Entries by Jerry Shiverdecker

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Imperfect American politicians: babies and bathwater?

“…the haunting fear that someone, somewhere may be happy” Senator Cochran’s marriage last week to Kay Webber revived gossip about whether their relationship before his wife’s death had offended Puritan sensibilities. Cochran lost consortium with his wife at least a decade and a half before last year’s election battle. During the campaign, Cochran’s Tea Party […]

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“Let ’em up easy” attitude died with Lincoln

Mississippi writer Shelby Foote told of visiting Mary Forrest Bradley in her Memphis home sometime during the 20 years he worked on his three-volume history of the Civil War. Mrs. Bradley was the granddaughter of Nathan Bedford Forrest, the fabled Confederate general who grew up near here in what is now Benton County. Foote said he […]

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Has Union Become a Two-Party County?

     A record number of candidates in 2015’s Union County elections have filed to run as Republicans.      Seventeen of the 54 candidates (over 30 percent ) seeking Union County offices this year are flying the GOP flag. However, it is hard to find a single candidate, Democrat or Republican, who is flying either party’s banner very high or with […]

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OPINION R. R. Reasoner: My Name It Means Nothing

After a hiatus of more than fifteen years and in my seventh decade, I take up the pen again to comment on politics, the economy, the social condition and anything else the sacred First Amendment allows me to say. Some teachers of rhetoric recommend using a bit of verse to open up, so, being a […]

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New Albany Renaissance, Part I

Although many factors made it happen, downtown New Albany has undergone a notable renaissance since the Tanglefoot Trail opened in September, 2014. Mayor Tim Kent pushed contractors hard to have the new plaza at the Tanglefoot trailhead open in time for the annual Tallahatchie Riverfest September 26 and 27. Working night and day, the workers […]

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Men and Their Toys

Chancery Court Judge Talmadge Littlejohn and his grandson Gray took a close look at a railroad locomotive in downtown New Albany on a pleasant day in late January, 2015. Railroads have played an important part in the history and development of New Albany. The tracks of the BNSF Railroad and the Ripley and New Albany […]

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Stan the Man

I met Stan Musial once at Sportsman’s Park on Grand Avenue; had to have been 1957 or 1958, when I was nine or ten years old. The Cardinals were playing the Braves, then still sojourning in Milwaukee. Warren Spahn pitched for the Braves, striking Stan out twice and beating the Redbirds. My dad and I […]

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