My memories of Walnut
and the Wilbanks family
by Ronald L. Hughes

The only child of Henry Everett and Lassie Wilbanks was, Jack Wilbanks.  H. Everett Wilbanks, became a successful lumberman and cotton gin operator in Walnut.  Their son Jack Wilbanks, married Mildred Thompson, their son is Phillip Wilbanks. Mildred was the daughter of Walter and Effie Thompson of Middleton.  They managed and owned the Bus Station Cafe in Walnut.

My father, Leroy Hughes married Ruth Rowland the eldest child of Huey Isaac Rowland.  He lived with the H. Everett and Lassie Wilbanks family, as a young man, and he became, as an older brother to Jack Wilbanks.

My father, Leroy Hughes and my mother, Ruth Rowland Hughes, lived next door to Jack and Mildred Wilbanks, on the ridge line, north of the H. I. Rowland and H. E. Wilbanks homes, on old Highway 15, South of New Highway 72, and across the street from, and facing East toward the railroad.

Henry Everett Wilbanks and Lassie Hobson Wilbanks (I grew up thanking of them as my grand father and grand mother, I called her Mother Lassie and, H. E. Wilbanks, I called Dad Everett), lived on property that had a large lumber yard just to the South. This also was the location of the city water supply and water tower, and, in the 1960's, the city swimming pool.  According to the book, "Tippah County Heritage, Vol I";

In 1938, Mr. and Mrs. H. E. Wilbanks had the first deep well dug and a water tank installed.  This tank was located where the swimming pool is now.  It had a capacity of 30,000 gallons.

This water system was for their own private use to serve as a prevention against fires in their businesses.  After some time other people wanted to use the water and were allowed to do son at a flat rate of $1.50 per month.

Across the street, on the Railroad tracks, was the Cotton Gin, owned by H. E. Wilbanks, where I would play as a young child.  As South of the Gin was the stockyard.

"Mother" Lassie (Hobson) Wilbanks, was at one time, a school teacher at the Brownfield School.  Other teachers at this school, that were probably related to the Rowland / Hobson families were; L. B. Hobson, Ruth Thomas Gatlin, Homer Gunn, Lloyd Hopkins, Sadie Thornton, Monroe Street, Robert L. Mohundro, Johnnie Luna Tomlinson, Joe Byrd, Mary Hopkins, and Valca Mitchell.
 

"Dad" Everett and "Mother" Lassie Wilbanks, reportedly had the first telephone in the community.  According to Carol J. Smith's article, written about Walnut, in the "Heritage of Tippah County, Vol I", this telephone was...known as a "check station".  Phones were later installed with service from the Ripley exchange.  The Shannon family owned the telephone lines at one time.  Note, Huey I. Rowland's brother Charles Briggs Rowland, married Maude Shannon.

The H. E. Wilbanks home was one of the finest homes, in the town of Walnut.  It was of brick construction and had two or three bedrooms up stairs, as well as three bedrooms down stairs.  It had a separate home for Myrtle, the family cook and maid.  Myrtle was the finest cook I have ever seen as well as one of the nicest people. She treated Phillip, and me, like her own.  She made the best fried okra and a form of "baked fat back" IE; Salt Pork, that you would kill for.  Her desserts were from heaven.

The house also had a large wash house and stable, as well as a large garage, which had a large power mower with tracks, like a tank and long control levers sticking out everywhere..

The home had a large flower garden area with a large gold fish pond.  The entire front of the home was surrounded by a sandstone fence.  A large Willow tree and a large "scaly bark", otherwise known as a Sycamore tree, dominated in the front yard.  These trees  provided Phillip and me, with many good days of play.

When I was about 9 and Phillip about 16, we climbed the Old Water Tower, which sat on the old lumber yard, on the South side of the house, where the lumber yard once sat and where the swimming pool was later built.  Phillip Wilbanks climbed to the very top and sat on the Ball on top of the cone roof, I just made it to the edge of the roof. There was a hole in the side of the ball, in the hole was a birds nest.

The most dangerous part of the climb was the connection of the leg, by ladder, to the catwalk.  It is normal for catwalks of this type to have a hole cut in the floor. On a "normal" water tower the connecting ladder, from the legs to the catwalk, would enter the catwalk thru this hole, on the inside of the catwalk railing.  This was not the case however on the "old water tower".  In this case the ladder veered out from the legs to the outside railing of the catwalk.  This made anyone
(who was stupid enough to get on the catwalk, like us) have to climb out, away from the legs, with the hands a little overhead and outside the feet.  This was, looking back, very dangerous and not a lot of fun.

Every one living in Walnut today can see the property on which "the big house" once sat, I think there is just a big vacant lot, the Walnut Swimming Pool was just South of the house.   The house, finally became rental property, when Mother Lassie, moved to Theodore, Al, and it burned to the ground a number of years ago. The property was totally razed. I have no idea what happened to all the old sandstone that was used to fence the yard.

The city took over the water system in the 1960's, I think.  Until then it was a private utility owned by Lassie Hobson Wilbanks.

It is fair to say that, H. Everett Wilbanks, was one of the wealthiest men in the area, especially from 1935 to 1950.  He even printed his own script, which he paid to his employees, during the Great Depression.

I remember visiting Mother Lassie one time when she decided to unearth her new crop of turnips.  It appears she had decided to plant a crop of turnips in an old horse paddock area.  This area, I assume was fertilized on a regular basis, for a number of years, by the horses, and had lain fallow, until the planting of the turnips.  My mother and mother Lassie and I, took a forked shovel, I know there is an name for this but cannnot recall it, and bagan to remove the turnips.  Wow!  Many of them were the size of footballs or soccer balls.  Everyone's eyes were big!

My father, Leroy Hughes, who was a lumber yard overseer for H. E. Wilbanks, told me that, even during the worst days of the depression, H. E. Wilbanks paid his employees 50 cents per day, even though times were so hard, some men were willing to work for 25 cents a day.  (Note, a day, at that time, was sun up to sun down, six day a week.)

                                            The H. E. Wilbanks Cotton Gin

The Gin was located right across the street from the Wilbanks home.  It was also a place to go, to explore and to play.  It was probably crazy to play in the Gin, because many men were probably killed and maimed in cotton gins over the years.

The whole place was run by a big steam engine.  From this big boiler there came a huge piston that turned a large wheel.  The wheel was used to turn a large belt.  This belt was probably two or three feet wide, as I remember it.  This belt in turn was connected to other wheels, which were, in turn connected to other belts, etc. to power all the machinery in the Gin.

Some of the belts were connected different pieces of equipment sometimes 20-50 feet away.

I used to watch the men operate the giant vacuum that pulled the raw cotton from the cotton trailers that were pulled under it by trucks or tractors.  This vacuum would suck the cotton out of the trailers into a dumper, which dropped the raw cotton, (note raw cotton means that the cotton seeds are still emeshed in the cotton) into a shredder or separator, with large wire teeth.  These teeth, stuck on the outside of a large metal rod, rotated while the raw cotton was forced over them.  The teeth removed the seeds from the cotton fiber.  The seeds and a lot of cotton were then dumped into a large pile, which was good for jumping into.

The cotton was then sucked into or transported by conveyor belt to other ginning operations until in ended up at the "Compress".  The compress was a large steam operated contraption that turned 400-500 pounds of loose cotton fibre, into a dense rectangle of cotton measuring about three feet by five feet.

The cotton gin, as you might imagine was a loud and dangerous place, with all the heavy moving equipment and belts going everywhere.  But nothing was a loud or as dangerous as the cotton press.

The cotton was dumped a few pounds at a time into the press, the steam would build up and the heavy steel plate would come down and compress the cotton into the mold.  As it was compressed it would be held in place until more loose cotton was placed under the press and the process repeated.

A completed bale was wrapped in mesh burlap, and kept under pressure by the use of large metal bands.  These bands, as I remember, usually two on the long end and three on the short side, kept the compressed cotton in its small size.  You must imagine that 400 pounds of raw or fluff cotton would probably fill a room, 20 feet long by eight feet high, maybe more.

It was at the end of a press, that the real danger would take place.  This was when the gin compress operator would try to compress all of the remaining loose cotton into one very heavy bale instead of having one light bale.

I assume, the one heavy bale, would save on the cost of compressing one small light weight bale.  This "last bale", was very dangerous, and I used to watch the men as they nervously watched the bale as the banding took place.  The extreme compression of the cotton made this bale very dangerous to band. If the bands broke men could loose arms or legs or die.  Missing fingers were a way of life in the Cotton Gin.

The Auction Barn and corrals.

The Walnut livestock acution facility was also located across the street from the H. E. Wilbanks property.  I walked around the area often.  I remember all the cattle and horses that were brought in and the frantic auctioneer.  It was quite an exciting place.

My cousin Phillip Wilbanks, the only son of Mildred and Jack Wilbanks, now lives near Mobile Alabama, where Mother Lassie died and was buried.   Phillip had one daughter by his first wife..