Newest StoryWalk book tells the history of the Hamilton Road area of LaGrange

The new book featured on The Thread’s StoryWalk tells the history of the historic Hamilton Road area of LaGrange.

StoryWalk is a project of Get Troup Reading, where signage along a half-mile loop around the George Harris Fields Baseball Complex provides a story to read as people walk along the trail. Each sign displays different pages of a book from beginning to end.

The project is overseen by Get Troup Reading, and the books along the path are changed out every six to eight weeks to keep them fresh.

The newest book, Time for a Haircut, tells part of the history of LaGrange through the eyes of a fictional little boy and his father.

Author Felicia Moore said that she was working at LaGrange College when she was contacted by the Georgia Department of Transportation to conduct some oral interviews about the historic Dr. Isaiah T. Epps home in the Hamilton Road area of LaGrange.

Epps was one of the first African American doctors in LaGrange.  His home and office later became a boarding house that provided a home for single female teachers, who were not allowed to live alone at the time.

Moore said she learned so much about the neighborhood that it inspired her to write a book about it.

“I was finding out about more and more of just Hamilton Road in general, just that whole area. I’m not originally from [LaGrange], and I found out so much information,” Moore said. “I felt like I had to create like a memorial for that neighborhood.”

The book tells the story of a boy and his father going to get their hair cut on a Saturday morning. As they’re walking down Hamilton Road, the father tells his son about all the places, and they see people at the barber shop and along the way.

“It’s just a great story, and it’s so funny,” said Kim Myers of Get Troup Reading. “This was intended for children and parents to interact. But adults are enjoying this book and the history.”

Not only did Moore write the book, but she also provided illustrations for the book from her own paintings of the historic Hamilton Road area.

Myers said Time for a Haircut will be featured on the StoryWalk until around December.

Time for a Haircut is available for purchase locally at Pretty Good Books in LaGrange and online at Amazon.com.

This post was originally published on here