New Residents at White Hall Defy Interpretation

EUTAW—Long-time residents of Eutaw are abuzz about the family lately seen lounging around the grounds of White Hall, ancestral home of Mrs. Margaret Irwin. This reporter caught up with Mrs. Irwin and her Garden Club as they lunched at the Ceinture Noire restaurant last Tuesday. When asked about her new tenants, Mrs. Irwin explained that they are “a family of perfectly respectable hippies who have taken up residence on the back lawn.” At first, she was a little apprehensive about their unfamiliar dress and manner of speech. Leaning across her chicken salad plate to be heard, Mrs. Bea Moore interjected, “These hippies give themselves the most curious names that I just can’t remember.”

Said Mrs. Irwin, “They don’t do much, and spend most of their time on the kitchen porch. But they do have the nicest watermelon garden. And they just eat them up as soon as they are ripe. I guess I could let them live in the big house, but I knew they would be more comfortable back in the old kitchen. You know at first I thought they had two little girls with long blonde hair, but it turns out one of them is a boy. They call him Little Moon or something. He is so cute, but you know he’ll grow up to be a problem soon enough. Now I wouldn’t mind keeping the girl, oh, what is her name, River Lotus or something. I wouldn't mind keeping her around to help me in the house some. However, the other day I am pretty sure I recognized one of my chandelier crystals on the mamma’s rope necklace.”

Last Sunday morning at the First Baptist Church, during the third call to altar and the sixth chorus of “Just As I Am,” several faithful say that they heard what sounded like distant bongo music. “I went over to investigate after the service,” said Brother Bobby Smith, associate pastor. “I followed the sound to the grounds of White Hall and saw what looked like a reenactment of the book of Job—-they were all half naked and swaying, kinda dirty, with flowers and sackcloth, and the smell of burning rope was heavy in the air. I just let them be, because they must have their own sort of religion. They might be really good practice for our youth ministry before their mission trip to Costa Rica this summer.”

When asked about the new tenants, Willie Jackson, the Irwin family gardener said, “They ain’t fit to live at White Hall. My people been keeping up this place for generations, and now times is hard and Mrs. Irwin has got to take in the likes of those. I feel sorry for the children of those no-count hippies. Some folks got no shame at all.”—Miss Virginia "Tootsie" McAlpine, with W. G. Marion

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Roscoe Pippin to Move Truck

LINDEN, AL—In a surprise move no less remarkable than the delivery of a lost letter after thirty years in the dead letter office, Roscoe Pippin has apparently decided to try to crank the Ford pickup truck he parked in his front yard six feet from the side walk in 1978 and move it around back. The curiosity of area residents was stirred recently when Pippin was seen with the hood propped up, a gas can and a new Wal-Mart battery sitting on the tail gate of the rusted-out eye sore, which according to his neighbors has become an area landmark and source of irritation since the disco era. Pippin told The Vidalia he really couldn’t remember why he had parked the truck in his front yard back then, and added, “If it’ll crank I’ll go on and move it to the back if I can get that tree out”, referring to a four inch diameter twenty foot tall water oak growing through a large rust hole in the truck bed. As Pippin poked at one of the flat tires with his screw driver, he took a drag on his cigarette and joked, "I guess it’s gone make it hard to tell people looking for the new high school where the turn is on High Dairy Road when I move the old buggy.”—Clement P. Tate

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Dayton Beneficiaries Receive Unexpected Inheritance

Examples of items from the hoard include decades-old K-Mart model cement that may
be priced in Confederate dollars and an ancient coupon for a long-defunct brand of soap.

DAYTON, AL—When the Black Belt’s oldest living resident, Mrs. Verna Pinson Penson died last month at the age of 113, she left behind a bewildering, if ultimately worthless, collection of hoarded refuse for her descendents. Within Penson’s modest Victorian cottage, her heirs, including children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and great-great-grandchildren, were amazed to find every drawer, cabinet, and even chair cushions bursting at the seams with items today’s wasteful young folks would consider garbage. The most common items included bread bags, scraps of used aluminum foil, plastic rings from the lids of milk jugs, and long-expired coupons for canned peas and frozen pie shells.

While the utility of saving some of the items eluded younger generations of Mrs. Penson’s descendants, her son and next-door neighbor, Eustace Pinson Penson, aged 93 explained, “Her mother told her about the blockade and Reconstruction, and she lived through the Great Depression and two World Wars. Of course, so did I.” Mr. Penson further explained, “All of this supposed garbage could be used again. Those bread bags could be used to store leftovers, or as booties or a hat to keep out rain. Sometimes the Piggly Wiggly girl doesn’t look, and she’ll take an expired coupon. It’s a small victory.” All descendants were clueless, however, as to the purpose of saving milk jug rings.

Penson’s grandchildren were decidedly less understanding. Linda Penson Cortez, a 61 year-old Sedona, AZ resident, found her grandmother’s behavior exhausting. “She once came behind me and took a hunk of moldy cheese and pile of potato peels I was throwing away out of the garbage, saying she would eat them later.” Nearby family members nodded in assent, since few of them could suppress the haunting memories of that fateful 1995 Thanksgiving when Mrs. Penson gave half her family food poisoning after serving an inadequately reheated, half eaten turkey leftover from the previous year’s meal and then refused to allow any family members to seek medical treatment, instead foisting expired pink bismuth down their throats.

The younger generations of the Penson family reacted to the collection with amusement, astonishment, and horror. “I mean, some of this stuff is old. I think some of these prices are actually in Confederate dollars,” noted great-great-granddaughter Elyse Cortez, a history student at Radford College. Since she has never lived in and seldom visited the area, Miss Cortez is likely unaware that the Black Belt was slow to accept that Alabama had in fact rejoined the Union, and Confederate dollars were considered legal tender in Marengo County until their value collapsed when President Richard M. Nixon abolished the American gold standard in 1971.

Family members are expected to remain in Dayton until the house is emptied of trash. Provided they can sustain 12-hour work days, the task should be completed in roughly 10 days. The final destination of the Mrs. Penson’s hoard is currently being kept a secret, primarily to prevent Eustace from scavenging the materials.

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Demopolis Widow Wills Mansion to Attic Residents

The Bonner home, which was recently willed to a sizable pack of raccoons.

DEMOPOLIS, AL—In a move that surprised and disappointed her descendants, widow Evelyn Bonner willed her property, a nineteenth-century mansion with nine adjacent, overgrown acres, to a family of raccoons who resided in the upper floors of the house. Bonner passed away two weeks ago at the age of 104. In her video will, she explains, "The raccoons should get the house. They moved into the attic 30 years ago. Twenty-five years ago, they moved down into the upstairs, and it's been 24 years since I have been up there to check on them. They seemed considerate. I only hear them scratching around in the early evening and around dawn. They only raided my kitchen garbage twice a week and usually defecated in the corners. Plus, they certainly stuck around, unlike all my children and grandchildren, who moved to Birmingham first chance they got."

Lawyer Dickie Bay, who served as executor, also noted that Mrs. Bonner had expressed some concern that her son would clear the lot behind the house and fill it with cheap rental trailers or that her daughter-in-law would open an ill-conceived "back-to-nature" bed and breakfast attempting to attract urbanites by promising nightly viewing of raccoon antics. Says Bay, "She wanted the house to remain a stately manor inhabited by someone with generations of breeding, and those raccoons certainly had been breeding in her attic for many generations." The only question now is whether the raccoons will plan on evicting the thousands of bats who call the attic home now that they have officially taken control of the property. The new principal owner of the house, the alpha raccoon known to Mrs. Bonner as Mr. Bandit, was not available for comment.

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Porch Collapse Triggers Domino Effect in Uniontown

File photo of the porch that started the collapse, at the home of Mrs. Antoinette Tubbs on Northwest Street

UNIONTOWN, AL—The dust has finally settled after a weekend calamity in Uniontown that started with the collapse of a single porch roof and ended in a landscape of splintered wood, disoriented chickens, and scattered asphalt shingles. Observers pinpoint the moment of the collapse to roughly 3:20 p.m., when a single pigeon landed on the sagging front porch roof of a two-story Victorian home inhabited by Antoinette Tubbs, 84. Apparently, the rotting wood comprising the porch roof exceeded its carrying capacity for vermin and collapsed under the load. Amid the crashing of timbers and shingles were heard the squawks, barks, and squeaks of fleeing bats, squirrels, and birds. A lone possum was also witnessed fleeing the scene. Ms. Tubbs was quoted as saying, “That bird was just one too many, I guess, but what can you do? They gotta stay someplace, too.”

In an unfortunate turn of events, the tremors created when the porch crashed to the ground prompted a simultaneous implosion of decaying verandas at half a dozen other dilapidated nineteenth century structures. As Perry County Sheriff’s deputy Ralph Brooks looked out over the chaotic scene on West Street, he noted, “I suppose this was bound to happen sometime. We’re just lucky no one was seriously harmed, and that we don’t have any county building codes. That way, everyone can just push aside the rubble and return to life as usual.”

In fact, aside from the throngs of pest animals suddenly rendered homeless, only a single minor injury was sustained. Ms. Tubbs brother, Festus Porter, 79, a resident of a decaying Neo-classical home on the next block, sustained a bruised hip. Paramedics note that Mr. Porter was fortunate to have his head in a broken avocado green refrigerator while he stripped copper parts from the cooling system. The ancient steel appliance shielded him from a direct blow by a roof girder. Some neighbors believe a higher power may have been at work protecting Mr. Porter, since he reportedly placed the refrigerator on the porch after it stopped working in the late 1980s. Although he frequently mentioned that he needed to repair the appliance, thus far he had never been witnessed working on it. “I don’t know why he was out there today after all them years. I think Jesus told him to work on that icebox,” mused neighbor and local entrepreneur Perkins “Peeps” Pate.

For the most part, local residents are taking the collapse in strides; however, one resident, social worker Ellen Barnes, has raised some concerns about lasting effects. Barnes notes, “The amount of particulate matter from asbestos, bat guano, and bird and rodent feces that was ejected into the atmosphere as a result of the collapse may have lasting effects on the respiratory health of Northwest Street residents.” Perry County health department officials who visited the scene noted that they did not seem to have any trouble breathing during their five minute tour and declared the area safe for children and the elderly. Read More and Comment...

Individual with Least Number of Ancestors Found in Hale County Outhouse

GREENSBORO, AL-Mr. Inge Hobson Hobson Inge was discovered last week by Robbie Furrow while clearing a one acre mass of wisteria vines from behind the storied Inge Hobson home, the first house to be condemned by the county since Reconstruction. Local lawyer Dickie Bay declared Mr. Inge a product of impeccable breeding, who may, on paper, be the most eligible bachelor in Greensboro. Mr. Inge, who insists on calling his outhouse a "dependency," has not been seen in public since his mother, Hobson Inge Inge Hobson Inge, known as Miss Hi, was laid to rest in 1978. Apparently, he has been holed up in the dependency with only one servant for 30 years, subsisting on pickled peaches that his great great great aunt Inginea Hobson Inge canned and hid in preparation for the advance of the Union army. Now that the county has learned that the property is inhabited by Mr. Inge, they have rescinded the condemnation order and will allow the wisteria, and nature, to take its course.—Marion Morgan

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