Reed Peanut & Pecan Company Silos, Pinehurst
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Tag Archives: Georgia Peanuts
Hot Boiled Peanuts, Claxton
Hot boiled peanuts really are a sort of Southern caviar. If you don’t understand, you probably never will. But as any Southerner will tell you, we love ’em down here! Georgia leads the nation in peanut production, so there are plenty to go around. Roadside vendors like this one are a link to the past and no small town in South Georgia is worth its salt if it doesn’t have at least one. Amanda Jones Little says this seller “has the best in town” and nice produce, as well.
Wynn Peanut & Shelling, Sycamore
This nice old warehouse and the garage seen in the next post were among the first places I photographed for Vanishing South Georgia six years ago. They haven’t changed much since then.
Jimmy Carter Peanut, 1976, Plains
The most-photographed roadside symbol in Plains, this peanut was made for a rally in Evanston, Indiana in 1976 by James Kiely, Doyle Kifer, and Loretta Townsend. After spending years beside the depot, it was later moved to the Davis E-Z Mart on Highway 45.
World’s Largest Peanut, 1975, Ashburn
This kitschy monument has been promoting Georgia’s largest cash crop to passersby on I-75 for nearly forty years. Designed by A. R. Smith, Jr., it was sponsored by the Georgia Peanut Commission as a tribute to the peanut industry and as a memorial to Nora Lawrence Smith, longtime editor and publisher of The Wiregrass Farmer. And while there are other monuments to America’s favorite legume scattered around the country, this one is the largest.
The peanut was toppled during Hurricane Michael on 10 October 2018.
Farmers Peanut Company, Unadilla
Carter’s Warehouse Storefront, Plains
Plains Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Boiled Peanut Vendor, Valdosta
I wish I’d been able to get a better photograph of this man, who could often be found selling boiled peanuts, grapes and watermelons in a parking lot near the courthouse in downtown Valdosta. He was always smiling and waved when you passed by his truck.
Harvesting Peanuts at Thornton Farms, Wayne County
Vanishing Georgia: Photographs by Brian Brown 