This train travels the longest stretch of railroad track on earth without a turn — 299 miles. There’s a bank car, theater car, grocery store car, a car filled with doctor’s offices, one that has a chapel. Sixty train cars. A mile long. Most do not have a passage way between them, so people who work in one seldom see those who work in another. The “Tea and Sugar” meanders more than a thousand miles across South Australia, stopping whenever someone waves it down. Its arrival in remote places is the social event of the week. All the families linger for hours buying impulsively, trying to extend the moment when there is laughter and community.
- Homeless No MoreForest Cochran was just two. Much had happened in his little life. His parents separated. His mother Karen lost their home. There was no shelter for the homeless in Loganville, Georgia. But Joy Davis and her husband Wayne took them in. They have helped dozens of people get back on their feet. Once they started their single bathroom with ten strangers. Why?
- The Most Primitive Place on EarthThe Okefenolee Swamp is one of the most primitive places on earth, a swamp so big, you could lose New York City inside. Every 20 years or so, in times of drought, a great purging blaze burns out the vegetation. One lasted for more than a year.
- Beehive TelephoneTo find this business, you go west from Salt Lake City, Utah. Turn left and drive for the rest of your life. Along about middle age, you may pass a battered 1951 Ford Installer moving among the tumbleweeds. That is the Beehive telephone company.
- Europe’s First Soul FoodLeroy Haynes has led a life that ought to begin, “Once upon a time…” He went to school with Al Capone’s kids. Played in the old Negro baseball league. Was an All American football player at Morehouse College in Atlanta. Made movies with Bridget Bardot. Studied for a Doctorate degree at the Sorbonne in Paris. Quit to sell Soul Food to the French.
- $2 DocDr. Russel Dohner looked after his neighbors for 55 years, charging them for a visit about what they would pay for a fancy cup of coffee: two bucks when he started his practice. Five bucks later on. Dr. Dohner worked with a broken back and after he had a heart attack — the only two times he ever closed his clinic. The morning we first met, back in 1983, Dohner had been to surgery twice, prepped a broken arm, handled two emergency cases, checked on 50 patients and delivered three babies. It was not yet 10:30.