between the magnolias

A Union Springs ghost story.

The Rainer-Lewis home in Union Springs, Alabama. Built in 1904.

It was only one of many similar occurrences, back in the shadowy age in the South before the Civil War, that were never inked in spidery script into the front-leaf dynastic chronicles of the parlor Bibles. In this instance, it was the young heir of a thorny and grizzled old patriach who presided over a plantation with a multitude of slaves down in a south-Alabama Black Belt community called Union Springs, and who, having already exhausted and buried several wives, was preparing to take yet another. A few days before the wedding, his son notified him that he was in love with one of their slave women, and meant to make his life with her. The father, in a reeling fury, dispossessed him, and promptly dispatched the female slave to another owner. The youth lingered until the day of the wedding. Then, during the marriage feast-- he poisoned his father-- and fled, vanished, never to be seen again.

Excerpted from Marhall Frady's Southerners: A Journalist's Odyssey

I can't help but wonder which plantation was the scene of this family crime. Perhaps the Sedgesfield Plantation? If you know any more about this bit of local history, please share.

More to wander in historic Union Springs:

• A map of downtown Union Springs plus a historic building tour.
• Some fans of the paranormal have taken an interest in the Josephine Hotel and the Pauly Jail.
• More hauntings.
• Thom S. Rainer, President and CEO of Lifeway, the Christian bookstore chain, comes from Union Springs. It seems that he must be somehow related to Frances Rainer (the ex-wife of African-American mayor Johnny Ford), who also hails from Union Springs, though nowhere in Thom's magnificent online opus have I found any mention of Frances. Does Mr. Rainer have a living ghost he'd like to mention?
• More Union Springs.

An excerpt from David Kimbrough's book about snake handlers.

Most snake handlers avoid wearing any type of jewelry and refrain from extravagant dress. In many churches, even a person who bears just a wedding ring or watch is seen as sinful. The snake handlers argue that Peter 1:18 justifies this position: "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers." The women wear long print or solid-colored dresses and abstain from make-up or other cosmetics. They do no artificially curl or color their hair. It is usually pulled to the back of the head and bobbed. They cite 1 Corinthians 11:15-15 as support for their belief: "Doth not even nature itself teach you, that if a man have long hair it is a shame unto him? But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given to her for a covering".

Arnold Sayer told me,

"After my wife was saved she took off her wedding rings and flushed the down the commode. I am against women cutting their hair, and I will tell you why. If a woman says she is just cutting the dead ends off her hair, the next thing she does is cut it off to her shoulders, because she claims it is hot. Then she cuts it off like a man's next. The next time you see her she will be wearing britches. I believe that cutting off the first dead end of hair is a gradual, step-by-step process for developing the spirit of a homosexual. It is a sin for a woman to act like a man. One thing leads to another. Even the small things. Before long you get away from God. I certainly don't believe that an angel cuts her hair."

From Taking Up Serpents: Snake Handlers of Eastern Kentucky by David L. Kimbrough

Pardon me while I trim my hair.

For more on snake handlers and such:

• "Religious snake handlers busted in Kentucky" circa 2008
• Snake Handling Church in Georgia
• Snake-handling Pentecostal sects
• Video of snake handling church service
• Ruby Dee and the Snakehandlers
• "The origins of snake handlers in the holiness churches"
• Salvation on Sand Mountain: Snake Handling and Redemption in Southern Appalachia by Dennis Covington
• "A Fundamentalist Social Gospel"
• Snake Cell blog, in praise of snakes.
• Image source

Southern Arts get lean and mean.

The Southern Arts Federation (SAF) has down-sized to match the economy in their presentation of the annual Folklorists in the South gathering for 2009. Their belt-tightening benefits those who decide to join them for Folklife Collections in the 21st Century, a professional development workshop offered as an online, interactive opportunity. 

Doug Boyd, Director of the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History at the University of Kentucky Libraries, will present Folklife Collections in the 21st Century. The session will address issues surrounding Internet access to field recordings and examine numerous options for disseminating fieldwork online. This workshop will provide an introduction to current archival best practices for the preservation of digital resources created by folklorists and oral historians in an independent and an institutional context. Additionally, the preservation of digital fieldwork materials forces a radical reconsideration of traditional approaches to preserving archival resources.

Be online on Tuesday, June 30th from 2 to 3:30 pm EDT to learn from Doug Boyd, producer of Oral History and Digital Technology and participate in (Faux) FITS 2009. Register online here. If you live in the South, the cost is $25 to participate. Those with questions should contact Teresa Hollingsworth at thollingsworth@southarts.org.