By Staff
TRADITIONS – Bet Deweese looks through a scrapbook recording her family's adventures over the years at the Neshoba County Fair. On the page she's looking at is a photograph that appeared in The Meridian Star in 1980. It shows the late Glen Deweese and his father, Carl J., talking on the front porch of the family cabin. Photo by Paula Merritt / The Meridian Star
By Fredie Carmichael / staff writer
July 28, 2002
Cabins at the Neshoba County Fair are as unique as the people who call them home for one week each July.
Most are small, no more than a kitchen, bathrooms, front porches and bunk bed sleeping quarters. Many have been modernized with plumbing and air-conditioning.
But each cabin is marked by the special style of its owners.
Meridian families
In Meridian, lots of families load up their cars, vans and sport utility vehicles with supplies for the week and make the drive to Neshoba County to prepare their cabins for the fair.
With cabins that can sleep more than 40 people, preparation can take weeks.
Sue Davidson's family cabin is three stories tall and can sleep up to 38 people. Davidson, of Meridian, said all of that space will be needed to accommodate this year's guests. Family members from Chicago, Houston and Mobile, Ala., will be staying in the cabin this week.
The Davidson cabin has two upper levels with bunk beds and bathrooms. The ground floor has a full kitchen and small dining area.
One of the trademarks of the cabin is the signatures on the ceiling's wooden beams. Shannon Plunkett of Mobile, Davidson's second cousin, said the family decided to get everyone who came in to sign the beams after the cabin was rebuilt a few years ago.
Cabin traditions
Traditions abound at the fair's cabins. Just a short walk up the muddy road from the Davidson cabin, near the main gate, is a brightly colored three-story cabin: The Deweese cabin, No. 85.
The bright orange-and-yellow cabin will be without its grand host this year. Glen Deweese, a prominent civic leader, a pioneer in the convenience store business and a popular legislative leader, died late last year after a long battle with cancer.
Family members say the cabin won't be the same without him this year.
The Deweese cabin is coated in its original colors of "hazard orange" and "hazard yellow" two colors with a funny story.