Our haunted national parks

            Halloween spooks are everywhere these days. No longer is the annual holiday relegated to tykes and teens; the Celtic New Year’s Eve now attracts every walk of life with events held in every corner of this great and ghoulish nation.

            The National Park Service, not to be outdone, is now getting in on the act. There are several fall festivals held throughout the U.S. offering freakish fun — some even hair-raising!

            DeSoto National Memorial in Brandenton, Florida, for instance, will host “DeSoween VI: Return of the Desoween” from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 25. The event includes “restless spirits, zombies, night creatures, and the most terrifying monster to encounter in the dark, CLOWNS,” according to the park web site.

            I definitely see the connection between Conquistador Hernando de Soto and clowns. Don’t you?

            This terrifying night at the national memorial won’t cost you a dime, either, and is “suitable for ages 7 and up,” they say. For information, call (941) 792-0458 or click here.

            Park rangers with the National Mall and Memorial Parks in our nation’s capital of Washington, D.C., explore the tragedies that have occurred at the Washington Monument with "Strange but True!" from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. Halloween night. The event is also free. For more information, call Kathy Kagle at (202) 438-5377.
            Not really scary and not a Halloween event, the Vicksburg National Military Park in Vicksburg, Mississippi, offers a tragic step back in time with “Shadows of the Past” beginning at 6 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 1. Tours will depart every half hour until 8:30 p.m. for an evening candlelight walk with historical personalities. The battlefield was the site of ferocious fighting and death so who knows who will be following behind you in the dark.
            For more information on the parks and other events, visit http://www.nps.gov/index.htm.

Tom’s Wall outside Florence, Alabama, is a reflection in patience and love

Originally published Nov. 25, 2009, in The Advertiser, Lafayette, Louisiana

Tom Hendrix

            Our tourism hosts wouldn’t explain where we were going as we drove along the winding woods of northern Alabama as part of a recent press tour. “You just have to see it,” our guides told us.

            Fall was slipping into the area, with a few maples and other hardwoods showing their colors, and a crisp breeze urged us to pull our jackets a little tighter together. We stopped alongside a cotton field and a woman hailing from Seattle immediately headed for a boll, ready to pluck the soft interior out to bring home as a souvenir until she realized wet cotton felt like, well, wet cotton.

            Tom Hendrix wandered out of his driveway across the street, curious as to why we were stalling.

            “The Yankees have to take a photo of the cotton,” our host yelled back.

            Hendrix laughed, as did the Southern journalists among us, but he didn’t appear surprised. After all, he gets hundreds of visitors a year to this remote location, from all corners of the globe.

            They come to see his wall.

            Hendrix’s story begins in the 1930s, when his grandmother used to tell him stories about his family, particularly his great-great-grandmother, Mary Hipp, aka Te-lah-naya a Yuchi Indian. Hipp had lived along the banks of the Tennessee River in what is now Lauderdale County, believing as many of her people did that a woman within the river’s water sang to the residents.

            In the 1830s, Hipp and her teenage sister, like many Native Americans of that time, were deported from 9 miles south of Florence to Oklahoma on the infamous Trail of Tears. They were given silver tags with numbers on them; Hipp’s was “59.”

            But the waters didn’t sing in Oklahoma, and Hipp dreamed of her mother beckoning her home.

            Even though her sister adjusted to life in Oklahoma, Hipp insisted on returning to Alabama. She spent five years on the road, hiding to keep from getting caught. When she arrived back in the Florence area around 1845, she met a white farmer who married her.

            Hendrix researched this amazing woman’s story, having her “59” button as evidence of her remarkable return. He eventually traveled to Oklahoma to speak with members of the Yuchi tribe, who accepted him as one of their own. After much introspection, Hendrix decided to build a wall on his property, stones stretching to the right in honor of Hipp’s journey to Oklahoma and one stretching to the left for her long walk home. A tribal elder advised him to lay one stone for every step she took.

            The result is a massive stone wall on either side of his multi-acred property, complete with benches and places to rest and contemplate, plus a sacred prayer circle. The wall consists of 23 million pounds of stones, created in 32 years by one man.

            “For 32 years I’ve laid one stone at a time,” Hendrix told us.

            “Tom’s Wall,” as the locals call it, is the largest un-mortared wall and the largest memorial to a Native American woman in the United States. On top of his handiwork are stones from more than 100 indigenous tribes throughout the world, a 1907 meteorite, shells from Acadiana, a leather pouch with tokens, beaded necklaces, crystals and other items brought to Hendrix from many continents, even Antarctica.

            But more than the stones is the spiritual nature of the place. As visitors walk the length of the wall, on average about five feet high and spanning several football fields long, sunlight trickles down through the dense woods and birds are heard overhead. There’s a divine peacefulness here, born of love and devotion to an ancestor who would not give up.

The Prayer Circle

            After a tour of the grounds, the group headed back to the van, some still fascinated by that cotton field. I longed to stay within the loving arms of Tom’s Wall, gravitating to the prayer circle and thinking of my own grandmothers, the strongest women I’ve known. After offering them both a prayer and letting them know how much I missed them, I could almost feel their comforting hands on my shoulders. Hendrix gave me a hug upon leaving, and quietly slipped a jasper arrowhead into my hand.

            I could have sworn he saw them, too.

Wanna know more? Click here for a story by NatchezTraceTravel.com.

Cheré Coen is an award-winning travel writer specializing in the Deep South. She is also the author of “Forest Hill, Louisiana: A Bloom Town History,” “Haunted Lafayette, Louisiana” and “Exploring Cajun Country: A Historic Guide to Acadiana” and co-author of “Magic’s in the Bag: Creating Spellbinding Gris Gris Bags and Sachets.” Write her at cherecoen@gmail.com.

Louisiana’s Poverty Point is some sweet, yeah!

Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne with a scale model 

of Poverty Point made out of Mounds bars.

            In the northeastern corner of the Bayou State lies a series of Native American mounds and structured city like no other. The 3,400-year-old site named Poverty Point — for the plantation owner who struggled on the land in recent times, not the ancient natives — the site consisted of several earthen ridges stretched in a semi-circle facing a wide plaza with various mounds scattered about and a giant earthen bird in the rear with its wings stretching outward.

            Poverty Point is considered one of the most culturally significant Native American sites in the United States, but don’t take our word for it. The archaeological treasure was just named a UNESCO World Heritage site.

            In honor of Poverty Point being named the 1001^st site inscribed to the UNESCO World Heritage List, the Hershey Company donated 1,001 Mounds candy bars to celebrate. (Get it? Mounds candy?) Louisiana Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne requested the bars last month to hand out at the site’s inscription ceremony beginning at 10 a.m. Oct. 11, 2014, in Epps, Louisiana. Pictured is Dardenne creating his own Poverty Point in Mounds bars.

            The ceremony will include the unveiling of the UNESCO World Heritage Site plaque and remarks by U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu and dignitaries from the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Department of the Interior. The ceremony will be followed by a community event including free food and living history demonstrations beginning at 11 a.m.

Sunset over the eagle mound at Poverty Point.

            Poverty Point is the 22nd World Heritage Site in the U.S. and joins the ranks of others worldwide including the Great Wall of China, Stonehenge and the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt. Poverty Point was the U.S. Department of the Interior’s lone nomination for World Heritage status — adding to the site’s accolades as a National Historic Landmark, National Monument and Smithsonian Affiliate.

            But I’ll bet none of the World Heritage Sites or other landmarks were replicated in Mounds candy!

Cheré Coen is an award-winning travel writer specializing in the Deep South. She is also the author of “Forest Hill, Louisiana: A Bloom Town History,” “Haunted Lafayette, Louisiana” and “Exploring Cajun Country: A Historic Guide to Acadiana” and co-author of “Magic’s in the Bag: Creating Spellbinding Gris Gris Bags and Sachets.” Write her at cherecoen@gmail.com.