Pat Murphy - historian and well-known coast musician - has been working on his memoir, "Growing Up Downtown," for several years. During 2015, the Cleaver will feature one of his essays each month - along with historical photographs from his archives.
1940s North Beach Blvd. looking South - My grandfather, George Stevenson's business on the right downstairs in the Sea Coast Echo building.
Growing Up Downtown
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Odile, George and Carol Stevenson
Baby Carol Stevenson
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My mother’s family grew up in turn of the century New Orleans, LA. In 1924, my grandparents, George and Odile Stevenson, moved from New Orleans to Bay St. Louis. They moved into a house in the first block of Sycamore Street (named Good Children’s Street at the time). My grandmother, Odile Stevenson, was orphaned at a very young age and taken in and raised by an aunt, Ms. Camille Webster. Aunt Camille originally purchased this house on Good Children's Street and held the mortgage on it. My grandparents made payments eventually purchasing the house from my aunt. Aunt Camille lived with her sister Rita in a little shotgun house in the second block of Ballentine Street in Bay St. Louis. Aunt Rita died around the time that I was born but my Aunt Camille lived to be quite elderly in that same shotgun house on Ballentine Street. At the time she passed - in the mid-50's when I was eight or nine years old - she was still living in that old house with no indoor toilet using an outhouse in the back yard!
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By the time of the great depression in 1929, my mother, Carol, had been born and my grandfather would commute to New Orleans by train every day to work as a clerk for a steamship company. Gramps was one of the many working people who lost their job when the great depression finally settled into the New Orleans area.
My grandfather and grandmother had come to Bay St. Louis in search of a better life and there were opportunities to be had. Soon after losing his job in New Orleans, my grandfather found one of those opportunities and ran with it.
My grandfather and grandmother had come to Bay St. Louis in search of a better life and there were opportunities to be had. Soon after losing his job in New Orleans, my grandfather found one of those opportunities and ran with it.
My grandfather Stevenson standing in the doorway of his first store at 211 South Beach Blvd. early 1930s
Gramps and a partner, Townsend Wolfe, started a business hauling coal and firewood to the federal government WPA construction camps that existed in the area during the years after the depression. These camps were funded by the federal government to create jobs for the unemployed and built everything from schools to highway bridges (many of them are still around). From the coal and firewood deliveries Grandpa’s business expanded into the installation of electrical service in homes in and around the Bay/Waveland area and sales of electrical appliances. It was in this business that Gramps found his niche and began to prosper.
By the year of my birth in 1949, the Bay/Waveland’s area’s population had grown to around five thousand full-time residents and my grandfather’s business was thriving and growing in the vibrant downtown area of Bay St. Louis. By 1949, Gramp's business was located at 200 North Beach and The Sea Coast Echo was located upstairs (in the same building that currently houses the restaurant 200 North Beach). This is where my story of “Growing Up Downtown” begins.
By the year of my birth in 1949, the Bay/Waveland’s area’s population had grown to around five thousand full-time residents and my grandfather’s business was thriving and growing in the vibrant downtown area of Bay St. Louis. By 1949, Gramp's business was located at 200 North Beach and The Sea Coast Echo was located upstairs (in the same building that currently houses the restaurant 200 North Beach). This is where my story of “Growing Up Downtown” begins.
Growing Up Downtown
is sponsored by
in the historic City Hall
Beach Blvd at the intersection of Main Street looking North mid 1940s
