Jimmy,I don't have a map but I've got the memories of living on the corner by both churches. I remember the Avondale Main office across from the baptist church. The park that was behind it of trees,played a many days there clinbing trees and catching chipmunks in a mason jar.The methodist parsonage was beside the church going towards the breakroom at avondale, I was told the bus used to pick up and drop workers there.Across from our house was Mrs. Albrights, it's now a parking lot for the baptist church. And I can't forget to mention the baseball park and the hospital that used to be behind the methodist church. A lot has changed in the past years,wish I had a map also.
DD

Yep, DD, I can close my eyes and see it ALL, including the house you lived in, I reckon. My Uncle Henry --- Chief Holmes --- lived in the house catty-cornered from the Methodist Church. There were maybe four houses down that street toward Alabama Avenue before the Baptists took over that whole triangle.

But don't get me started. I'm getting too ****ed old. Makes my lip quiver just to think about that childhood in that place at that time --- things like slipping in the back door of that Methodist church...late...to sing in the choir with little pieces of toilet paper stuck over 'knicks' from shaving. In comparison, the children of today are living a nightmare. It's just too sad for me.

My Lord Jimmy you left out Dairyland. Sunnybrook was not mill village but everybody who lived there was mill people or as ES would say MVB's. Then of course there was Skeeter Flats and what about Walco #2?

Horace

Clean your goggles, Horace! I did NOT leave out Dairyland. Shantytown, or Skeeter Flats, was only temporary, so that's why I didn't include it. I have no idea what you mean by "Walco #2." The only thing I can think of that I left out was "The Quarters." Not gonna use the full name. Maybe that's what you're thinking of, too, but Jimmy Holmes NEVER heard it called that.

Man, Y'all have struck a soft spot in my heart, HOME!!
Anywhere else is just staying there. I lived 44 years down here, twice the time I lived at 44 Twin Street, but my home is in the mill village. It was the best place to grow up in in the world. Mentioning the "Chicken houses, That was in dairyland, right? What about skeeter flat and shanty town? I remember the houses in Walco that were put up during the war, Mama wouldn't let us go over there, don't know exactly why but what Mama said goes. Ears mentioned something about chicken houses, Ears, did you live there or know someone who did? I still say Jimmy had the best of the best, actually living at Lake Louise and fishing out of his front yard, swimming in the pool anytime he wanted. Heck, we had to walk a mile or more to get there, but it was worth evry step.
Gonna quit fore my lip gets to quivering. MVB ES

Jimmy, I'm sorry and beggin' yore pardon. I missed your Dairyland, my Dairyland. You wrote Sunnyside, did you mean Sunnybrook? Yep you hit it right on Walco #2....I'm surprised that you never heard it called that. You know they lived on Tuskegee St. before that section was built for them over on the road to Thomas Hill and Five Points. We moved from Dairyland to Tuskegee Street. We lived in the houses that replaced the chicken houses at Dairyland...and in a house on Tuskegee that was previously occupied by the residents of the quarters. You are forgiven for leaving out Skeeter Flats...it wasn't there long enough to count, thank God. That was a terribly awful place to have to live.

Horace

Horace, where was skeeter flats? Is it the houses they built during the war?

I've never heard you mention RUDD HILL or COOPER'S FIELD. Wasn't that part of the Mill Village?

I know Rudd Hill, but I don't remember Coopers field. Fill me in. Unc

My Dad used to live there. It was across the pasture from Sunnybrook and over the hill. I used to walk there when I was five-or six with my single-shot bolt action Stevens .22 rifle and go hunting with him. My Mother would make me take the bolt action out and keep it in my pocket until I got to his house before I put it back in the gun. I was so small that I couldn't pull the bolt back to take the safety off so she tied a shoestring around the back of the bolt and made a loop to go around my hand. Sometimes when I would try to fire the gun, the string got caught in the bolt and it wouldn't have enough spring-power to fire the cartridge.
A true, true story...

Yep, Horace, I just mixed up Sunnybrook and Sunnyside, which was right next to Camp Helen.

ES, Skeeter flats, or Mosquito Flats as some called was a buch of tar paper shacks they threw up in a hurry at the start of the war for new mill workers. It was over behind Walco by the box mill if my recollection is as good as I like to believe. Now Lathan I need a better description of that place, Cooper's Field? I never heard of it and your description sounds like Tennessee Ave or East Street, unless you are talking about the cemetery. I remember some houses on Mt. Vernon going up the hill from Sunnybrook, you know where ES's old girl friend Moochie live.

Horace

Horace,
If you took the road behind Taft Rudd's service station and walked up that hill about half-way, then took a left on one of those roads until you came to the woods (that would eventually take you to the pasture that would take you to Sunnybrook). There were some houses just before you got to the woods and my Dad rented from a guy named Cooper and everyone called it Cooper's Field...

Actually, as I remember it, that bunch of shacks was more often called "Shantytown" than "Skeeter Flats." And they were actually a LITTLE better than tarpaper shacks. They did, for instance have board siding on them, although they were cheaply and quickly made...definitely NOT for the long haul.

Also, there were some pretty "undesirable" folks who lived there at one time or another.

As to the exact location, those of you who can remember where Pine Street actually passed between the Box Mill and the "Settling Basin" of the water works and the area where lumber was always stacked can just keep on going toward the big pasture, which is where Shantytown was built.

My recollection is so clear I can ever SEE the clothesline that Jimmy Persons nearly decapitated himself on one day while I was chasing him. We were both on our bikes and he was looking back at me laughing because he was faster....WUPS! LOL

Jimmy remembers, too. I asked him.

I think I know where you are talking about now. There was a little road right there beside the Old Freewill church across from Mom and Dad Pressley's place that went way off up into the woods. I remember now there was a pasture on the other side of the church with an electric fence it came down to the road, Mt. Vernon Ave. I believe that cows could cross the road by walking in the creek under the bridge on Mt. Vernon and pasture on the church side of the road. I never explored that area but I now know where it eventually led. Never too old to learn new things just too old to remember them.

Horace

Not my girlfriend Horace, took too many 100 watt light bulbs to keep her happy and I was always broke. You were the money man with your paper route. MVB ES

Horace, You're right on. If I remember the Church was made into a house...