Holcomb, Mississippi

New life for an old landmark

In the 1950s, when the old Bank of Holcomb building at the corner of North Main and Tuscohoma streets, was the Corner Grocery, Coca-Cola painted a big sign on the side featuring its mascot "Sparkle" and advertising Cokes for 5 cents. In the 1970s, below left, the sign was fading, but still a local landmark. By the 1990s, below right, it had almost vanished.

In 1999, Mike Lott, the new owner of the building, commissioned artist Cristen Craven Bainard of Tutwiler, Miss., to repaint the sign. The Coca-Cola Co., after some discussion, granted permission. Writer/photographer Gwen Woods of The Daily Sentinel-Star newspaper in Grenada, Miss., photographed Bainard at work (below left) and the restored sign (below right).

Lott also hopes to have Bainard paint scenes of old Holcomb on a 1916 concrete horse and mule watering trough that used to sit in front of the old bank building and offered animals their own place to pause and refresh from a nearby Artisan well.