No court house square, but a quaint small town. I think you need to drive it again and give Montevallo Alabama a look (University of Montevallo Falcons). Columbiana is Shelby country seat.

Montevallo is a few miles off a major north/south interstate ... 65.
Montevallo is far enough from Birmingham to keep students from driving there everyday and maybe getting into trouble.
Montevallo is close enough to Birmingham to enjoy the ocassional weekend day trip with friends for a get away or shopping.
Montevallo doesn't have a football team but various intramural sports involving any and every student wishing to participate, an opportunity to compete.
Montevallo is ranked pretty high academically and even higher as a "best value school".

quote:

Originally posted by Woodman:
I have a recollection of a courthouse on a town square.

Any of these look familiar?

Thanks, all. I gave it a rest and then ordered a similar map to that I would have used 22+ years ago, the AAA state map (although I was probably using a state-issued map, with more detail of individual towns about the margins).

Driving north on US-11 through Mississippi, parallel to I-59, would bring me into Meridian.

Anywho, my 7th grade niece might do well in a small, polite, temperate college town in a few years. We'll see how it shakes out.

Check out Florence and my alma mater, University of North Alabama. UNA is big on training teachers and nurses, but the business school is also top notch. Florence is a big small town. You can get just about anywhere and anything you need in a 10-15 minute drive. 38k people, plus another 80k out in the county. I moved my fiance and her boys here this spring. The older one (18) loves UNA and SWMBO + the 12 year old love the city schools and the town. Doesn't hurt having the Tennessee River right here for fishing and boating and cypress creek for paddling kayaks.

Our courthouse is fugly though.

While Auburn is a beautiful college town, and the landmark administration building, Samford Hall, is almost in the middle of town and might be mistaken for something like a town hall, based on your description, I was going to suggest Livingston as well. It matches just about perfectly.

Auburn's Samford Hall:



Sumter County Courthouse, Livingston, AL -
Although this photo doesn't show it, there is a beautiful, ornate wrought-iron fence around the property:

I'm quite sure it wasn't Eufaula, Alabama. I spent 3 months there in 1960 and the only things in town were 3 restaurants, a few stores and gas stations, a bank, and a country club. The inhabitants were polite (traditions of the South) but not friendly.

You could go to this link and view all 72 of Alabama's courthouses: https://www.al.com/living/2017...38.%20More%20items...

flashguy

I live in the Pensacola area. If you go north to I-65, Greenville, Al is on the way. A small college there, Reid State.

Quite a resource of official state highway maps dating back to 1928. I found a 1998 Mississippi front and back. https://mdot.ms.gov/portal/maps Alabama refuses to be outdone. A huge index. http://alabamamaps.ua.edu

https://mdot.ms.gov/documents/...p%201998%20Front.pdf

https://mdot.ms.gov/documents/...ap%201998%20Back.pdf

Spring Hill? Athens?

Will this end up being the one thing that Sigforum doesn’t know?

quote:

Originally posted by cooger:
Will this end up being the one thing that Sigforum doesn’t know?

Got to be this one in Greenville, AL. OP said the route took him from NOLA to near Pensacola. Probably on I-10, which is just north of Pensacola. There he would have turned north on Hwy 29 to the state line to connect with I-65 to travel North. This is the only way Pensacolaians can travel north to Alabama and Atlanta. Greenville is the first town encountered on I-65. The courthouse itself checks all the boxes; Wrought-iron fence with finals, etc.

I'm thinking it was in Mississippi. US-11 into Meridian maybe ... Time will tell. You'll spot me. The slow truck with a cat in the camper shell.

Although after looking at several dozen small towns with park-like town squares surrounded by their government and commercial buildings, I see many idyllic spots.

quote:

Originally posted by Woodman:
I'm thinking it was in Mississippi. US-11 into Meridian maybe ... Time will tell. You'll spot me. The slow truck with a cat in the camper shell.

Although after looking at several dozen small towns with park-like town squares surrounded by their government and commercial buildings, I see many idyllic spots.

So disregard your reference to Pensacola? How the heck can we help locate this place if you change the freakin' state? Highway 11 doesn't even go through Alabama, much less Pensacola. Hwy 11 does, however, go through my hometown of Ellisville, MS. The courthouse in Ellisville, while picturesque, does not have a fence around it which you describe in detail.

quote:

Originally posted by cne32507:
So disregard your reference to Pensacola? How the heck can we help locate this place if you change the freakin' state?

After two weeks of New Orleans during JazzFest, without running out of money, I'm surprised I had many brain cells functioning. But I might have skipped P-Cola on the return, instead heading due N-NE leaving N.O.

But I've done the return from P-Cola plenty of times. After a week on the beach, camping, I'd mosey north on the 2-lanes without a map. Now, there was this fella selling buffalo jerky I'd love to visit again. Might have been Kentucky, but probably Tennessee. Or maybe Georgia. Sort of hilly then a flat town with a straight north-south main road? And his shop was off on the left?

Well, as they say in Maine: "Ya kant git thara from heara"

quote:

Originally posted by cne32507:
Well, as they say in Maine: "Ya kant git thara from heara"

I once heard an Iranian (in Tehran) say the English equivalent of "The way from here, it does not become."

flashguy

quote:

Originally posted by cne32507:
Well, as they say in Maine: "Ya kant git thara from heara"

Credit: "Burt & I" tapes

No help from me but your travels remind me of the book Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon. I did a trip across country in 1970, following mostly blue lines on the map, not the red interstate highways.

quote:

Originally posted by UTsig:
No help from me but your travels remind me of the book Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon. I did a trip across country in 1970, following mostly blue lines on the map, not the red interstate highways.

I read that book also!