Travels in the South

Oh my friends – mom/dad found the *best* local seafood restaurant.  It is called Fishers of Men and they are located at 1500 Mt Zion Road, Suite 20, Morrow.  They are open everyday except Sunday.

Mom/dad went there one Saturday night to check it out and they have since been back repeatedly.  Why?  Let me tell you why mom/dad like it so much.

The food is authentic.  As you’ve read on my blog, mom/dad like to travel and they like to eat.  They’ve eaten everywhere.  And this place can hold their own with some of the other restaurants they’ve been to all over the world.

The atmosphere is home. You go in, order and pay for your food.  Then you  find a comfy spot and wait smelling all of that deliciousness being created in the kitchen for your order.  There’s no rush to herd you out of the restaurant like some places do.  Everything is cooked fresh to order so it comes out sizzling hot.

And let me tell you one more thing.  You may go in as a stranger but you will leave as family.

When mom/dad went the first time, they ordered two of the whiting and shrimp dinners.  That’s four pieces of whiting and thirteen shrimp with fries.  They didn’t have any clue how much food they would get.  Look at all of that food!  And yes, dad said they snorted it all down – can you believe that?

There is a LOT of pictures below that mom/dad wanted to share with you – no they didn’t order everything at once – snorts with piggy laughter.  As I’ve said, they have been there many times in the past couple of weeks.

As they like to tell one of the owners Arlene, they are working their way through the menu.  Today, I wanted to share with you some of their fabulous food.  And, if you are in the area we highly suggest you try this place.

You will not regret it!  In fact, as mom/dad try more of their food, you might see them here again on Travels in the South.

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Now try not to get too hungry looking at these gorgeous pictures!

In no particular order, the following pictures are:  scallops (sweet, succulent and flaky on the inside like they should be); crab sticks (we had to ask what these were too!  crab meat breaded and fried); oysters and catfish; whiting and shrimp; whiting and the best seafood salad and clams.  And let me add by saying there french fries are crispy and there onion rings are out of this world!!  Mom/dad have also tried their wonderful cole slaw and grits.  Yes grits are good for you!

 

#fishersofmen #seafood #oysters #crabsticks #whiting #scallops #shrimp #clams

 

40th Anniversary…

That’s right friends.  This past weekend was the 40th Anniversary of the Smokey and the Bandit movie that came out in 1977.  Do you remember the basis of the movie?  This is what it says on the IMDB webpage:

Big Enos (Pat McCormick) wants to drink Coors at a truck show, but in 1977 it was illegal to sell Coors east of the Mississippi River without a permit. Truck driver Bo “Bandit” Darville (Burt Reynolds) agrees to pick up the beer in Texas and drive it to Georgia within 28 hours. Cledus “Snowman” Snow (Jerry Reed) drives the rig while the Bandit helps make his path.  When Bo picks up hitchhiker Carrie (Sally Field), he attracts the attention of Sheriff Buford T. Justice (Jackie Gleason). Angry that Carrie will not marry his son, Justice embarks on a high-speed chase after Bandit.

Knowing the story line, you now know that some of the movie is based in Georgia, home sweet home to this oinker.  And downtown Jonesboro (less than five minutes away from the Hotel Thompson) held its 40th Anniversary over the weekend.  The big rig came rolling in on Main Street followed by the famous Pontiac Trans-Am.  And not only was the rig and Trans-Am present, so was the sheriff’s car that was driven by Sheriff Buford T. Justice (played by Jackie Gleason).

And of course they had a re-enactor that was playing Burt Reynolds character… who just happened to get arrested by our finest here in Clayton County, Georgia.

Nah, not really.  It was all for show but doesn’t that guy look just like Burt Reynolds years ago in the movie?

He was a great guy for getting arrested and hanging out with everyone… and mom said not bad on the eyes whatever that means.

Burt Reynolds did show up to the festivities.  This is him in the picture next to the Trans-Am.  What an awesome time it was for everyone in attendance.

Did you know some of this trivia that we read on IMBD?

• A senior executive at Pontiac promised Burt Reynolds a free Trans-Am if the movie became a hit. It did and the 1977 T-Top Trans-Am became one of the hottest selling cars of the year. When the movie became a hit, Reynolds expected the executive to come through with his promise. But the Trans-Am never came. After a few months, Reynolds, (who was afraid of looking like one of those pretentious stars looking for freebies), finally called Pontiac. As it turned out, the executive that made the promise had retired and the new executive refused to keep the promise that was made, by the previous Pontiac Trans Am executive.

• Jackie Gleason would often ask his assistant Mal for a “hamburger,” which was code for a glass of bourbon.

• In Jonesboro, GA (YAY close to us here at the Hotel Thompson) where a lot of the film was shot, Snowman’s house and the warehouse where the Coors beer is picked up (in Texarkana, TX) are actually only about a half a mile away from each other.

• The line of Jackie Gleason’s dialogue printed on the movie’s poster is incorrect. The quote on the poster reads “What we have here is a total lack of respect for the law.” In the movie Gleason actually says “What we’re dealing with here, is a complete lack of respect for the law.”

Credit to IMBD web page for information on movie.  Credit to Scott Stubbs for pictures.

 

 

 

Travels in the South

Hello sweet friends.  Today we are continuing our Travels in the South series with our great friends Bill and Jean who are the parents of Shoko and Kali from Canadian Cats.

The first week we posted, we posted of their arrival and eating at a local seafood restaurant.  You can read about that here.  The second week, we posted about a fantastic restaurant we all went to called Fogo de Chao.  You can read about that here.

This week, we are going to talk about a tour that we took of a place called Stately Oaks.  Stately Oaks is a historical Antebellum home located in Jonesboro, Georgia and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.  It was originally constructed in 1839 by Mr. Whitmill Allen who sold his home to Robert McCord in 1858 and then moved to Tyler, Texas.

It is located in Jonesboro, Georgia.  Does that sound familiar to you?  Jonesboro is the very city where Scarlett O’Hara from Gone with the Wind had to pay the taxes on Tara. Even though Tara only existed in Margaret Mitchell’s imagination, she placed Tara in Clayton County where she had visited relatives who lived on a large plantation south of Jonesboro. Many of the stories she heard as a child are in the movie.

Now, Stately Oaks is open for tours and on this day (mom, Jean and Bill) decided to tour the home.  The down side of the tour was we could not pictures of the inside of the home which was a real bummer.  The start of the tour starts off on a CD and you listen to the history of the home while in the bottom level.  Then the tour moves you into the sitting room, the dining room and the entertainment room.  Then the tour moves to the upper levels of the home.

 There are some items to point out which is interesting to know.  Back during this time, tea was expensive and kept in a locked box with only the woman of the home having the key.  Sugar was kept in cones and was brown, not the normal white sugar we are more accustomed to today.

Also,  celery was a sign of money in the southern days.  There was actual celery jars – kind of like the one in this picture – that were put on dinner tables to show the status of wealth in the family.  Can you imagine that?  It makes you want to go out, buy some celery and put in a jar on your table doesn’t it?  Who knew this could be a sign of wealth… especially in today’s market at what $0.99 cents a bundle – LOL.

They also didn’t season meats when they cooked them.  They had little individual salt bowls at every table setting.  The mistress of the home would pass around the big cluster of salt and individuals would put some in their salt bowls to season their meats.  Brings new meaning to, “Can you pass me the salt”.

One of the things we all fell in love with was the courting candle.  I think it would be a blast to have one of these today.  Jean bought one and trust me – mom is going back to get one as well.  You see how they are made in the picture?  The father could lower or high the amount of candle that would be burned during the courtship of their daughter.  Once the candle burned to that desired place, the man that was courting the young lady had to leave for the night.  What a concept huh?  Such an easy and simple method to watch over a courtship.  Of course, mom says she would use hers to show daddy actually how much time he had to be silly for a given amount of time.  That’s my mom – snorts!

Now let’s talk about the upstairs of the home.  The day that they went on the tour it was a little hot outside so you can imagine the inside of the home.  Mom started getting the vapors downstairs and had to sit out a bit for some of the tour.  Now, once mom was feeling a bit better, she ventured up the stairs as well.

 Stairs in southern homes are steep.  You see the average woman was around 4’11” and the average man was like around 5’7″ – not very tall for the likes of these days.  And the stairs go straight up it seems with not much railing.  Can you imagine as a woman in full attire (hoop skirt, bodice squeezing the heck out of you, tiny shoes, etc.) walking up stairs?  In fact, at the top of these stairs, there was usually a chaise or chair of some sort for the women.  Because believe it or not, sometimes they would pass out from the shear heat of exhaustion.  Well, that was almost like my mom.  She made it up the stairs, started having a hard time breathing and had to rush back downstairs and out of the door before she was hit with the vapors once again in a bad way.  Don’t ask.

One thing that mom did notice upstairs in a glassed case was mourning tear jar.  When the woman of the home was going through mourning, she would collect her tears in a jar.  Once it was full, she would then close the top for her mourning.  Forever, she would have the tears of her sorrow that she cried for her loved one.

Now the kitchen of this home had been redone more modern and we didn’t get to see any of that.  But then again, the kitchen of the home back in the day really wasn’t a ‘kitchen’.  It was more of a warming room.  You see food was prepared in a ‘shack’ behind the home.  This shack would host a fireplace, a table to prepare food and you can imagine the heat from the summer or the cold from the winter creeping in through the boards of the walls.  The food was then brought into the home to the warming kitchen and stayed there until the woman of the home motioned for it to be served at the dinner table.

So much wonderful history was learned this day about the ways of the south.  Can you imagine doing some of these things and living like this today?  I hope you join us next week my friends as we continue our series of Travels in the South.

 

A Little About My Town

Perhaps you’ve heard of this area called historical Jonesboro, Georgia.  Do you know the story of Gone with the Wind that was written by Margaret Mitchell?   Parts of this novel and movie were actually set in Clayton County in historical downtown Jonesboro.  

In fact, the plantation in the book/movie, “Tara”, is an important part in Clayton County.  One of our main north/south roads is named after Tara and is called Tara Boulevard.  They actually even made two sequels to Gone with the Wind – did you know this?  They were called Rhett Butler’s People and Scarlett.  Both take place briefly in Clayton County.

AND, I bet you didn’t know this fact.  Parts of the film Smokey and the Bandit were actually shot in and around Clayton County, specifically downtown Jonesboro.

This is a picture taken off of thebanditrunphotos.com  It actually shows Burt Reynolds in his famous car in front of what is actually the historical downtown Jonesboro depot. Although there is a sign up on the building that states “Texarkana”, if you look in the lower left hand corner you will actually see a sign that states Jonesboro Days. 🙂 A little oversight by the movie company.

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Another known fact about our little town – the Jonesboro Confederate Cemetery also known as the Patrick Cleburne Confederate Cemetery.  This cemetery is opened daily between dawn and dusk.  Mommy highly recommends the visit.  This cemetery is north of Jonesboro where the heaviest fighting took place during the second day of the Battle of Jonesboro. This battle took place August 31 – September 1, 1864.

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This cemetery is home to between 600-1,000 men who died during this battle.  If you look closely at this picture, on top of the monument that states Confederate Dead, you will see on the arch 12 cannonballs.  Once you enter this walk way, it takes you inside of the cemetery. It really does take your breath away when you think about all of the blood shed in such a short time.

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As you walk through the cemetery, you notice something just a little different about the layout.  The headstones are patterned in the shape of a confederate flag.  The walkways are shaped like a X and the graves fill in the triangles of the X.

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You can spend hours in this cemetery just looking at the different headstones reading the names.  Names of people that you actually don’t know in person but can feel and reconstruct in your mind the battles they must have went through during the time.  It is an emotional feeling to say the least.

There are also many homes in historical downtown Jonesboro  that were used in the civil war as Confederate field hospitals.  You can learn more about the homes and businesses located in the area  at http://jonesboroga.com/site/VisitingJonesboro/OnlineHistoricalTour/tabid/91/Default.aspx 

It’s a great read into this area.  I hope you enjoyed my little taste of some of the famous things about my home town.  I would love to hear about your home town 🙂  XOXO – Bacon