Goat Town, Rutger tomatos and Elberta Peaches – looking for the true flavor of the South

Some years ago I read an article about Margaret Mitchell hosting a bevy of the literary and social elite from New York on the heels of her explosive success with Gone with the wind. 

As the story goes, she loaded everyone into the car and drove them from Atlanta down to Milledgeville, GA.  Showing her guests the beautiful tree lined streets and the grand antebellum mansions, including the former capital of the Confederacy and possibly even Andalusia, Flannery O’ Conner’s homestead.

Once everyone had confirmed that the South was indeed just as they had imagined, she would take a different route back to Atlanta, in order to pass through the tiny hamlet of; Goat Town, GA.

As the rustic name implies, Goat Town is not a shining example of southern culture, and has never hosted an entry in Architectural Revue.   

But it is the genuine south, with the rusting carcasses of cars in front yards, chickens prowling for bugs and a thick layer of red dirt from the unpaved road covering everything.

If you’ve read Harper Lee, Flannery O’Connor, Robert Penn Warren or any one of the great southern authors and wondered how they come up with such interesting and colorful characters – well, let me tell you about my weekend – it was a bit surreal.

Annie and I travel on a Sunday afternoon to visit my sister-in-law (Deborah) who is recovering from some health issues.  She is doing well, her prospects for a quick recovery are excellent, and as the southern response to any significant life event is to gather and eat, we head down to Lizella, GA for a fish fry, at my brother's home.

Lizella is well out in the countryside of South-Central, GA, and in August it is so blistering hot and humid your shoes will stick to asphalt if you stand still too long. 

On the way there we pass through Musella, GA, stopping at Dickey’s Peach packing shed.  An oasis of cool shade and ceiling fans, with soft serve peach ice cream and peach flavored iced tea, and a fleet of rocking chairs. 

The little village of Musella is about 200 yards long with 6 houses, 2 churches (yes, both Baptist), 1 store and smack in the middle sits this huge peach packing shed. 

There were about 20 motorcycles parked in front, along with a variety of mini-vans, pickups and cars.  Almost all of the tags were from Georgia.  I suppose people from Connecticut haven’t heard about the place, because much like Goat Town, Musella is off the beaten path.

All the rocking chairs were occupied by a mixture of grandmothers, old bikers and a few kids, with everyone eating ice cream and rocking in the shade under the fans. 

An elderly looking, dirty red pit bull dog is laying in the shade by the steps of the packing house, ignoring everyone – but when a pickup truck goes by raising a small cloud of dust in it’s wake – he rises, giving a half-hearted chase, as if to enforce the no pickup trucks on my street, pitbull ordinance, before returning to the shade and flopping down to resume his nap.

We picked up some fresh peaches, (big juicy Elbertas), and head over to Lizella – where my brother Paul (Deb’s husband) is frying up some fresh catfish from the pond in his backyard. 

That may seem unusual to us urbanites – but in Lizella it is pretty customary to have a fish pond within easy access.  Frankly, I wish more of us would embrace this tradition, there would be less strife in the world.  With catfish in your backyard, how can there be rancor in your heart?

Thankfully, he has some beer on ice, and handing me a longneck, he tells me a couple of his friends will be joining us for supper – and a short while later the other guests arrive:

First to arrive were Robert and his wife Darlene.  Robert is about 65 years old now and is retired from Norfolk Southern – but in the 1960’s he was a professional wrestler under the name of Dr Death. 

He is 6’10”, and my guess is he is a little heavier than when he stalked the ring, but not by too much.  He rides a custom built three wheeler because his arthritis makes straddling a two-wheeled bike for very long a painful proposition. 

The nicest and most erudite guy you ever wished to meet.  We had an interesting discussion which in turns covered Hemmingway, catfish, hot weather and what a lucky duck Paul was to have married Debra.

Next Jerry and Cheryl arrive; Jerry was the first truck driver the Allman Brothers Band had, moving their equipment while they were on tour.  He tells me it was a string of firsts.  The first time he had ever driven a truck, been to New York, wrecked a truck, and so forth.

The second stop on his first trip was Fillmore East auditorium in NY – where the band recorded one of the seminal rock albums of all time.  What an interesting guy!  Rather than talk about his front row seat to Rock history, he spoke at length about various ways to catch white perch, make the perfect hushpuppy and how to synchronize the carbs on an high performance VW engine.

Jerry also entertains us with stories about how he used to act as Deborah’s big brother when they both worked at Powell’s Pharmacy – (he delivered prescriptions on his Harley – she worked at the soda fountain) – he would examine any guy that Deb intended to date and give a yea or nay.  He said Paul passed because he wanted to take her fishing on their first date....and Jerry took that as a good sign.

Southern literature is filled with hosts of colorful characters, and people from other parts of the world tend to believe they sprang from the fertile imaginations of great writers like Percy, Foote and Faulkner.  The simple truth is you can run into some really interesting people just by going to a fish fry at your brother’s house!

Goat town and Milledgeville are nice, and they are not that far away, but there are no peaches or Dickey’s peach packing shed.  So any visitors we get during the summer get a ride down to Musella for some soft serve peach ice cream.  Then we'll head over to my brother's house.  Maybe we'll catch a few catfish and see if Dr. Death is viisiting.