With Dick Hodgetts

The University of Georgia graduated two young people and turned them out into the economy in 1975.  George Launius had a degree in Pharmacy, and Nancy was trained to be an elementary school teacher.  They have come a long way transforming themselves and their business over the past 30 years.  Their vision has changed and shaped the business that we know in Madison as Thrifty Mac Drugs. George began his pharmaceutical career in Commerce working for a Thrifty Mac store.  The owners expanded into Madison and sent their eager young employee to manage the new business. The potential of the operation convinced George Launius that he wanted to own his own business and he bought out the owners.  Thrifty Mac Drug was located where Laughing Moon is now operating.

George had a vision for his business.  He wanted clients to enjoy coming into his store.  He was convinced that if he offered quick personal service he could grow his business.  He and Nancy shared a belief that if they carefully selected employees and had well motivated staff it would translate into satisfied customers. In addition, the business of filling prescriptions is a serious one, so the objective of having an enjoyable business for customers; and the obligation to fill the prescribed medication correctly is a very serious endeavor.

Story by Jamie Miles • Photos taken from “The Ideas of a Plain Country Woman”

hat began in 1915 as an agreement with a young teacher to furnish “occasional school notes” to The Madisonian, the local newspaper, evolved into 63 years of chronicling her life as a country woman. Genie Maude’s weekly columns or “letters” as she referred to them quickly became the most anticipated corner of paper. She wrote through the Depression, wars, joys and sorrows. When age forced Genie Maude to lay down her pen, the paper’s publisher, Adelaide Ponder, wrote an open letter pleading:

“Please don’t quit! ... To be honest, I don’t think that anyone CAN take your place. Your Fairview News in The Madisonian has been everyone’s favorite column for more years than even I can remember.”
December 14, 1978

The best of her beloved columns have been compiled into a book for long time Morgan County residents to relive and recent arrivals to discover. Compiling “The Ideas of a Plain Country Woman” was a labor of love by two of Genie Maude’s granddaughters, Rachel Wilson Harper and Sally Wade Stephens. “Some people even started a collection but never finished it.” Rachel added with a laugh, “Now we know why.”
Born in Morgan County in 1892, Genie Maude graduated from Madison High School and gave the valedictory speech. After receiving her teaching degree from The Normal School in Athens, she came back home to fill a position in the one teacher school in Fairview just a few miles south of Madison. It was there she agreed to pen her first column under “School Notes.”

 “Our school is going steadily forward in the improvements begun in 1913-1914. The floor has been reoiled, the lawn cleaned and the woodpile straightened.

Story by: James Faucett

From her second floor office in Madison, Tara Cooner conjures up people from the past, summoning them at will, bringing them flickering to life on her backlit computer screen.

Story by Van Jensen • Photos of Ross Mason by Kelvin Kuo

Mathematician Edward Lorenz was preparing to run a computer weather prediction in 1961 when he took a shortcut. He entered .506 into the number sequence instead of the full .506127.

That seemingly insignificant difference completely changed the predicted weather pattern. Lorenz’s finding helped establish chaos theory — the idea that dynamic systems can be highly sensitive to the smallest of influences.
A talk by Lorenz famously was titled “Does the Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings in Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?”

On the evening of Aug. 2, 2007, a bee was flying along the Silver Comet Trail near Atlanta. The bee came into the path of a small but athletic man riding a bicycle. It collided with his face, becoming stuck in his helmet. The rider raised a hand to brush away the bee. As he did, his elbow grazed the handlebar.

The man was a competitive cyclist, and the bike was moving so fast that the slight movement of the handlebar threw it off course. The bike launched off the trail and landed with the rider’s feet still locked into the pedals, both sliding headfirst down a hill.

The cyclist’s head collided with something large and hard enough to crack open his helmet. When he and the bike finally came to rest, a piece of brush was pressed against his throat. He could barely breathe.
By instinct, the rider’s brain commanded his hands to push away the brush.
His hands would not move.

Story by George L. Batten, Jr.
Photos by Angelina Bellebuono
Rubbing by Kathryn Schiliro

I blame my friend.
My friend loaned me a copy of the book “Rambles Through Morgan County, Georgia” by Louise McHenry Hicky (1971, reprinted 1989), and in reading this book I discovered that Elizabeth Lumpkin is buried in our fair county.
Elizabeth Lumpkin, who died at age 33 in the year 1819, was the first wife of Wilson Lumpkin, a man who held several important public offices during his life, including that of governor of the state of Georgia (1831 to 1835). Elizabeth Lumpkin is just the sort of minor historical figure that intrigues me, and so I decided to visit her grave.
It is interesting to visit the graves of the famous, and I’ve visited my share, but the graves of the nearly famous can be just as rewarding. I value a photograph of the grave of Ottmar Mergenthaler that I took in the late 1970s or early 1980s, in Baltimore. Once upon a time school children learned about Mergenthaler and his invention, and I suspect that even today newspaper publishers of a certain age still recall fondly the inventor of the Linotype machine. He is no longer famous, but still intriguing.

And so it is with Elizabeth Lumpkin. She married a future governor, gave him children, lost three in infancy, and died young. Best of all, she is buried nearby. I had to see her grave. The problem was finding the grave.
Mrs. Hicky was not very helpful. Here is her description of the grave’s location, in its entirety:

Story by: James Faucett