Dr. Rock Helms continues focus on moving health care forward
Story by Roxann Edsall Photos by Mackenzie Free
He’s written plenty of prescriptions in his 24 years as a physician. Perhaps none has been quite as wide-reaching as the plan Dr. Rock Helms wrote for Pell City residents outlining how he would alleviate the pain of having to drive to Birmingham to see a medical specialist.
Two years after beginning his family medical practice with Baptist Health Systems, Dr. Helms, along with Dr. Bill McClanahan and Dr. Carl Frosina, opened a new medical clinic they named Northside Medical Associates. Since their opening in 2001, the facility has grown from those three doctors to 25 primary care providers.
While the increased number of primary care providers has been helpful in keeping up with the city’s growth, what has made the clinic most impactful is their partnership with subspecialties and the access to advanced care imaging available right in Pell City. No longer does a patient have to see a doctor here, then be referred to a Birmingham doctor for further treatment by a specialist.
Formerly Northside, Complete Health is a
major medical facility in Pell City
The expanded care has made a huge difference for those needing medical care in the area. “There were times as administrator for Northside that I had to stop seeing patients because there just wasn’t time to run the clinic and to see patients,” said Helms. “It was a very busy time.” The partnership sold Northside to Complete Health in 2020, allowing Helms to return to his patients.
Long-time patient and Pell City attorney John Rea appreciates Helms’ dedication and the vision he had in expanding the community’s healthcare options. “His vision has been transformative for the Pell City area,” says Rea. “He and the others grew a medical operation from a small primary care practice to now becoming a partner with other specialties. Now we can just go down the road to see a cardiologist or other specialist. It’s remarkable.”
Helms has been a part of the community since his parents, Ron and Joanne Helms, moved the family to Pell City when Rock was in second grade.
He graduated from Pell City High School in 1988 and graduated from the University of Alabama. He earned his medical degree from the University of South Alabama. After a residency at the University of Alabama, Dr. Helms returned to Pell City to his extended family. “If I hadn’t,” he jokes, “they probably would have disowned me.”
Helms and his wife, Jennifer, are the parents of seven children, four of whom are adopted. They also have two grandchildren. Family is very important to him, so he makes a point to take time off to spend with them. He is very close to his parents, who still live in Pell City, and to his mother-in-law, Sarah Rhodes, also from Pell City.
While his parents inspired him in many ways, Helms’ inspiration in the medical field was and continues to be Dr. Bill McClanahan. “He inspired me to become a doctor and remains my mentor to this day,” says Helms.
Helms describes himself as a “country doctor.” Living in a smaller town affords him the opportunity to really get to know his patients and to serve the community where he grew up. “The people in Pell City are the people who made me who I am today. I enjoy knowing my patients as completely as I can,” says Helms. “It’s a more personal relationship.”
“I know him as my doctor and as a client,” says Rea. “But I also consider him a friend. I think his strongest attribute as my physician is his willingness to take the time to listen to me.”
“Listening,” Helms agrees, “is an important part of the job, if you do it right.” Recently, he listened as a terminally ill patient confided that she did not have family to guide her through her end-of-life decision-making. “I was able to help guide her through parts of that process,” he said. “Being able to help people through life-altering events is a gift.”
Helms’ patients include many of the people he grew up with, including former teachers and classmates. “One patient I see I went to college with,” Helms says with a smile. “I still aggravate him about cheating us out of money at poker in college!”
“I think practicing medicine in your community makes you do a better job as a physician,” admits Helms. “When you’re serving the community you grew up in, and are still a part of, you know you’re going to give everything. You go the extra mile for people you are close to. I think it conditions you to try harder and makes you a better doctor.”
Dr. Rock Helms and local attorney John Rea
Lizzie Jones is one of those patients Helms credits with making him a better doctor. He looks forward to catching up with her during her appointment. “She comes with Fred, her husband of 63 years. She was a dedicated professional cook for 30 years at the nursing home in Cook Springs. She comes to her appointments dressed for church, complete with a fancy hat,” Helms says. “The whole office staff looks forward to her visits and her beautiful, warm smile. She always has a wonderful attitude, no matter what adversity she has faced.”
It’s a very gratifying job, Helms says, unlike some other jobs he has had. “I’ve worked in the corporate world, where you don’t always get that,” he says. He recalls being on call one night and receiving a call while eating dinner with his family. “An emergency room doctor calls me about help with a patient. I started to have him transfer her to Birmingham, but instead, I went in to see her. She had had a heart attack. I sent her by helicopter to Birmingham and she made it through. I got to see her for her six-month checkup, and she established me as her primary doctor. She’s been my patient ever since.”
When he’s not working at the clinic or hanging out with family in Pell City, he can be found on his bulldozer or tractor or hunting on his land in Lowndes County in South Alabama. “It’s where I go to de-stress. It’s definitely in the country,” Helms says. “You have to drive 17 miles for a bag of ice!”
Rea sums up Helms’ success as a combination of personality and commitment to both community and patient care. “He could have gone anywhere to practice medicine and probably had an easier path than the one he chose. But at his core is that commitment to community.” Pell City has benefited from that commitment to expanding the medical options locally.
Helms says his second-choice career was meteorology. Fortunately for the St. Clair County area, his first choice seems to be working out just fine.
Story by Elaine Hobson Miller Photos by Graham Hadley and submitted by Ascension St. Vincent’s
Ascension St. Vincent’s St. Clair may have begun life as an in-patient facility. But by keeping up with technology and the latest in surgical techniques, the Pell City hospital has built a reputation as a go-to place for outpatient surgeries, too.
“I would say that we are a leader in outpatient surgeries,” says Lisa Nichols, hospital administrator. “We have excellent patient satisfaction and quality scores. Our outpatient volume continues to grow. “
Ascension St. Vincent’s St. Clair’s surgical services department has provided care to more than 5,500 patients in the past 12 months, with that breaking down to 2,691 outpatient surgeries, 171 inpatient surgeries, 706 infusion treatments and 1,932 GI procedures.
Surgeons who use the hospital are able to perform total joint replacements as outpatient procedures. Patients come in five to seven days before surgery, to meet with a pre-admission testing nurse to make sure that all the patient’s needed resources are ready when they go home, Nichols says. “Before the total joint patients have surgery we want to make sure they have everything they need so they can successfully recover at home.”
Ascension St. Vincent’s main entrance
Stacey Wachs, director of Surgery Services, says that in most cases, “We encourage patients to go home in one day.” Even total hip replacement and knee replacement surgeries no longer require overnight stays, unless the patient has other health concerns that the doctor wants monitored.
While physical therapists are lined up to make in-home visits the day after patients arrive back home, therapy actually starts before they leave the hospital. “We make sure they are up and walking the day of surgery,” Wachs says. “We have the patient’s caretaker come with them when they have their surgery, so they will know how to assist the patient when they get home.”
Same-day surgery involves many more operations than hip and knee replacements, though. Colonoscopies, cholecystectomies, appendectomies, mastectomies, thyroidectomies and colon resections are just a few examples. Many surgeries that used to require several days follow-up care in the hospital are often less invasive now. Some are handled through laparoscopy, which cuts down on recovery and healing time. “Patients themselves are wanting to go home as soon as possible,” says Nichols. “It’s better for them psychologically, too. Once they are home, we make follow-up calls to keep up with their progress.”
Having an outpatient surgical procedure can be a less expensive option than a surgical procedure that requires a hospital stay, Nichols says. “Of course, the patient’s insurance coverage determines the amount the patient is required to pay.”
Around 30 staff members are at work in the Same-Day Surgery (SDS) department on the high-volume days of Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. That number includes doctors, nurses and technicians who not only do surgeries but a whole lot more, such as infusion services and monitoring patients after their procedures.
“We have 10 SDS rooms that we use to get patients ready for their surgery, for those needing outpatient infusions and for the final stage of recovery prior to being discharged home,” Nichols says. “We also have one GI procedure room, three ORs (operating rooms) and a recovery room with eight bays.”
“We’re not a small-town hospital,” Wachs says. “We have the latest equipment and doctors who come here from Birmingham, Anniston and other cities for their procedures. We updated the systems in our GI lab recently, and doctors come to me daily about other possible upgrades they would like to see. We have a wish list.”
Robots that assist physicians with minimally-invasive surgeries are high on that list. “I think this facility has been kept up well,” Nichols says. “A lot of our employees live in this county and have pride in this facility.”
A new beginning
Ascension St. Vincent’s St. Clair opened on Veterans Drive near the Col. Robert L. Howard State Veterans Home in December 2011. In its first incarnation, it was in a now-demolished facility on the opposite side of I-20.
Surgical scheduler Latasha Kidd at the check-in area for same-day surgeries
Nichols has been administrator there for eight years, while Stacey Wachs has spent her entire 25-year medical career at the hospital, including her time at its former location. Both Nichols and Wachs are registered nurses.
Contrary to what much of the public believes, Ascension did not buy out St. Vincent’s hospitals. Ascension has been the parent company to St. Vincent’s hospitals in Birmingham, Oneonta, Clanton, St. Clair County and throughout the U.S. since their inception, but only recently began branding them with the Ascension logo.
“Outpatient surgery at St. Vincent’s St. Clair bridges the gap between efficiency and patient care,” says Dr. George Crawford, a general surgeon who uses the hospital. “They have found a way to treat patients respectfully and how they deserve to be treated, while at the same time being efficient and effective in preparing them for their surgical procedure.”
Story by Roxann Edsall Photos by Richard Rybka Submitted photos
“It’s like finding a box of buried jewels,” says Tom Mottlau, describing the hunt that has become his happy obsession. He’s spent countless hours over the past three years researching his genealogy. For him, each discovery is a treasured connection to his family tree.
For Mottlau, it all started when he found himself cooped up at home during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. An executive with LG Electronics, Mottlau typically spent most of his time flying internationally, but suddenly found himself grounded at home with loads of time on his hands.
He had always been interested in history, particularly his own family history. With time to work on it, he subscribed to the online ancestry database, ancestry.com, and began populating his family tree with things he already knew about his genealogy.
Further research landed him in St. Clair County. Using information found on billiongraves.com and findagrave.com, he found that he had family buried at Coosa Valley Baptist Church in Cropwell. So, he headed to the cemetery, where he found the graves of two sets of great-great-great-grandparents, John James and Purlina Abbott and Samuel Patton and Margaret McClellan. Along with many others originally laid to rest at Easonville Methodist Church, their caskets were moved to the Cropwell land before the flooding of Easonville when Alabama Power impounded the Coosa River in 1964 to create Logan Martin Lake.
He’s also located many of his ancestors’ graves at Elmwood Cemetery in Birmingham and has made it his mission to replace those grave markers that were broken or missing.
T. Jones Abbott, Idora Abbott and Margaret Abbott
Locating information about ancestors can be a daunting process because America is truly a melting pot of nationalities. Going back several generations, many Americans find that, like Mottlau’s family, their ancestors immigrated from many different countries.
For him, those people came from Denmark, Ireland, Costa Rica, Portugal and Jamaica. He has discovered that some of his distant relatives worked to help build the Panama Canal. Others worked in the steel industry, which is what eventually led them to Birmingham.
Mottlau grew up in Miami, Florida, but now resides in Sugar Hill, Georgia. He has a son in school at Ole Miss, and the drive to visit him takes him over Logan Martin Lake. Each time he crosses over the water, he wonders about his ancestors who called this place their home.
On several such trips, he’s made a slight detour to Ashville, where he spent time at the St. Clair County Archives, digging deeper into information he’s found on ancestry websites. Originally an extension of the library in Ashville, the archives were moved to the current location in the former Ashville Savings Bank in 2007 and offer numerous resources for people researching their ancestry.
Archive director Robert Debter says the first step he always recommends in tracking down information on family histories is to check the heritage book for your county. “Every county has one,” he explains as he grabs a book off the shelf. “All the families that have connections to St. Clair County since it was established in 1818 are included in the St. Clair book.” These books include records on adoptions, wills, estates, as well as probate, civil and circuit court records.
After that, Debter recommends looking online in one of several ancestry databases, websites like ancestry.com, newspapers.com, or, for military records, fold3.com.
History buff and Ashville resident Billy Price has used these databases extensively to find out more about his own family. He spends at least one day a week at the archives and has learned that his family included two Revolutionary War veterans, two dozen Confederate soldiers and two Union solders.
Use of these databases on a personal computer requires a membership fee, but the St. Clair County archives and the Pell City library offer ancestry searches under their memberships for free. Patrons can get on one of the library computers and search their family histories on newspapers.com, which has information from American newspapers from as far back as the 1600s. Another available resource is familysearch.org.
“When I started fine-tuning my own family genealogy,” says Pell City Library Director Danny Stewart, “I started by asking my oldest family members to verify the stories that had been passed down. I would also search obituaries, deed records, titles and tax records.”
Mottlau has done all that. He can’t put a number on how many hours he’s spent on the computer running down leads. “My wife says I should have been a detective,” he says. “I’ve uncovered a lot, but just keep going deeper. I really want to find out enough to create an archive and make copies for all my other cousins.”
Mottlau also wants to find pictures of everyone in his direct line up to his great-great-great-grandparents. Addressing that goal, Stewart recommends regular searches on newspapers.com. As a frequent visitor to that website himself, he has recently discovered a picture of his mother’s great-uncle from 1906 that had just been digitized and uploaded to the website.
Sometimes, though, the actual story behind the picture is not the one passed down from generation to generation. Mottlau tells the story his grandmother told him about a picture of her dad. The story was that he was an attorney and was shot on the courthouse steps in Birmingham. After extensive research, Mottlau learned that his great grandfather was, indeed, shot in 1912, but not on the courthouse steps. He died in a pistol duel across the street from the courthouse, on the steps of the Stag Saloon. That information has been one of the biggest surprises to date on Mottlau’s ancestry quest.
On a recent trip to Pell City, Mottlau again stopped by the familiar grave sites at the Coosa Valley Baptist Church cemetery. He questions whether the burial plot of John James and Purlina Abbott might also include the remains of their son and daughter-in-law, John Henry and Idora Abbott, beneath a marker that simply reads “Abbott.” There are no records that he has been able to find that list the events or location of their burial site. It’s just another mystery that he continues to work to unravel.
After more than three years of searching, Mottlau has made progress, confirming some things he knew about his family and dispelling some as fiction. It’s a painstaking process, but he says finding out more about the family who are part of his past has been a labor of love. “I just really want to know the people they were,” he says.
Every now and then he finds another jewel. Some are rough and take some polishing. In the end, they are all part of his treasured past. And they’ll become part of the legacy that he will, one day, pass down to his own children.
Story by Elaine Hobson Miller Photos by Richard Rybka
St. Clair County is about to open a brand new, state-of-the-art jail that will allow guards to control every valve, commode and door lock from second-floor hubs overlooking the cell blocks. The new jail will accommodate about the same number of prisoners as the current jail in Ashville and the former one in Pell City combined.
The $35 million, two-story facility, located across the street from the county courthouse in Pell City, can house 333 inmates in 54,000 square feet of space. Designed by CMH Architects of Birmingham and built by Goodgame and Company of Pell City, it is next door to where the old jail was. The old was torn down to make room for the new.
“The jury is still out as to the fate of the Ashville jail and the building next to it,” Stan Batemon, chairman of the St. Clair County Commission, said in a telephone interview. Speaking at an Open House for the new facility, Batemon said it could not have been built in Ashville because the sewer system there can’t handle it.
He said the project was financed with a $24 million bond issue and $10 million in federal COVID monies. When the county commission agreed to build the jail, it earmarked court-cost fees attached to all criminal cases toward the payment of the bonds.
“With the control of the facility done from the second floor looking down, we’ll need fewer guards and less contact,” Batemon said. “Every valve, sink, commode, door lock and every piece of video equipment will be controlled electronically by panels the jailers can monitor.”
“This is what happens when elected officials from the city and county work together,” said St. Clair County Sheriff Bill Murray. “The architect and the builders made a great team. Soon it will be my job to make it safe and keep it safe and secure for our citizens.” He also thanked the St. Clair County Commission for making the project a reality.
Cutting the ribbon, from left, front row: Chairman Stan Batemon, Sheriff Billy Murray; back row, Commissioners Ricky Parker and Bob Mize
Murray and the deputies who will be working at the new facility went through a month-long training program. They will be set to take the jail’s first inmates by the first week of August.
During the Open House, tours started in the large, secure intake area, where inmates will begin the process of getting booked. The male wing has five dorms with five cell blocks in each, and each dorm has a central commissary containing eating tables, a television and video visitation capabilities. The female side is similar but smaller, containing only two dorms with one cell block each. However, there is space to add more dorms on the female side, because the number of female prisoners is growing, according to Brody Bice, project coordinator for Goodgame and one of the Open House tour guides. “They expect to have to expand, and we have provided a place to expand the female side, which is set up like the male side,” Bice .
He said the facility was built with concrete blocks that are filled with rebar and poured concrete, making it a very secure building. Cells were shipped in from Georgia, two at a time, attached together. They already contained bunks, stools, chairs and toilets, as well as the conduits for utilities, in place.
All of the dorms, cells and accommodations are located on the first floor. So is the public lobby, which has a machine for depositing money to a prisoner’s account and a video visitation area. There will be no in-person visitation allowed.
The new kitchen area
Other main-level amenities include:
Arraignment Room
Control Room, which allows control of all exterior doors
Break room for officers and staff. One wall will have a kiosk with sandwich makings, where jail and county courthouse employees may eat.
*Administration Office
Training Room
Laundry Room
Kitchen, with walk-in freezer, commercial gas stove, and the capability of expansion
Medical wing with four cells
“We have prisoners farmed out to three other counties, and we’re paying several thousand dollars a month for that,” Chairman Batemon said. “We have all we can put in the Ashville jail right now. We’re almost ready to move all inmates to the St. Clair County jail.”
Batemon said it costs $50,000 per year to house a prisoner in Alabama, and St. Clair County is doing what it can to reduce the number of inmates.
“We already have a drug court and a veterans court to help keep some out,” he said. (See“Saving Veterans,” October/November 2019 issue of Discover.) “About 20% of prisoners are veterans. We’re hoping to add a mental court, too. We’re proud of the jail, proud of our citizens for their support of this new facility.”
Several lovely valleys run through St. Clair County and bear the name of the streams meandering through them: Coosa Valley, Cahaba Valley, Beaver Valley, and Shoal Creek Valley.
And then there’s Slasham Valley. Why name any place Slasham? A local fellow recently commented that he hoped it had nothing to do with slashing somebody. And it doesn’t.
The name’s origin rests in folklore passed down from the 19th Century. The story has been recorded in Mildred Wright’s book, Josiah W. Wilson and Lydia Melinda Wilson and Slasham Valley, St. Clair County, Alabama Kinfolk. “Tradition holds that in the early days of the settling of the valley, a house-raising was in progress. An Irishman with a heavy brogue stopped and offered to do work for a meal. After being served once, he said, ‘May I have another slosh o’ ham?’” Folk had fun mimicking his heavy Irish brogue in the retelling, and thus was the valley named.
When in the 19th century this occurred, we have no record. However, the earliest obituary mentioning Slasham Valley is found in Pell City Library’s online copy of By Murder, Accident, and Natural Causes. It reads: “Jun. 27, 1883, Southern Aegis: Died. Odom. On June 23, 1883, in Slasham community, this county, John Odom, about 22 years old.” The name no doubt predates this obituary by a number of years, for the north end of the valley consisted of enough families by 1830 to organize Hopewell Baptist Church.
Alsoin Josiah W. Wilson and Lydia Melinda Wilson and Slasham Valley, St. Clair County, Alabama Kinfolk, Mildred Wright gives the location of Slasham Valley, writing, “Slasham Valley lies east of the town of Ashville, between Canoe Creek Mountain and Beaver Creek Mountain. The primary watercourse is Permeter Creek. ‘Permeter’ is the colloquial name for palmetto (U.S. Government geological survey map, Steele quadrangle). Highway 33 runs the course of the valley.”
Lelias Kirby, born 1895, included the town of Steele in his sweeping description of the valley. His parents L. S. and Nannie Lee Spradley Kirby were married February 7, 1884, and settled in Slasham Valley near the Etowah County line above Hopewell Church on today’s Rainbow Drive. In the introduction to Lelias’ booklet, How Me and Amos Won WWI, Lou Harper states, “Although Slasham does not appear on any map of Alabama, Dr. Kirby claims it does exist somewhere in a circle taking in… Steele and Ashville.” In the book, Lelias writes that the community was “…located between Greasy Cove and Smoke Neck. …It was 10 miles to the nearest little village, Ashville.” Smoke Neck seems too expansive because it was in Etowah County. Today Smoke Neck is Southside, Alabama.
Today, Slasham Road begins in Ashville at 10th Street and Greensport Road and runs from there to County Road 33 near Gum Springs Baptist Church. It is a peaceful valley of farms and homes.
Stewart and Nannie Kirby’s family consisted of daughters: Elsie, May, Geneva, and Anna; sons: Joe, Amos, Lelias, Otis and Taylor.
Lelias became a well-known physician in Birmingham and authored 3 booklets: How Me and Amos Won WWI, Corncobs, Cockleburs and Country Boys, and Cotton Picking’ Coon Huntin’ Country Boys. Otis became a Methodist Minister, serving in the North Alabama Conference for many years. He authored It All Started in Slash-Ham. In these books, the Kirbys recorded their growing up in Slasham, St. Clair County Alabama.
In How Me and Amos Won WWI, Lilias told how the family “…walked two miles to Mount Hope Methodist,” and said, “I could see the lizards playing races across the rafters.” He told how their pastor, J. M. Wigley was encouraged as he preached his long sermons “…by a chorus of ‘Amens!’ from the ‘Amen Corner.’”
J. M. Wigley, a college student, lived in Steele and “…walked five miles through the flat woods” once a month to preach at Mount Hope. This was November 1913, and “…the log road was very muddy, but he arrived on time—11:00 A.M.”
Lelias recalled a non-religious family in Slasham that “never attended church.” However, at Bro. Wigley’s encouragement, the whole family attended a service. Two of the younger boys went to sleep on a pallet with other children. The Methodist in the South in those days were called “Shouting Methodist.” This was not “speaking in tongues,” but understandable shouts of praise to God. Therefore, as the service and preaching progressed, the saints of the Lord began rejoicing by shouting “Hallelujah!” “Praise the Lord!” “Glory to God!” As these praises reverberated from wall-to-wall, one of the boys awoke, grabbed his brother and said, “Quick, let’s head to the barn; Ma and Pa are fighting a-gin.”
Maragret, J. C., & Hubert Franklin
In his section on church life, Otis Kirby, in It All Started in Slash-Ham, writes “Mt. Hope [Methodist] Church was a large, unpainted frame building. I remember sitting on rough-hewn benches and reading my little Olivet picture card… The church stood on the banks of Big Canoe Creek in the northeastern corner of St. Clair County where Auberry Bridge spanned the creek.”
In her History of Steele, Alabama, Vivian Qualls records that “Bro. Wigley” was J. M. Wigley who pastored the Steele Circuit in 1913 and 1914. And in History of Methodism in Alabama and West Florida by Marion Elias Lazenby, Rev. James Milton Wigley is mentioned six times. The last reference is in 1929 when the Methodist Conference appointed him “Financial Agent” to Athens College.
The Kirby children attended Ford Schoolhouse. As related by Otis in It All Started in Slash-Ham, the school was named after “Uncle John and Aunt Jeff” Ford because they lived close to the school and “the teacher always boarded with them.” Constructed of boards, the school had one unpainted room. The teacher’s desk sat on a raised section that ran the width of the room. Being on the stage gave the teacher “…better oversight of the student body and indicated who was boss.”
“The water bucket,” Otis continued, “was placed on a shelf on the wall outside the front door. Everybody drank from the same dipper. We ‘toted’ water from the wet-weather spring down in Uncle John’s pasture.”
According to both the Kirby brothers’ memories, one end of the Ford Schoolhouse rested on the ground while the other end stood about three feet off the ground and was partially underpinned. Otis related that “…on rainy days goats and hogs would move out of the flatwoods and shelter themselves under the schoolhouse.” The animal noises sometimes drowned out the human voices. There were cracks and holes in the floor, and Otis recalled one winter when his brother “Amos quite accidentally (?) let a few red-hot coals drop through the holes onto the backs of the hogs.” This caused a pandemonium of grunts and squeals as the hogs fled the shelter and headed to the woods—for a few days.
In the April 1997 issue of Cherish: The Quarterly Journal of the St. Clair Historical Society, Ada Wilson Sulser (b1897-d1988) wrote memories titled “Zion Hill Schoolhouse.” She attended there beginning in 1903 and recalled that the school located next to Zion Hill Church held “…classes from November to April, weather permitting.” She also mentioned classmates: “Homer Waldrop , Clem Lowery, Claudie Wilson , Dora Putman, Houston Cobb, Clara Wilson, Wakely Wilson and Vivian Palmer.”
“The schoolhouse burned twice,” she recalled and added, “It was a standing joke that when a member of a certain family was expelled, the schoolhouse would burn.
Curtis and Lurla Fail Franklin set up housekeeping in Slasham Valley around 1925. In time the family grew to include five children: Hubert, Margaret, J. C., and Billy. All three boys became Church of God ministers and evangelists. Billy Franklin’s son is Jentezen Franklin, internationally known evangelist and pastor of a mega-church in Gainesville, Georgia. In 2008 his book Fasting was on the New York Times Best Seller list.
Today, 95-year-old Margaret Franklin Berry cherishes memories of living in Slasham Valley and attending Ashville elementary school. Her best friend at school was Betty Jean Hodges. “The family lived right in the middle of Ashville,” she recalled. “In fact, the first time I ever saw an electric refrigerator was at their house. She and I were in school together, and I went home with her for lunch one day. Her mother had frozen some little popsicles for us. I’ll never forget that.”
After the third grade, the family moved to Birmingham. Margaret’s father, John Curtis Franklin, had a job in Avondale. “He was a paint sprayer. And that’s when they used lead in the paint,” she told the interviewer. “Well, daddy got really sick. He had ‘paint poison,’ and ended up having to have his leg amputated. It was a terrible time. He was crippled and walked on crutches the rest of his life after the amputation. So, we moved back and forth from the farm to Birmingham several times.”
It was the Great Depression years, and the Franklin family would live in Birmingham for a while and then back to Slasham for a while during those Depression years.
“When we first moved back from Birmingham to Slasham,” Margaret reminisced, “the farm had been leased out to a sharecropper, and we couldn’t move into that house that daddy owned. So, we rented a house. We had no electricity in the area at that time, and I am positive they had no running water. Everybody had wells. But there was a spring on the place that daddy rented, and that’s where we kept our milk to keep it cold. I guess the milk was ice cold, for the spring water certainly was. Every night for dinner, mother would send me and my brother Hubert down there to get the milk out of the spring.”
Although it was hard times during the depression, Margaret recalled that Pawpa J. G. Baswell, her step-grandfather, “…had six sons and they all had houses all down Slasham… All you had to do was to let somebody know you needed help and help was there.” She thought a moment, then spoke of God’s goodness. “I can hardly ever think about all those years and what we went through, without knowing that we were so blessed, and that God took care of us. All of us.”
After commenting, “I’ve not thought of some of this in years,” Margaret recounted things she and Hubert enjoyed as children.
“On one of our returns to Slasham, we lived in an old house that had a porch, and when they picked cotton, they made one end of the porch, the cotton spot. I don’t remember how they enclosed it, but they would just pile that cotton up there, on and on and on until the day they took it to the cotton gin. Hubert and I used to play in that cotton. We’d jump around in it just like kids today jump on a trampoline. That was so much fun!”
Then another memory came to mind. “When we needed cornmeal, they would send Hubert and me out to the corn crib to shell corn. I remember gallon buckets of shelled corn, and I’d go with my daddy when he’d take it to the mill to have it ground. It was so fascinating to watch that miller pour the corn into that hopper, and it come out cornmeal.” She couldn’t remember the name of the grist mill her dad used.
A community event Margaret recalled was Box Suppers. In the 1930s and ‘40s, schools and churches would raise money by sponsoring “Box Suppers.” Girls would prepare a picnic lunch to place in a decorated box for this community event where the “box suppers” were auctioned, with the money going to the sponsoring school or church. These events were announced in the papers as seen in the Southern Aegis of January 29, 1920. “Box Supper at Zion Hill Saturday night Jan. 31st. Bring boxes and have a good time.”
Margaret remembered participating as a young girl. “You would just spend days and days decorating a beautiful box with ribbons and all kinds of decorations. And you’d think up something really enticing that you hoped would tempt the guys, you know. And they would bid on the box, and whoever bought it was who you ate with. Of course, you hoped that one of the guys you liked would be the one who bid on it! I must have had a sweetheart who I was wanting to bid on it.”
Margaret’s family attended Gum Springs Baptist Church in the old building and in the current building. The first sanctuary was across the street from today’s Gum Springs and located near the cemetery on that side of the road. There seems to be no photo of that first building.
An annual special occasion was “Decoration Day” (Memorial Day) each year on Mothers’ Day at Gum Springs. In olden days, the week before Mothers’ Day, community folk would clean the cemetery so graves would look nice for flower decorations on Sunday. On that Sunday, folk recalled old memories, enjoyed good preaching, joyful singing, and “dinner on the ground” after morning service. In truth, this event was a community reunion.
All day singings and singing schools occurred at Gum Springs Baptist and at Zion Hill Methodist. Margaret recalled them, saying, “They had Sacred Harp singing at Gum Springs. And they had special people come who taught us.” They called those events “singing schools.” Sacred Harp singing had no musical instruments, for the voice was the “sacred harp.”
County newspapers announced these singing Sundays, as in this September 28, 1922, issue of the Southern Aegis “Slasham News” column: “There will be a singing next Sunday at Zion Hill. Everyone come and bring your books.” Sacred Harp singers used special books which used fa sol la musical notations.
All Day Singings was another type musical event. They were also announced in the Southern Aegis, as in this October 17, 1917 issue. “All Day Singing at Gum Springs. Joe Baswell will sing at Gum Springs the third Sunday in this month, beginning about nine o’clock a.m. and sing all day. Everybody have [sic] an invitation to go and especially the singers, and still more especially those who will carry DINNER out for we may go, and if we do, it will take a lot of it, you bet.” You can’t have an “All Day Singing” without “Dinner on the Ground.” These were social as well as spiritual events.
Bo Davis, a 5th generation Davis living on the Slasham Valley Davis Farm, recounted interesting information in a recent interview.
The original Davis house burned and Bo’s great granddad, James Davis, rebuilt it. It still stands today on Davis Drive. “My Granddaddy, Robert Ely Davis, was born in 1878,” Bo said, “and the house burnt when he was two weeks old. His sister grabbed him up, pillow, mattress, and all, and carried him to the smokehouse.” Later, when the excitement of the fire came to an end, Jim asked, “Where’s the baby?” “He’s out there in the smokehouse,” they told him. And there they found him, sound asleep.
From the burned home, “They saved some of the sills and used them when they rebuilt the house,” Bo told the interviewer. “In that old house—my granddaddy’s house—the lumber on the walls are boards 25 inches wide. That lumber was sawed in 1878 when they built the house. They had a sawmill, and they sawed the planks and built the house back around the chimney of the old house.”
Bo was born in this house on December 21, 1943, and the valley was blanketed in ten inches of snow.
After Zion Hill Methodist Church burned, the Methodist Conference decided not to rebuild and all that remained was the cemetery. However, Bo remembered two preachers who came and held revivals on Zion Hill property.
One evangelist held services under a “brush arbor.” An online article, “The history of Brush Arbors,” gives this description: “Rural folk built a brush arbor by putting poles in the ground for the sides and then poles across these uprights. For the roof covering, they cut bushes and branches and laid them across the roof poles for a covering.”
Bo recalled that a “Rev. A. E. Jones would come from Gadsden and hold a week or two brush arbor revival on Zion Hill. He’d come down to my grandmother and get permission to run power lines down to my grandaddy’s house so they could have lights at night.”
“There was another preacher who ran a tent revival,” Bo recollected. “I think his last name was Bowlen who lived down around Margaret. He had tent revivals there back in the ‘50s.”
Slasham Valley has been a place called home for almost 200 years now. Settled year-by-year by families relocating from other states, it became a sweeping valley of farms and homes, schools and churches, and cemeteries, for with living comes dying. Folk who live, or have lived, in the valley speak of it with affection and love, and for all of those who have called it home, the lyrics of a song as old as Slasham hums in their hearts:
McConaughey shows Pell City why he is a fan favorite
Story by Scottie Vickery Submitted Photos
Lena Parris went through hail to see Matthew McConaughey. And by the time the time the Ragland woman caught a glimpse of the actor, whose upcoming movie recently called for filming at the Pell City Steak House, she’d also survived five hours in the summer heat, gotten drenched from several rain showers, and acquired a sunburn to boot.
So was it worth it? “Yeah, I’d say it was,” Lena replied. “I’m not planning on going to California anytime soon, so I figured this was the closest I was going to get to seeing a celebrity. It was an experience for sure, and it was true Alabama weather. You ride out the rain and a hailstorm, it gets bright and sunny, and then you get burned.”
She also got some good photos of McConaughey, who has been in the Birmingham area since early June filming scenes for The Rivals of Amziah King, which is written and directed by Andrew Patterson and produced by Black Bear Pictures.
The award-winning actor, who earned a Best Actor Oscar for this role in Dallas Buyer’s Club and has also starred in blockbusters such as The Lincoln Lawyer and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, will star in the movie, a crime thriller set in rural Oklahoma.
Since arriving in Alabama, the actor and crew have been spotted at a variety of places in at least three different counties. In Jefferson County, they’ve eaten at Birmingham restaurants and filmed at J&J Grocery and Deli in Bessemer in addition to a Hoover church and home. Shelby County’s Elvin Hill Elementary School in Columbiana was recently transformed into Bill Waugh Elementary School for filming, and McConaughey’s trip to St. Clair County took him to the Steak House as well as a farm in Cropwell owned by Kathy and Bill Carleton.
All Abuzz
Kathy had no idea just how appropriate the name of their farm – Bin Swindled – would turn out to be. She didn’t find out that McConaughey had spent a morning there until hours after he’d left, and she felt as if she’d, well, “been swindled” out of her chance to meet one of her favorite actors.
An avid Texas fan, McConaughey gives his fans the “Hook ‘em, Horns” sign. Photo credit: Anna Turner
“I was so ticked off,” she said with a laugh. “I would have at least enjoyed getting his autograph or getting my picture with him while he was in my pasture. I’d have loved to have taken him a glass of tea.”
The Carletons allow a relative, a beekeeper, to keep his bee colony on their property, and he showed the actor and crew some of the finer points of beekeeping. “I guess Matthew plays a beekeeper in the movie,” Kathy said. “He was showing them how to act and react around bees.”
The fact that McConaughey was long gone by the time she found out he’d been there still stings, Kathy admitted. “How would you feel if he was on your property, and no one told you? My husband still doesn’t get why I was mad,” she said. Now that some time has passed, however, the irritation has faded. “What can you do but laugh? It’s a good story to tell.”
That morning, she noticed several people in their driveway, so she sent Bill, who apparently hasn’t pored over many issues of People magazine, out to check. He came back and said the relative was showing some people the bees. Later, when the crowd had grown, Bill headed down for another look.
He talked with some of the folks and came back and told her a few had gotten stung and added that “one of them looked familiar.” When the beekeeper told them later who the A-list guest had been, “Bill said, ‘I guess if it had been John Wayne or someone like that, I would have recognized him,’” Kathy explained. “Can you imagine?”
Kathy, a concierge travel professional, said she was working from home that morning and not dressed in her finest since she didn’t know company was coming. “What if I had wandered out in the driveway? I would have absolutely flipped,” she said.
The farm, however, looked great. “The grass had just been cut, thank goodness,” she said. “Everything looked really pretty.”
Steaking claim
Bruce Spann, manager of the Pell City Steak House, said the crew started scouting the location a few months before the filming. “They just came in one day out of the blue,” he said. “They came in several times after that, just looking around, and then we sat down to do a contract.”
Although they weren’t told at the time which movie it was and who the star was, “we kind of figured it out since we knew they were shooting in Birmingham,” he said. They got official confirmation on Monday afternoon and learned that filming would be Wednesday, so they announced on Facebook that the restaurant would be closed. Bruce said he and his mother, Janice Spann, were the only employees allowed to be there the day of filming. “They were very strict, but they were very professional, every one of them,” he said. “It was a great experience.”
Tuesday night, “they came in and took everything down from the walls and redecorated,” he said. “It’s supposed to be a restaurant in Oklahoma, so they took down the business license and anything to do with Pell City.”
Bruce said the filming process was fascinating. In addition to the action happening in the main part of the restaurant, “my downstairs was slap full of people watching it on big screens,” he said. “They were looking at every little thing, and I don’t know how many times they would reshoot things. They worked very hard, and I have a whole different respect for what they do. They were busy people.”
He also learned that filming a movie requires a lot of silence. “You can’t have any noise whatsoever because their mikes are so sensitive,” he said. “I had to cut the ice machine and air conditioner off. We couldn’t cook anything because we couldn’t run the exhaust fans.”
As a result, he and Janice got an inside glimpse of Hollywood magic. Although McConaughey was only having a cup of coffee in the scene, the extras who portrayed the diners at tables around him had full plates. “It was plastic food,” Bruce said. “It looked so real.”
Although they got to see the whole experience unfold, they only had a brief encounter with McConaughey. “He was a super nice guy,” Bruce said. “He came back about 3 o’clock and asked if we wanted a picture with him and said he might not get another chance. He shook my hand and said, ‘Thank you very much,’ and went back to work.”
The next morning, the crew returned and put everything back just like they’d found it. “They had taken pictures of how we had everything, and they took their stuff down and put ours back up. We opened up that morning at 10:30, just like we always do,” Bruce said. “It was a cool experience and we enjoyed it.”
Braving the elements
Although things were nice and dry inside the restaurant, that wasn’t the case outside where a group of fans gathered, hoping to meet – or at least see – McConaughey.
Throughout the day, there was rain, heat, and even a few minutes of hail, but the storms are what led Sundi Hawkins to the Steak House, which is not far from her home. “Our power went out, so I looked at my youngest and said, ‘Hey we need to go get some exercise. Let’s go for a walk.’ He knew exactly where I was going,” she said. “I just couldn’t be this close to him and not try to see him.”
The weather did not always cooperate
Throughout the day, fellow stargazers came and went as their schedules allowed. “I wasn’t planning on going at all and was just going to let them do their thing,” Lena said. “Turned out I had an hour to kill, so I decided to go by and see what was going on. That hour turned into a five-hour adventure. I almost left, but then I thought, “I’ve invested so much time here I may as well stay.’ ”
She also sacrificed a good bit of comfort – and her pride. “After the rain and hailstorm, I was soaked. And when I say soaked, I mean I was drenched,” Lena said. “I had on slides, and my socks were soaked, so I took them off, wringed them out, and put them in the pocket of my raincoat.”
A crew member later told her that McConaughey happened to look out the restaurant window and saw the whole thing. “He sees me out there wringing out my dadgum socks,” she said and laughed. “Could I have had a more Alabamian moment than that right there?”
Wet feet aside, Lena said she enjoyed watching everything unfold. “It was actually pretty neat to see how films are made,” she said. “The crew was going in and out and they all had walkie talkies. They were all labeled – one said ‘props.’ You could see all the different jobs because of the walkie talkies.”
Although the wait was long, the crowd was finally rewarded with a Matthew sighting and a little interaction. After filming, the actor went to the trailers parked across the street at First Baptist Church at Pell City. He emerged late afternoon and waved to the onlookers before driving off in a Lincoln Aviator and driving away, a chorus of squeals following him.
“When he was filming, he was very focused,” Lena said. “He came outside and went to the trailers, but he never waved or looked up or anything. When he was leaving, he was a little more friendly and talkative, and he interacted a little with the crowd.”
Although he didn’t sign autographs, the actor rolled down his window before leaving. “Can I get a ‘Roll Tide,’ Matthew?” someone shouted. “Not a chance,” the actor said with a grin. McConaughey, a graduate of the University of Texas and a huge Longhorns fan, flashed the “Hook ‘em Horns” sign at the crowd as he drove past.
It was a bittersweet moment for Sundi. “One of my favorite actors of all time is right here. He drove right in front of us, and I got so excited I forgot my camera was on zoom, so I missed the picture,” she said.
Likeability factor
Although the lure of Hollywood is strong, it seems that Matthew Mania was fueled in part because so many people like the man behind the persona. McConaughey was named Philanthropist of the Year by The Hollywood Reporter in 2022 in part for his efforts in organizing the We’re Texas concert that raised $7.7 million for victims of Winter Storm Uri.
He was also recognized for the impact of the just keep livin’ Foundation, which he and his wife, Camila Alves McConaughey, started in 2008 to provide after-school fitness and wellness program in inner city high schools.
“I’m a big fan,” Kathy said. “I just love him, and I love his way. He seems like a kind person.”
Sundi agreed. “He’s always been one of my favorite actors and it’s not just because he’s good-looking,” she said of the star, who was named People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive in 2005. After hearing some podcasts he’s been on and listening to part of his audio books, she’s become a bigger fan. “He’s down to earth and very spiritual. He just seems like a cool guy,” she said.
Lena, who said she was a fan long before McConaughey came to town, said she hoped his experience in Pell City was a good one. “It was an experience I wouldn’t have gotten to have anywhere else,” she said. “Hopefully we didn’t annoy the man too much.”
