Work should begin on Andalusia’s next downtown mural within the next month.
Pat Palmore, who chairs the city’s mural committee, presented a sketch of the new mural to the Andalusia City Council Tuesday.
Prep work will begin on Dairy Queen’s dine-in building soon, she said. The new mural will focus on education, and in addition to including early classroom scenes, will also include early schools. As well, more than 20 tiles of education-themed artwork designed by the county’s students will be an element of the mural.
Palmore said most area residents would be surprised by the traffic the Hank and Audrey Williams mural brings to Andalusia.
The education mural will be the city’s seventh.
Also planned are murals devoted to textiles and piney woods cattle.
James Newton is a man living his dream.
Spotted Monday morning traveling through Andalusia on a horse and covered wagon, the long line of traffic stood as a testament to his method of taking it slow and easy.
Newton said he left Corpus Christi, Texas, in February 2009.
“Since then, I’ve been just traveling,” Newton said. “Making my way from here to there. I’ve been across eight states, and right now, I’m headed to Louisiana.”
Being on a tight timetable – and considering the lack of an optimum stopping stop, Newton apologized for his inability to discuss his trip further.
However, passersby could easily see inside his small covered wagon, which was filled with the necessary trip items – a cooler filled with drinks and eats; a radio to break up the quiet; a bale of hay for his traveling partner and his best friend – a beagle.
A Star-News staffer said she also spotted Newton as she traveled back home from a weekend trip to Georgia.
I t is surely to be a night to remember as a host of beautiful young women from Andalusia and the surrounding areas take the stage in the first-ever Relay for Life Runway Show.
A collaboration between Angie Parker, owner and photographer of Parker Photography, and Dianne Jones of the Andalusia Adult Activity Center, the event is set for 7 p.m., on Fri., March 10, at the Adult Activity Center.
“This show will be a professional runway show, from start to finish,” Parker said.
Tickets are $10 per person, and $5 for children 6 and under.
“Even those who are not stricken with the illness are touched in some way by the deadly disease,” Parker said of cancer. “You probably know someone who is fighting this horrible battle and if you don’t, then chances are you will.
“Cancer changes your life,” she said. “You learn what’s important; you learn to prioritize, and you learn not to waste your time. You tell people you love them and they tell you the same.
“My father, William “Bill” Cross, who passed on Sept. 2, 2011, from lung cancer, even on his last day of life said often, ‘Count it all joy,’” she said.
“Those words inspired me to become a better person and to do everything I could possible to make a difference,” she said. “It is our goal for this event to bring additional awareness to this disease and to contribute to finding a cure.”
Models, who are affiliated with Parker Photography and the Lower Alabama Photography Division, will be showcasing clothing lines from Oasis, Elegant Apparel, Maurices, Touch of Country and other local retailers. Staging will be provided by MaryAnn’s.
On the entertainment front, the Sweet Magnolia Gypsies will be performing a tribal dance routine; the Company Dance Center will be performing a dance routine mixed with hip-hop, jazz and more, while vocal entertainment will be provided by Salynn Mullen, Daryll Blakely and Nathan and Kayla Bagwell.
Parker said at closing, there will be a candlelight ceremony in remembrance of those who have passed on. Participants may purchase leaves for $5 to commemorate loved ones, which will be displayed on a Tree of Remembrance. To purchase a leaf before the event, contact Angie Parker at 334-892-2257 or by email at .
On the catwalk:
Jakelyn Carter
Candice Sosebee
Ansley Shipp
Candice McNeill
Alexa Watson
Courtney Lawson
Amy Morrison Jacobs
Jade Maddox Taylor
Autumn Marie Spicer
Chelsea Moseley
Brittany Paige Smith
Cassey Hayes
Brennan Woodham
Kimberly Teel
A kick-off social for Project Miracle is planned for 6 p.m. until 8 p.m. this Thurs., March 22, at Springdale.
Dwight Mikel is leading the fund-raising effort to build a new Miracle League field.
Miracle League removes the barriers that keep children with mental and physical disabilities off the baseball field. Children play on custom-designed, rubberized turf fields that accommodate wheelchairs and other assertive devices.
The league uses a “buddy” system, pairing each player with an able-bodied peer. More than 500 potential Miracle League players have been identified in Covington County.
This week’s kick-off will begin the $450,000 fundraising effort, and will include live music, a silent auction hors d’oeuvres and light beverages. The event is sponsored in part by Horn Beverage Co., Inc.
A $15 donation to Miracle League is the required admission.
The whitewashed picket fence, albeit leaning and thin in some places, still bordered the home place. A tin-roofed barn made of rough-cut lumber sits, flanked by grass made green by recent rains.
Across the way, what once was a country store stands a little too close to the now-traveled clay dirt road.
If those descriptions bring to mind the scene of a movie, one would be absolutely correct – especially considering that on Friday, the student film production of “Only Fear of Death” was winding down shooting the remaining scenes at an old plantation site just over the county line.
The low-budget, 35-minute film is the senior thesis for Michael “Mike” Infante, a student at a New York school of visual and performing arts. So how does a New York director find a location in South Alabama?
“Well, two ways,” Infante said. “We were originally thinking we’d shoot it in New Jersey, but one of the crew members (Abby Riley) was from Florala, and she said we should look at the area.
“So, then I called the state film office, and got fantastic people who got me the best possible locations here,” he said. While Infante and his crew didn’t want to pinpoint the various locations throughout the county, he did mention areas of Red Level, Florala and the Brooklyn area, specifically Boggs and Boulders and the surrounding lands.
The film tells the story of a family dealing with slavery during the Civil War and is a collaboration between Infante and fellow film student and girlfriend of six years, Jessica Thoubboron.
“There are no war scenes in the movie,” Infante said. “Instead, it’s a drama about the interaction between a members of a slave-holding family. It’s a modern look at the social dynamics among everyone, about humanity and how people are forced into a situation they don’t want to be in.”
Infante and a location scout traveled to Florala the first part of January to “scout” out the area.
“We found everything we needed to make a great film – a manor house, gorgeous roads, great barns, slave quarters, an old country store and the weather – the weather goes in and out, which, as a director, is amazing,” he said. “You can have sun, wind and rain all in one day. Here, in South Alabama, you have everything. I will be back.”
While here, of the 25 cast members, there were four local castings made, including two Brewton women and one Andalusia woman, Alice Maholmes. Maholmes was shopping inside “All is Well” when spotted by Kent Smith, an Andalusia native with decades of experience as a location scout for the film industry and working to find talent for the film.
The Brewton women, Linda Turk-Frazier and Maggie Dozier, were discovered after answering a newspaper ad printed in The Brewton Standard.
Other locals also had their hands in the movie-making magic. Costumes and props for the movie were put on loan by George and Brenda Gantt at Sweetgum Bottom Antiques, while Sir Francis McGowin lent his expertise in history, Infante said.
The 19-member crew will finish working on location today, and will soon return to New York to finish producing the film.
Infante said while this may have been a student project, he plans to enter the selection in a variety of film festivals.