Shopping in Laurel Mississippi

Before we go shopping, I thought that I’d cover a little history about Laurel.  The town was founded in 1882 as a mill village clustered around the Kamper Lumber Mill along the New Orleans and Northeastern Railway.  Laurel was named for the laurel thickets near the original town site.  With the addition of another mill in 1893, the town prospered and grew rapidly…achieving city status in 1901.  Two other railroads, the Gulf and Ship Island and the Mobile, Jackson and Kansas City reached Laurel by 1902, stimulating even more growth.  Other lumber mills popped up and the city was booming.  It even had a streetcar system.

It was all about the yellow pine forests in the region.  After World War I, Laurel shipped more yellow pine than any other location in the world.  By the mid-1920s, the 4 local mills were producing a million board feet of lumber per day.  Laid end to end, a single day’s production would reach 189 miles!  By 1930, the town’s population had reached 18,017 as many rural people had settled here due to the plentiful and relatively well paying manufacturing jobs.

More history later, but now for those who love shopping, here is a partial look at the available stores and shopping opportunities in Laurel, a town that is currently undergoing a re-birth of sorts.  As a reminder, we were visiting Laurel with Laurie’s sister Bonnie and her husband Bill…

The Scotsman General Store is one of the properties operated by Ben and Erin Napier, the stars of HGTV’s “Hometown”.  Ben’s truck sits outside and offers many photo opportunities to visitors, including Bonnie and Laurie.  While I believe that this building was a railroad freight depot at some point…this long narrow building sits right next to the tracks…I couldn’t find any information that confirms my impression.

There were a lot of folks visiting the store.  Available items include Scotsman Brand apparel, handmade wood products, pantry/food items, old time candies, brooms, buckets, hatchets, paper products, Big Ben’s coffee blends, décor items and much more. (Note: Big Ben is big…standing 6’6” vs. Erin’s 5’5”)

To me, generally not a fan of shopping, this was the most fascinating part of the Scotsman’s General Store.  This walk in cooler features just about every brand of local or old time sodas that I’ve ever heard of and many that were new to me.  If I was a local, this would become a weekly stop…just to try all the different varieties offered. (Note: Normally I rarely drink soda…a few cans of Vernor’s Diet Ginger Ale in the summer along with a couple diet root beers and one or two Diet Cokes)

For those of you who love woodworking and/or who follow Hometown on your televisions, this is Ben’s Woodshop as viewed through a large window inside the store.  There were a couple of woodworkers doing their thing while we were there but alas, no Ben and no filming going on. (Actually, during our visit, both Erin and Ben were a bit pre-occupied with Erin expecting their second child at any moment)

On the show, Ben frequently makes furniture…accent pieces…for the homes that they renovate.  If you’d like to see some of his designs/finished items, they are on sale and on-line.  Check out some of his offerings at https://www.laurelmercantile.com/collections/scotsman-woodshop.

Laurie took this photo of her sister Bonnie in front of The Scotsman General Store.  The entire railing across the front of the store is covered with beautiful southern jasmine vines in full bloom, a very nice touch.

This RV was parked at one end of The Scotsman General Store’s parking lot.  We were told that it is used by the production crew that films “Hometown” for HGTV.

Our next shopping stop was the “Rusty Chandelier” but I did forget to take a photo of the outside of this building.  This huge store features individual booths that appear to be leased by the purveyors of just about any home or personal item you can imagine.  The quality was much better than many store of this same type that we’ve visited before.  Check it out on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/therustychandelierlaurel/.

After visiting the Scotsman, unlike Bonnie, Bill or Laurie, I was already ‘shopped out’.  But, like a good husband I soldiered on.  My routine was to make a quick pass through each store to see if there was anything interesting that caught my eye.  Then I would exit the store and find a bench to relax on… The weather during our visit was amazing…low 70s and low humidity in Mississippi…in the month of May!

While the others were shopping, I wandered up and down the street a bit taking photos and seeing what I could see… I liked the appearance of this old bank building.  The First National Bank building was constructed in 1902 and it played a significant part in Laurel’s growth in its early years.  The bank itself closed in 1983 and it’s now occupied by a variety of businesses.  The building is a key element of the Laurel Central Historic District.  The historic district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

The Kress Building was part of the S.H. Kress and Company chain of five and dime stores.  The company was started by Samuel Kress in 1896 and grew to over 250 stores in 29 states by 1955.  Some Kress stores operated under that name as part of McCrory Stores until that company went out of business in 1981.  

A subsidiary chain, Tiendas Kress is still in business in Puerto Rico and The Kress Foundation, a philanthropic organization promoting art is a continuing operation.  In 1941, Samuel Kress and Paul Mellon gave large gifts of art to the people of the United States, thereby establishing the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

It should be noted that the company’s exclusion of African Americans from its lunch counters made Kress Stores a target for civil rights protests during the 1960 lunch counter sit-ins along with other national chains.  Stores in Nashville Tennessee and Greensboro North Carolina were the centers of significant demonstrations and boycotts.  The Kress Store in Baton Rouge Louisiana was the site of that city’s first civil rights sit-in, an event that eventually saved the building from demolition.

There was a little excitement in Patina’s just before we arrived.  The ladies discovered a snake under the counter and they were still in a state of semi-panic when we walked in.  Fortunately a customer who wasn’t afraid of snakes caught it and removed it to a trash bin outside the store.

Patina’s is a gift/home décor store that offers pottery, tabletop décor items including lamps, baby items, bath/body products, clothes, accessories and stationary.  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/patinas.laurel/.

I didn’t venture into The Guild and Gentry/Burks Barber Shop.  This store is a classy men’s clothing store…with a barber in the back.  First of all, I mostly wear t-shirts, an occasional golf shirt and shorts.  On really cold days I might wear blue jeans.  I’m not a classy dresser at this point in my life and I don’t have enough hair to warrant a barber.  But, the concept is interesting… Check it out at https://guildandgentry.com/.

Laurel was really founded by northerners from Iowa.  John Kamper built Laurel’s first lumber mill, but on the verge of bankruptcy in 1891, he sold the mill and over 15,000 acres of timber to “Northerners”, Iowa lumber barons Lauren Chase Eastman along with George and Silas Gardiner.  Their new and improved lumber mill spurred significant growth.  

The investment by these and other ‘gentry’ from the north brought in white and black lumberjacks, craftsmen and merchants, hence the ‘guild’.  Nestled in the poorest state in the Union, beset by racial issues and the social ideas of the day, the combination of the guild and the gentry invented a new type of town that bucked the norms of the time.  Although the gentry set the tone and controlled the town, they were progressive for the times and especially for the south.  

The following article, regarding the successes of Laurel’s black community was published in 1902 in the Laurel Chronicle, the town’s newspaper:

“No well-intentioned Negro desirous of bettering his condition need hesitate for fear of ill treatment or discrimination in business or labor maters to come alone or with his family to Laurel.  Here he will not only find remunerative employment and an excellent business field, but good education and religious privileges and an excellent school taught by well qualified colored teachers… The school is open to the children without fee.  Nowhere else can the ambitious Negro be more certain of achieving higher standard of living or acquiring property.  He will see what others of his race have accomplished and the same opportunities they enjoy are equally his.”

In the south during this period of time…with segregation in force…this was a very progressive and I suspect controversial stance for any company or town to take.  White and blacks worked side by side in the mills and in their lumbering endeavors…even if they lived, went to school and worshipped separately away from the job.

The last stop in our wandering and/or shopping adventures before we headed out for lunch was the Southern Antiques Store in the old Laurel Furniture building.  The owner of this store is from Laurel.  She and her husband lived in Mobile for a while but when they started a family, she returned to her early roots in Laurel. 

Andrea had always been interested in interior design.  After working in retail management for a number of years, she became a design consultant for Ethan Allen where she was named ‘Rookie of the Year”.  Upon returning home to Laurel, she combined her work experiences and passions, by purchasing this 100 year old 3-story building and turning it into a one-stop shopping destination.  While I am not a ‘shopper’ even I could appreciate the variety and quality of the merchandise offered in this store.  You can check this store out at https://southernantiqueslaurel.com/. 

That’s all for now.  Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave