’t actually see it from the bottom on either side.

Picturesque, but run-down

When you approach the top, you get a pretty view of a picturesque, but somewhat battered town.

Business as usual

As I got to the top of the span, I was the normal detached photographer, thinking only of composition and exposure.

Then, something happened

I walked about halfway down the bridge, then turned back to head to the car. I hadn’t gone far, when suddenly I felt myself transported back half a century. I could hear the crowd behind me singing, talking, laughing. Spirits were high. They were marching for their freedom.

That’s when I took this frame and realized that here is where you would first see the line of lawmen waiting. I’ve covered my share of riots and protests, but there was generally some kind of restraint on both sides. Those men waiting down below weren’t there to enforce the law: they were there to mete out punishment.

I could feel the pressure of the crowds behind me. They hadn’t yet seen what I was seeing, and they were pushing me from behind. I couldn’t retreat, and I certainly didn’t want to go forward. I don’t know how long I was paralyzed there. If the spirits of the place could invoke that much terror, I can only imagine what it must have been like to live it.

We’re going to have to change the title

As soon as I regained my composure, I called Curator Jessica in Athens. In a choked voice, I told her we were going to have to change the title of an exhibit we were doing on the protest era at Ohio University. The working title was “The Sky Has Fallen.”

“A university closing is nowhere near what the freedom marchers in Alabama faced. We need to avoid hyperbole,” I argued.

Ms. Jessica explained the origin of the term: after a night of rioting two weeks after Kent State, the decision was made to close the university. The student newspaper, The OU Post, was on a hard deadline to get the story in print. Just before it hit the presses, someone said, “We don’t have a weather report for tomorrow.”

Editor Andy Alexander, a darned good journalist then and now, said, “Just write, ‘The sky has fallen.'”

I accepted that.

Gallery from Selma

Click on any photo to make it larger, then use your arrow keys to move through the gallery.

June 4, 2016April 23, 2021

Paradise Lost

When Curator Jessica and I headed up to Kent, Ohio, in 2014, she insisted on a side trip to see Big Muskie’s bucket at the Miners’ Memorial Park. Click on the photo to make it large enough to see her IN the bucket.

John Prine’s Paradise

The youngster had never heard John Prine singing Paradise, an ode to a town hauled away by Mr. Peabody’s coal train and bought out by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA).

Now, she wanted me to carry her off to Paradise. The first OH-MO-OH trip was plagued by fog, drizzle and downpour, so we had to bail. The weather was OK on this one, but we were pushing darkness pretty hard, particularly since we were looking for something that wasn’t there.

We found the TVA

The first clue that we might be close to the right place was when we spotted the mammoth cooling towers of the TVA’s Paradise Fossil Plant. An interesting website postulates that Mr. Peabody’s coal trains might have hauled Paradise away, but it was the power plant that was the nail in the coffin:

“The Paradise Fossil Plants were built and started raining ash and debris down upon the remaining citizens of Paradise. Concern arose for the health of the remaining residents of Paradise. Obviously having ash created during the factory process and pouring from the air like warm, toxic snow was not a positive influence for ones respiratory system. Most likely, to prevent an onslaught of environmental and residential poisoning lawsuits, the Tennessee Valley Authority stepped forward. TVA representatives convinced the remaining townsfolk to vacate and paid them minuscule amounts to abandon their once happy lives in Paradise.”

Power plant went online in 1963

The TVA website said Units 1 and 2 went online in 1963. They were the largest operating units in the world at the time. A third powered up in 1985. The two older units will be idled by the end of 2017, replaced by a $1 billion gas-fired plant under construction in the distance.

The hunt for the cemetery

One website we read said a cemetery was about all that was left of the original community. We poked around the power plant, wondering how long it would be before somebody from Homeland Security showed up to ask these flatland furiners with Florida tags why they were creeping around, occasionally taking photos. We took off down a promising road that kept getting progressively smaller and bumpier.

After passing a washtub-sized snapping turtle, a deer and a pair of amorous squirrels, I spotted a guy in his carport with a couple of kids around him. When I turned into his lane, my curator partner said, “This one is yours.”

I allowed as how Kentucky coal miners would probably be as friendly as Appalachian coal miners, but I mentally adjusted my dialect, taking a little Yankee out of my SE Ohio twang, and dialing some North Carolina into my Swampeast Missouri drawl. The gentleman couldn’t tell me exactly where we needed to go, but he gave us some hints, peppered with local landmarks of the “third dead skunk” variety.

You gotta be kidding

We headed back past the snapping turtle, past the power plant and back toward huge mounds of coal and the railroad cars that hauled it. Right about here, my navigator said, “Turn left.”

I did, taking us up a vertical gravel road that deadended at the top of a hill with a radio tower on it. While trying to figure out how to turn around, Navigator said, “That looks like a road going down the hill.”

I might have been able to go DOWN that hill, but there was no way we’d ever be able to drive back up it. Sometimes you have to disregard your navigator because I could hear Johnny Cash singing about what was going to happen if we went down that road that was Dark as a Dungeon:

And pray when I’m dead and the ages shall roll
That my body would blacken and turn into coal
Then I’ll look from the door of my heavenly home and pity the miner digging my bones

The McDougall Family

We headed back toward the power plant and found the road that led past the McDougall / Paradise Cemetery

The McDougalls, I assume of the family for which the cemetery was named, had plots surrounded by an intricate metal fence. They weren’t on the highest part of the burying grounds, nor were they in the mowed section, but the fence made up for it.

A grammatical error

John McDougall, born in Scotland in 1821, and who died in Muhlenberg county 60 years later, has been sleeping under a stone with a typo. Above the digit pointing to heaven, is the inscription, “THEIR IS REST.”

Eudoxia Smith Robertson

A significant number of the stones had birth and death dates in the 1800s. Eudoxia Smith, for example, was born in 1815, and married Alney McLean Robertson in 1837. She died two years later, after giving birth to two children.

Kneeknockers

The thigh-high grass hid lots of shin and knee-high gravestones. I found this one particularly attractive, probably because I saw it before I felt it.

Miz Jessica and I were pleasantly surprised to find ourselves chigger-free the next morning. I was afraid we’d pick up a bunch of ticks and itchy things wading through the high grass.

Peabody Wildlife Management Area

After you have, as John Prine sings, “come with the world’s largest shovel, tortured the timber and stripped all the land,” what do you do? Well, it appears that you smooth some of the bumps, plant some grass and call it the Peabody Wildlife Management Area.

Here’s a reason I’m cranky about strip mining.

Still a lot of scarring

In fairness, on our hunt for the Weir Cemetery, we managed to see two herds of deer in about two minutes, so there IS wildlife. A Google Earth view of the area still shows an awful lot of scarring left behind.

After a couple false starts, we finally found our second cemetery.

Weir Cemetery

The Weir cemetery was well-maintained. It had a small parking lot nearby and there was evidence of recent landscaping. The FindAGrave website said the cemetery is known as both the Doug Weir and the Vanlandingham Cemetery. We saw some stones with that name on them.

That flag is one of the reasons I tweaked the Ohio Yankee out of my accent. This IS Kentucky.

Markers decorated with shells

This row of stones were interesting because the markers had small shells embedded in the concrete. I had to assume they were mussel shells from the nearby Green River (where Prine said “the air smelled like snakes”).

Starting to get dark

This little excursion had been fun, but the sun was sinking faster than I liked, and we still had another 170 miles to go to get to Cape.

It was time to put Paradise behind us.