Our stories of small-town life keep ending up on my desk (not really; they end up on my computer, along with photos of cute kittens and, more recently, praise for the LSU all-time women’s basketball team). But when I say “at my desk,” it sounds like I have a real job.
Anyway, here’s a story by Mary Pramuk from Baton Rouge:
“When we lived in a small town in upstate New York, I embarrassed a man I met at a festival who claimed to know every town and village in the state.
“I said, ‘Newark Valley?’ He looked confused, couldn’t find it on his New York map.
“It was small but had most of the things you would expect: a traffic light, doctor, grocery store, bank, schools, library, etc. (The gas station went broke.)
“We shopped at Bill and Velma’s thrift and antique store. Old Bill liked to tell the history of the town.
“Chuckling, he said, ‘This is a dry city.’ He then slapped his hip (where the bottle goes) and declared, “But lots of wet hips!” (There was a bar just over town.)”
Which reminds me
As a native of Natchez, Mississippi, a wet city in a dry state, I became aware of an interesting phenomenon at a young age:
It seems every dry county in the state had a wet county (or at least a known smuggler) that was easily accessible by car.
As has been said many times about Prohibition, you can make drinking illegal, but you can’t make it unpopular.
Thank you, Dad
“I grew up in the small town of Dunn, North Carolina (population 8,000) in the 1940s,” says Lucy Sloan.
“We lived in a Victorian style house with a large wrap around porch overlooking the main street. As teenagers, my girlfriends would come over in the afternoons and we would sit on the porch drinking cokes and waving at passing boys.
“When we got tired of flirting, we would go downtown to the department stores and try on hats and dresses. If I saw something I wanted I would just say ‘Bill my daddy’ and take it home with me no questions asked. They never sent bills but the next time he was in the store he would pay.
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