Every Day Life of a Professor's Wife: Columbus, Georgia

In September of 1966 when I was seventeen years old, my family moved to Columbus, Georgia from Longueuil, Quebec. Longueuil is on the South Shore of Montreal. My father retired early from the Royal Canadian Air Force and chose to live close to my sister Margaret Fisher Hemsley and her small family living there. (She was married to Syd Hemsley and had two children, Robert Dee and Elaine.)

School had already started and I enrolled in high school at Jordan Vocational High School (Jerdan). Our bishop Bill Meadows taught there and it was only a few blocks from where we were living. The school was built during the depression era as a work project. Among the architectural features were wood floors. And no air conditioning. I remember sitting in a physics class in a lab leaning against the black lab table. Pools of perspiration formed around my arms. At seventeen this was my first encounter with such hot and humid weather.
Moving in my last year of high school was challenging for me. I never made any friends and struggled with unhappiness and depression. Most people assumed that I must be a freshman (14 years old) at the high school since no one had ever seen me before. Every day began with "home room" and a Bible reading. The school was segregated and for the first time in my high school experience there were no black students at the school. Neither one of these characteristics would exist today in the United States.

Our family attended church at the Howard street meeting house of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Presently the building is being renovated and is closed but it still stands in a quiet neighborhood only a few blocks away from the high school.

Kimberly took me to the center of the old city. She says that you go "uptown" to the old shopping district. It is apparently still vibrant and has lots of cafes and clubs that local people attend.

A couple of churches in the area. The old building above is an Anglican church.

This is an octagonal house.

The old train station.

A few of the stately older houses on Broadway.

Down some of the busy streets in the old shopping area runs railroad track. One time Will and Kimberly happened to be there when a train slowly rumbled along the street.