greenwood, day 2

We are scooting home this morning, before the predicted snow and ice in Atlanta. Here are some photos of yesterday, with few words --

Gray Evans was the City of Greenwood prosecuting attorney during Freedom Summer. Pull quote: "I knew things in Mississippi had to change. So did some other key people on the police force. As long as we could find out what was going on, we were able to keep many incidents from becoming much worse than they were. I was at the courthouse day and night..."

Pull-quote from Tricia Evans: "Gray came home from a meeting at church and said, 'We may be ostracized at church!' because he had refused to be part of a contingent that would rotate standing at the church doors on Sunday mornings and keeping blacks from entering.

What amazing people, people.

"And we knew a lot of other people felt like we did but didn't speak out," said Gray. "It was such a frightening time," said Tricia.

Hospital where Silas McGhee was brought after he was shot in August 1964:

Where I want Sunny to live on River Road. hee.

Where she likely lives, on River Road, close to the hospital:

First SNCC office in Greenwood, on 616 I Street:

Friendship Missionary Baptist Church where the black community gathered after Silas McGhee's shooting:

Chairs that were removed from the old Greenwood Public Library after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Now black citizens could use the library, but no one could sit down.

The Wade Plantation, where Mary Hoover grew up:

The commissary, owned by the plantation owners, where sharecroppers bought their goods. The plantations were just over the Tallahatchie River and outside town.

Pull quote from Mary Hoover: "Boss man would buy each of us two pair of shoes every year, one for school, and one for church. If your shoes didn't fit, you'd swap with somebody 'til you found some that did. There were 60 families on the plantation, and probably 250 kids. There were eleven of us kids in my family, and we lived in two shotgun houses, back to back. We'd take off our socks and shoes and take off across the cotton fields for church on Sunday, then dust off our feet and legs at the church door and put our socks and shoes back on."

Mary and I realized our maiden names are both Edwards, and we are both from Mississippi. Hmmm....

More from the other side of this ice and snow -- some really amazing finds. Stay safe, if you are traveling through these southern storms. Stay safe, no matter where you are. xoxo