Friday the Marietta Museum of History had an opened discussion on the tearing
down of the Old Cobb County Court House and building a new one.
The old one,
I suppose, wasn't missed until it was no longer there. Literally removed off the face of the
earth. The court house replacement was built with little plans, kind of like plan
as you go when each new problem arises which of course hopped skipped and
jumped over the bidding contract system of tax paid projects.
I remember
Herbert McCollum was the commissioner who was all for doing away with the
old building a new one.
It was just
about an overall consensus that Cobb
County leaped into the fast modern times and they needed their Face-front
buildings to reflect that.
When it was
gone we realized what a Mecca we had that slipped through our fingers.
Where did
the material go that came down with the
building.? The wood and the bricks. One lady said her late husband got the timber
and they built their house with it. I
have been told that the owner of either Discount Lumber or Discount Building
Supply got the bricks and made his home with them.
Listening to
people talk about how things were and who did what to shift's the direction of
Marietta History I heard a lot of name
dropping of the elite. And that is why we were there, to hear the names dropped.
Herbert
McCollum's Deputy Commissioner Cliff White, who was our neighbor behind us., I
don't know just what his role was with out with the old and in with the new,
rather quickly played. Oops! There I go
name dropping.
It was said
several times what a great town Marietta is and how some people who came here
to work for a short period of time, like the military people, liked it so much
they returned.. A friend and I were
talking a few days before that that we think or believe that Marietta also has
a very high rate of natives who stayed planted in Cobb County. Other places, people just live in their home town long enough to get their basic education, then
move on. Not so in Marietta very much.
Mrs. Clara
Howell,(name dropping again) my high
school science teacher, took the mike and said
a lot of people are using Photo Shop with their memories. She reminded us of all spit, snuff spit, tobacco spit, on the
pavement that you had to watch your step
in front of the Old Court House and all
the idle men that hung out there.
The lawyer
who made our will, Don Smith (opps! Name dropping again) recalled from his memory when he watched a
murder trial at the old court house while sitting in an opened window. I was impressed. Not only about watching a trial sitting in a window where he could fall and
no one cared but of all the facts he said I quickly calculated he was 92 years
old and was very robustly healthy looking.
Wow!
What he said
reminded me of a time in my preteen years that I was hooked on the lawyer
series on Saturday night TV, PERRY MASON.
I was so interested I wanted to watch a real live trial at the court
house. My daddy told me the next time
there was to be a trial by jury and I
went and had a seat in a pew.
A black man
was on trial for raping a black lady behind a school house at night. The trial was a sign of the times just how
much a Jim Crow style of living we were living in and didn't even realize
it. All the court officers were white
including the jury. Both the defense
attorney and the DAA took on the stereotyped black accent when they questioned
the accusing lady, or victim, and also the accused, like that was all they
could understand. They had the jury (certainly not their peers)
rolling with laughter.
The two
black people were openly being publicly mocked, ridiculed, and made fun of at their own
expense. I did not stick around to see
if he was found innocent or guilty. I
think in the jury eyes they were both guilty of being themselves, anyway.
I think that
is another case of Clara Howell's Mind Photo Shop.
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