Be sure to come early and catch the parade. In 2005, the Queen's float had an empty chair with no rider. Ms. Julie Y Stone, who had been the Cotton Queen for years, passed away earlier during the year 2005, and her float was designed with an empty chair to be a memorial to this dearly beloved lady. In addition to the parade, there are all sorts of arts and crafts. There are live bands, skits, and wonderful home cooking. They have the best barbeque you will find anywhere!
While you are there, be sure to tour the “Susie-Agnes Hotel.” The hotel was built in 1902 and is a typical example of an old southern building with two stories and a balcony overlooking the main road through the town. The sitting room downstairs is decorated with beautiful antiques, and the bedrooms upstairs are made up and ready for the next tenant. This was once a popular meeting place for merchants who came to sell their cotton. They would bring their crops here to be ginned, baled, and loaded on the train to Savannah. From the port in Savannah, the cotton would be shipped to England and other European countries. The hotel was named for the wife and the daughter of the town's founder, John Bostwich, Sr. It has since been listed in the National Register of Historic Places, and it was seen in the movie, “My Cousin Vinnie.”
Another place you must visit is the general store owned and operated by Mr. and Mrs. Ruark. The store is an old red brick building with a tin roof. When you step inside the door, time goes back a hundred years. The floor is wooden, and the shelves and showcases are handmade. Just inside the door is an old coke box filled with sodas. On the counter by the cash register is a scale to weigh candy and cheese. On the back wall, cotton-picking sacks hang from hooks. As you look around, the owners entertain you with stories of the “old days.”
Don't forget to see the cotton gin. You can see actual cotton being ginned and baled and loaded onto large trucks outside. You will see trucks coming in from cotton fields, and you will follow the cotton step by step as it is dumped into the machine that separates the fiber from the seeds. Then the cotton is cleaned and moved to the next machine where it comes out in oblong bales. Each bale then is placed inside a large sack and sealed to protect it from the elements. Lastly, the bales are loaded on to large flat bed trailers to be transported to the ports in Savannah.
