My grandmother, Corrie Bennett Algood, once told me every time a person from a preceding generation passes away it’s like a library burning down. Along with their passing disappears a wealth of knowledge, information, and links to the past. She was within weeks of being 100 when she passed away. I was a pallbearer for her graveside service at the old Masonic Cemetery in my hometown of Louisville, Mississippi. As I helped carry her casket from the hearse to the grave her words came back to me. I glanced around and saw not only the graves of her parents and grandparents, but the graves of many of the town’s founding citizens. – All libraries that had burned down.

Not only had my hometown lost citizens with their links to the past, but as I looked around from my viewpoint in the cemetery that day I noticed John Woodward’s cotton gin across the street was gone. To the north Butter’s Photography Studio was gone, too. Further to the south on the same street the old ice house was gone. All were either torn down or burned to make way for progress since they had become obsolete.

I noticed their absence that day, but their loss really didn’t resonate until years later as I was writing my first book and trying to resurrect memories of the peoples and places from my childhood. I realized many of those old homes and buildings were gone forever.

In researching past places and events for my book I found myself reading accounts of the past. Accounts such as A History of Winston County by Jennie Newsom Hoffman, a federal writer’s project by the Works Progress Administration in 1936. I, also, read Winston County and Its People by Louis Taunton and Nancy R. Parkes. That was a treasure of information and photos from the past. There were other books and old newspapers I searched through to get a feel for what my hometown and county were like in the decades before I was born.

That was when the gravity of loss hit me. So much of the past was gone. Gone forever. Along with their demise was gone the essence of the town and surrounding communities. There were beautiful old homes that once lined the streets from where Old Robinson Road intersected with Highway 14 (In the past it was known as The Old Wire Road) all the way to Main Street in the heart of Louisville. Traveling north and south on the “church streets” were old homes, hotels, the old First Baptist Church, the Lutheran Church and the railroad shop with a scope of woods nearby where hobos camped overnight on their journeys north or south. Fair Lumber Company and the mill houses lay further south on the outskirts of town.

Main Street was a thriving scene of commerce and reunions on Saturdays when most folks would come to town to buy groceries, staples, get haircuts and conduct their banking at the end of the week.

We cannot bring back those times, old buildings and people. But we can share our fond memories and pictures from the past for others to enjoy and enlighten the newer generations.

A fellow Facebook friend, Robert Hutto has created a site on Facebook called Winston County Historical and Preservation Site where we can share our memories and photos of the past. I believe it is a great idea. I just hope more people will join in and share their memorability from Winston County and Louisville’s past on its pages.

One of my friends mentioned a lot of her family’s memories were lost in the tornado a couple years ago. If we could share our memories on this media they would last longer and more people would enjoy them. Who knows, perhaps someday someone will take those shared memories and put them in a book we could all enjoy!

I love paper. It’s been good to me.

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Rick Algood
February 18, 2017