Water Valley Was Always Home
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DAVE’S WORLD
By David Howell
This week’s story about Amala Dass’ project to restore the Markette Street house is one of my favorites in a long time. I have known Amala for almost a decade, first connecting with him at Parchman as we both served with Kairos Prison Ministry. I rarely saw Amala the last few years and I discovered why! He has been busy working on that house.
Amala asked me to reach out to Nathan Swanson,who lived in the house as a child, for information that we could include in the story.
That phone call was a blessing, as Swanson shared many memories with me from the 1960s, a trip back to simpler times. He told me about his childhood in Water Valley and the years spent at the big house at 301 Markette Street.
Swanson recalled that his family never locked the doors and probably did not even have a key for the house. He said it was a good home for the family of nine – eight children and his mother.
Swanson’s father succumbed to cancer when he was a small child. His mother worked at Rice-Stix and later at Ram Tool.
I am sure these were tough times for his family, but Swanson said life was good. They lived off the bounty of his grandparents’ farm. His grandparents made apple turnover pies every single day. Swanson and his siblings would often help peel the apples or peaches.
“My mother was brave, she gave every one of us knives to help peel them,” Swanson said about the children helping.
The family ate pinto beans, sweet potatoes, turnip greens, peas and other staples from the garden every day. Gravy and biscuits were served most mornings. Meat was typically reserved for Sundays, usually a rooster from the flock.
Swanson said he remembered almost every family washed their cars on Saturday, they wanted them to look good for church. People dressed up for worship service, and all of the ladies wore hats.
His family attended Water Valley Church of Christ on Main Street. Swanson recalled that his mother forgot to count the kids one Sunday after the morning service. They arrived home and one sibling, Robert, was missing. His mother wasn’t worried, she knew Robert would go home with somebody from church and they could pick him up after the evening service.
“And that is what we did,” Swanson said.
If they had a free Saturday afternoon, Swanson said they would go fishing on the backwaters off of Mudline.
A lot of people don’t remember Swanson and his family, they moved away 50 years ago. But Swanson’s childhood memories never faded, a strong lure that ultimately brought him back in 2020 when he purchased a home on County Road 96.
The journey home started several years earlier, as he was living in neighboring Lafayette County when he was asked to preach at Ford’s Well Church of Christ.
“It was a wonderful feeling, driving through Water Valley each Sunday morning,” Swanson said about his weekly commute to the church west of Water Valley. He and his wife would eat Sunday lunch at Dunn’s in Sylva Rena most weeks after service and they started looking for a home to purchase.
They looked at house after house with no luck until one Sunday when someone told him about a house on County Road 96 – it was a perfect fit. He explains that Joe and Susan Newman are the best neighbors anybody could ever ask for.
Swanson served 20 years in the Army as an assistant chaplain, entering service when George H.W. Bush was president and retiring when George W. Bush was president. He served in Iraq during intense combat in Baghdad, recalling the most frightening days of his life.
“I was thankful when I got to come home,” Swanson said about his time in Iraq. “I was overwhelmed I got to come home to Water Valley.”
