“I’m gonna miss that tree,” said Jimmy Cole. He was nodding toward a white oak that might have been a seedling when Lincoln took the dais at Gettysburg.
You hate to use the word “majestic” in describing a tree; it’s an overused descriptor for a big, old, noble tree, but it fits here. A mature white oak is often as broad as it is tall, and this one, with its drooping branches, seems to embrace the house Cole calls “the home place.”
Except for the four years he and his wife Glenda lived on Nashville Ferry Road when they first married, Jimmy Cole has spent his 71 years here on Cole Road, first as a child with parents C.C. and Lollie Mae in the home place, and then next door in the house he and Glenda built in 1969.
Later this month they’re moving to Tupelo where their daughter lives with two of their four grandchildren.
This weekend the Coles were having a garage sale.
“I bet you’re going to miss that tractor,” I said nodding toward the 16-horsepower Ford for sale in front of us (with mower, tiller and box blade, 1,194 hours). That’s when Cole said he was going to miss the tree.
Earlier in the week Cole had called about a swarm of bees that had spent the weekend balled up on a shrub between the Cole place and the home of Matthew and Sunny Johnson next door. I had returned to visit. We walked over to get a closer look at the oak tree.
Cole retired after 22 years at the Golden Triangle Planning and Development District (GTPDD) and, before that, 29 years at Trustmark Bank. His banking career began memorably with an interview with John Henry at what was then Merchants and Farmers Bank.
John Henry was no ordinary bank president. A one-time correspondent for International News Service (INS), he covered U.S. Naval operations in the Pacific and Atlantic during World War II.
“Being a bank president never occurred to him in his wildest dreams,” said Margaret, Henry’s widow. Margaret worked with her future husband for four years in the wire service’s Atlanta bureau where he directed coverage of the Southeast.
John grew up in Columbus. His father, a doctor, had practiced medicine on horseback and, in Margaret’s words, “wandered into Columbus and met John’s mother.” Dr. Henry was also a director of Merchants and Farmers bank.
John and Margaret became engaged after Margaret had left INS and was working in Jackson.
When the wire service wanted to move John to Chicago in the mid-50s, he called his fiance and asked, “Columbus or Chicago?”
If it was ‘Chicago’ it was going to be journalism,” said Margaret; “if it was ‘Columbus,’ it was going to be the bank.”
“I loved Columbus,” she said.
The Henrys moved to Columbus in 1955 and took up residence in the house John was born in (he was delivered by his father), one block from the bank. Margaret has since been renamed the house “The Fourth Estate.”
At M&F, Henry developed a reputation for being plainspoken, if not blunt. To wit: Cole’s interview with Henry for a teller’s job in 1965.
“To start off, he had me wait three hours,” Cole said.
“I was 19 years old, and, I was bound and determined to be interviewed regardless of how long it took.”
Finally, when Cole was ushered into Henry’s office, he found the bank president reared back in his chair, feet on his desk. Henry glared at the teenager over the rim of his glasses and said, “Why in the hell do you think you’re qualified to work in my bank?”
“I proceeded to tell him,” Cole said.
“John Henry either liked you or he didn’t like you, and you knew it,” Cole said.
Cole eventually became the bank’s investment officer. He says he has fond memories as a hometown banker working with Henry, Davis Patty and Hampton Couchman.
Eventually, as was the case for many small-town banks, M&F was swallowed up by a larger regional bank, which was swallowed up by another regional bank.
Rather than live with the uncertainty that comes with such mergers and acquisitions, Cole took a job with the GTPDD in Starkville. He figures he made the 40-mile commute from Cole Road 10,500 times during his time there.
“I’m one of those numbers guys,” he said.
For now, he and Glenda are trying to tie up the countless loose ends that come with leaving a place you’ve spent your entire life.
“It’s hard. It’s so many steps in the process,” said Cole. “I can see it’s in God’s hand.”
We talked a while longer. I picked up a handful of acorns. Business at the garage sale was starting to pick up. On the way to my truck, I walked over to have a look at the shrub where the bees had been.
“I think you must have gotten the queen,” Cole shouted across the lawn. “They’re all gone.”
One less loose end, I suppose.
Birney Imes is the publisher of The Dispatch. Email him at [email protected].
Birney Imes III is the immediate past publisher of The Dispatch.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 41 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.