If you took the cutoff from Highway 61 into Vicksburg, Mississippi, and had need of 1. sundries 2. spiritual uplift or 3. a powerful folk-art environment, you could stop at Margaret’s Grocery. The Rev. H.D. Dennis, who encased the country store inside and out with his sculpture and fantastic architecture, would preach you a personal sermon while his wife Margaret stood ready to meet your earthly needs. These pictures are from 1995. The site decayed after the couple’s passing, but rehab is happening under the auspices of the Mississippi Folk Art Foundation and its director, Suzi Altman. You can learn
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Vollis Simpson Whirligig Garden
After Vollis Simpson died in 2013, his massive back-country whirligig garden in Lucama, North Carolina, was relocated to the center of nearby Wilson. Simpson ran a machine shop, did heavy equipment repair and was involved in moving houses. In retirement, he started tinkering with odd parts he had lying around. And he started making whirligigs. Big ones. His original whirligig park was the world’s most spectacular concentration of these wind machines. They still impress in their Wilson location, perhaps even more at night. Check out these videos. Scroll down for two photo galleries. Here are still photos of the whirligigs in
Continue readingQ.J. Stephenson’s Earth Museum/Occoneechee Trapper’s Lodge
Q.J. Stephenson’s Earth Museum/Occoneechee Trapper’s Lodge in Garysburg, North Carolina, was on my list of places to visit for years. Finally made it early one morning in September 2025. It’s a sweet little spot whose story you can read at Spaces Archives.
Continue readingUnsealed: The Art of the Bottle Cap Book
(This page contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.) $35.00 Dive into the eccentric world of 20th century bottle-cap sculpture. Description Discarded caps from beer and soda containers inspired a quintessentially 20th century folk craft as creative individuals strung millions of them into baskets, figures, buildings, animals, chains, furniture and other shapes. This book features more than 200 examples of this mostly unintentional but artistically impactful sculpture. Additional information Weight 13.5 oz Dimensions 8.5 x 11 Publisher interestingideas.com (May 30 2025) Pages 95 Illustrations 228 ISBN-13 979-8218711412
Continue readingLakefront Carvings Walking Tours – 2025
I’m giving four walking tours of Chicago’s fabulous lakefront rock carvings over the summer of 2025:
Continue readingA Charming Family
A long-ago Maxwell Street find. A charming family. Not sure about those Santas, however.
Continue readingSome New Creations at the Point
A visit to Promontory Point this week turned up a number of impressive new rock carvings, and a few old ones I hadn’t noticed before. Kudos to @CosmoTeocal for the first one. These are just so many more reasons that the Point’s limestone must be preserved.
Continue readingThe La Rabida South Gallery
Several of the Chicago lakefront’s most magnificent rock carvings reside on the stones south of La Rabida Hospital near 65th Street and the lake. For the last several years many of these carvings were inaccessible or invisible under the water. But with the lake’s level having fallen in the last few years they are now mostly visible (as of spring 2025). These 200 or so carvings, I believe, are the last large group that remained to be documented as part of my Lakefront Anonymous project. Here are highlights from this group. There are many more carvings around La Rabida hospital.
Continue readingDiners
Here is a modest selection of diners photographed through the years, all but one from the northeast. Also a bonus group of diners as rendered by the incomparable Ernie Bushmiller. And you should check out my page of diner matchbook covers. Bushmiller tackles the wonders of the roadside. Diners, for him, were the epitome of modernity, which also meant they were sometimes befuddling.
Continue readingMexican Roadside Art
Roadside art from Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, where hand-painted signage can still be found in quantity, and some from Mexico City as well.
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