Kim and I had a great time visiting Vicksburg this past weekend. The main purpose of the trip was my reading, organized by Lorelei Books at the Old Courthouse Museum during the Bicentennial Fall Flea Market. More on that in a moment, but first, let me tell you that we had a fabulous time and found Vicksburg to be such a charming city. I’d been there once before to read at Lorelei Books and enjoyed the quick trip, but Kim and I had never been there together.
We stayed at Halpino, one of the properties associated with the Duff Green Mansion. It’s a small BnB-style lodging with four or five rooms and a common kitchen area. The furniture was all antique or at least in the style, and though there were a few of the kinds of quirks you expect in a place like that, we had a perfectly wonderful stay. There was no iron or hair dryer, though, so it’s a good thing I brought my clothes for the next day on hangers and Kim packed her blow dryer. There was coffee in the shared kitchen, though you had to get water from your room because there was no sink. That and the code to the front door were things we figured out along with another couple who were staying there, so we got to know them a little more than we would have in a hotel, which was fine. The room was clean and the bed slept well, so really, what more do you need? It was also the least expensive decent room I could find, so I’m not complaining.
In the morning, we went over to Duff Green for the included breakfast, which turned out to be a sit-down 3-course affair that we were served. The food was quite good, and we were seated with another couple and a young woman who was in town for a funeral. There were several other people at our table, but these were the ones we were sitting closest to and with whom we conversed over breakfast. After the meal, we took advantage of the included mansion tour, which really was just of the ground floor rooms, but we learned a bit about the history of the home: for instance, it was at one point a hospital that housed both Union and Confederate troops, which may have saved it from shelling during the siege.
After breakfast we stopped by the bookstore and then headed over to the flea market to have a look around. For an hour or so before the reading, I sat at Lorelei Books’ table and talked to people about Tree Fall with Birdsong. Lorelei’s owner, Kelle, called over a few friends and between them and a few people who wandered by, we rustled up a nice, small crowd for the reading. One draw was that it was indoors in the old courtroom, which was air conditioned. A few people wandered in and out, but several stayed for the full reading and discussion. We talked about the poems, and also about The W’s low-residency MFA program and the Welty Symposium, which I had mentioned in my bio.
Along the way, I met the husband of a former student. The husgand is an architect working on a project to shore up the stone wall around the base of the courthouse lot, and his wife, Tarasa, is now a teacher in the Jackson area. Unfortunattely, she wasn’t able to come along, but it was great to hear what she’s been up to and how successful she’s been in the twenty-five years since she left my classes.
After the reading, we headed downtown to grab a little lunch, though we settled for ice cream from the store where Coke was first bottled. We didn’t tour their Coke museum, but instead headed down the street to the HC Porter Gallery. We probably would have spent more time with Porter’s art, the woman working in the gallery turned out to be an MSMS alumna, so we got to talking about all the latest news from campus. She was a friend of Emma Richardson, so we promised to say hello, and she is also a writer, so we talked to her a bit about the symposium and the MFA program, too.
From there, we went to tour the Vicksburg National Military Park, since we had heard it was still open despite the government shutdown, thanks to a local group that was funding it. There also was no entrance fee, though we donated more than what our fee would have been to the Friends of Vicksburg National Military Park in gratitude.
If you haven’t been to the park, it is definitely worth a visit. We only wish we had left enough time to drive the full 15 miles of park road. We did make it through most of the Union side and to the military cemetery and remains of the USS Cairo, an ironclad wooden battle ship that was sunk in the Mississippi river and thus preserved. Other river battleships were torn apart and used for scrap or repurposed after the war.
We’ll have to return another time to see the rest of the park. We’re already thinking about planning a trip next September for a new art festival that the RC Porter Gallery started this year. It looks like a serious, juried art show with nationally known artists. If that keeps going, it will be a great boon to the arts world in Mississippi. We also met the woman who runs the Catfish Row Museum and would love to go back to visit that, and there was the Manhattan Short Film festival on Saturday night, which we were tempted to stick around to see.
But unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. When the park closed at 5, we headed on back to Columbus, stopping in Clinton for dinner and getting back by about 9pm. It was a quick trip, yet a rewarding one, and a good reminder that we just need to make the effort to do a few more day trips to places we haven’t yet explored in Mississippi, or to go back and explore of the places we have started to get to know.
Kendall Dunkelberg 