[Granville-Hough] 14 May 2009 - Low MS

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

A Town which never was: Recollections of Low, MS.

Low came into existence with the building of the Laurel Branch Railroad 
from Saratoga to Laurel. As one went east from Saratoga, you came first 
to the place called Coat, where my father’s first cousin, I. W. “Waddy” 
Walker, held forth with his general store. Then you moved up and over 
the Ware Cut, which was almost on the Smith-Simpson county line. Then 
you went downhill about a mile and came to the Clear Creek swamp, and 
the railroad builders called that place “Low.” I suppose it was marshy 
and mosquito-laden. Certainly the mosquitos were still there when I was 
growing up. As the purpose of the Laurel Branch was to harvest the 
longleaf pine timber, there were frequent sidings and temporary branch 
lines into the woods for operating the skidders and loading the flat 
cars with logs for transport to Laurel. Low must have been on Frank Ware 
land, as his son Zollie Ware opened a store at the Low siding, and this 
siding was still in operation in my youth. In its heyday, Low had a post 
office and one or more stores. Unlike Coat and Milton, it did not have a 
sawmill. Milton also had a mill pond and water mill on Clear Creek. Then 
the next village was Abel, possibly named for Abel Sullivan, then on to 
Mize, the metropolis and intersection with the Cohay logging line.
In my youth, you could board the train at Low by flagging it down, and 
you could buy a ticket to get there from anyplace on the rail system. 
The siding was also used by the neighborhood for mass purchases of 
fertilizer or other goods such as lumber. You had to buy a box car load 
and it would be delivered to the siding, along with keys to the doors. 
Then you unloaded the car, each neighbor taking his allocation (whatever 
he had paid to get.) My father did this several times. First, it was 
cheaper, and second, the move by mule and wagon to our farm was a 
half-mile, while the move from Magee or Mize was seven or eight miles, 
and this was a laborious trip for a mule team. My father last arranged 
for a fertilizer shipment about 1934. By then, we were in Depression 
days, and few of our neighbors could pay their share. I’m not sure 
anyone ever used the siding again.

It was to Low that I would be sent to collect visiting preachers from 
Laurel. The road was rapidly being overgrown, so that you had to know 
your way or get lost in the swamp. I would guide them up to the Jim 
Meadows cattle gate on the road, then north a half-mile to our home. It 
was at Low where I brought my Richardson cousins by train from Laurel in 
1936, and they still remember the place as far out of nowhere.
Jim Meadows at some point bought the Low land and townsite, and he moved 
Zollie Ware’s store up near his home on the road, where he used it as a 
“sto” for his black tenants. Postmasters for Low included Jasper and 
Zollie Ware, Tommy Amason, and other close neighbors.

(It was said that some entrepreneurs wanted to establish a milling town 
in Simpson County about halfway to Jackson. That would save the hauling 
costs to Laurel or Jackson. They selected a place on Strong River which 
was low swampland. They called it “LOW” until someone reminded them 
there was already a Low, MS, on the Laurel Branch Railroad. They then 
decided to name the place “DAMN LOW” and so they did. Then, not to 
offend anyone with sensitivities, they abbreviated this name to “D’Lo;” 
and so it is known to this day. D’Lo, MS, survived as a town, but Low, 
MS, faded away, and even Laurel Branch west of Mize disappeared several 
years ago.)


From: "Herbert, Teri Lynn" <herbertl at musc.edu>
To: "gwhough at oakapple.net" <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Date: Thu, 14 May 2009 15:26:13 -0400
Subject: Re: LowMS -14 May 2009

More about D'Lo from Univ of MS:

Origins of the name D'Lo

The most controversial piece of D'Lo history is the origins of the name
itself. There are currently three different stories that explain how the odd
name of D'Lo originated.

The oldest and probably the most common story is one that could easily be
categorized as an "old wives' tale". This story claims that an early settler
referred to the D'Lo area around the Strong River where it commonly floods
as being "too damn low."  When it came time for the village to get a post
office he suggested that the village be named "too damn low" but the postal
authorities would not approve of the profanity in the name. As an
alternative someone came up with the name D-Low which over the years simply
became the shortened version of D'Lo.

The next story came about after D'Lo's original name, Millhaven, was
rejected by the postal authorities as a town name. Purportedly the US Postal
Service provided the village with a list of alternative four-letter names
for the residents to choose from. Among these names was one spelled "Delo".
After the citizens chose this name a penman prepared a letter to be sent
back to the authorities informing them of the name they had chosen. The
letter was written in a fancy colonial script which more than likely would
have put the little "e" in Delo up above the "lo". The story concludes that
the little "e" was probably misinterpreted as an apostrophe and therefore
documented the village name as being D'Lo.

The final story also came about when the name Millhaven was rejected by the
postal authorities as being an acceptable name for a town. The difference in
this story is that the citizens of the village came up with the new name 
"De Leau."  This name was submitted and approved by the Postmaster but was 
later shortened to just D'Lo. 
Although this story seemed far-fetched the University of Southern Mississippi
has proven that old maps from
16th-century French explorers show that they labeled the D'Lo area around
the Strong River with the words "De l'eau sans potable." This translates as
"bad drinking water." This leads us to believe that very early settlers and
explorers may have been referring to this area as "De leau" and therefore that
is why such an odd name was originally chosen to be the official village
name."