Dorothy Hopkins McClendon, the Cemetery Lady
By Thomas Daniel Knight and Randall Allen Troup High Key Club member, Bruce Batchelor looks on as Dorothy McClendon, dressed in her “cemetery uniform,” clears a grave in the John Hill Cemetery at Long Cane. Key Club helped clean the cemetery as a service project in October, 1980.(Troup County Archives) Fair warning [...]
John Marvin Thompson: Villain and Victim
By Randall Allen The genesis of this article goes back more than forty years. One Sunday afternoon my grandmother and I drove around Oak Grove Community, where she grew up. On Floyd Road (then called Pruitt Mill Road), we stopped at the site of the old Davidson grist mill on Turkey Creek. My great [...]
I’ll never forget ol’ what’s-his-name!
Anyone with an interest in Troup County’s history has heard about Fuller Callaway, Horace King, Benjamin Harvey Hill and the legend of the Nancy Harts. Every day, we drive by landmarks that are part of the fabric of our community, but we rarely think about their origins. In these articles we’ll explore some less well [...]
A Driver’s Guide to Hill View Cemetery – Swanson Lot
If, like me, you’re a resident of LaGrange, you will regularly find yourself driving down Morgan Street where it becomes New Franklin Road and passing the glorious riot of stone monuments that makes up Hill View Cemetery. As I pass it on a nearly daily basis, I find myself thinking about the many men [...]
A Driver’s Guide to Hill View Cemetery – Longley Lot
Photo of the Longley grave, 2021 by Lewis O. Powell, IV. If, like me, you’re a resident of LaGrange, you will regularly find yourself driving down Morgan Street where it becomes New Franklin Road and passing the glorious riot of stone monuments that makes up Hill View Cemetery. As I pass it on a [...]
What is Juneteenth?
Texas Juneteenth Day Celebration, 1900. Credit: Austin History Center Juneteenth (short for “June Nineteenth”) is the official name of the holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. Observed annually on June 19, Juneteenth is known to be the Black Independence Day. In 1863 during the American Civil War, President [...]
One Donation – Three Stories
Troup County Archives has received, from the estate of Dr. Leland Madison Park, this portrait of Dr. Thomas Randolph Lamar, by noted Georgia artist John Maier. Leland Park never resided in LaGrange but, over the years, he acknowledged his family ties to this area through generous support of Troup County Historical Society. He was [...]
The Smell of Smoke: Court Records from Before the Fire
Local photographer Stanley Hutchinson had a studio less than a block from the courthouse, enabling him to capture numerous photographs of the building as it burned in 1936. TCA Collections. On Thursday, November 5, 1936, a man walked into a telephone booth on the first floor of the courthouse. He left quickly. [...]
