Natchez, MS / Cotton Fields

byphaeton

833 followers

Updated 11 years ago

Today we are leaving New Orleans. Sort of a sad day but it had its moments. Do you remember on Day 2 that Lina, had locked herself out of her room? I showed her a trick so it wouldn't happen to her again? Well Betty and Marg had already gone down for breakfast and I was putting my luggage outside of the door when I heard that dreaded click. There I was in the hallway in my stocking feet and my key was in the room. Good thing that I had my pants on. We were on the 16th floor and the elevators were extremely slow. I managed to get to the lobby with only 1 extra stop. I got a room key and made it back up to my room. Surprisingly non stop. Got back into my room and put on my shoes and joined the others for breakfast. No mention was ever made of that incident. :-p

After breakfast we hopped on the bus and made our way north to Mississippi We stopped at a small town that was steeped in history. We found a nice little restaurant and ordered dinner. It was nice to be off of the bus for awhile. We went for a short stroll through town to stretch our legs. This accomplished we boarded our bus and set out for the Frogmore Cotton Plantation. After a short drive we arrived at Frogmore. This plantation dated back to 1790. We experienced the everyday operation of a cotton plantation from the 1790's through to the modern techniques employed by today's plantations.

We were shown an extremely rare steam cotton gin and the present day owners explained conditions and the slave culture of the early plantations. They attempted to show us that the slave culture benefited the slaves as well as the plantation owners.There work helped to pay for their food, clothing, and housing. It was portrayed as being more beneficial to the slave, than what the alternative was. Whatever that means.

There were a lot of antebellum outbuildings 19 in total, of which we visited 8. They were sparsely furnished with period furniture, very crude and rough-hewn. All single room dwellings some with blankets for walls and some had no separations at all. It all looked quite primitive and unappealing. Share-croppers buildings were quite similar. It boggles the mind how these people could be happy in such a situation.

Some slaves added a great deal to the evolution of the cotton gins to the modern day equivalents. After all I guess that the credit rightfully belongs to Eli Whitney, a black man as the inventor of the very first cotton gin. It is a good thing to remember that technology and innovation cannot lay claim to any one race or group of people. Progress can be made when people can live and work together in peace and harmony.

I don't know how many of you are familiar with the great bales of hay that are rolled up into big rolls and covered in plastic. Well that is the same way that cotton is baled today. As we continued travelling north we saw many bales of cotton laying in the fields. Part of Hurricane Sandy was beginning to catch up with us. It crossed my mind that when the cotton bales soaked up that extra moisture that those bales would be extremely heavy. Good thing that everything is automated today. Makes me wonder how long that cotton could lay there in the fields before it got rotten.

We arrived at our hotel in Natchez, for our supper and a good nights sleep before we drop in to Graceland, for a visit with the king of Rock and Roll Elvis Presley.