JULY 12, 1930
Whistle Stop Growing by Leaps and Bounds
Opal Threadgoode, Julian's wife, has rented the building two doors down from me at the post office, and is opening up a beauty shop of her own. She had been fixing people's hair in her kitchen, but Julian said for her to stop doing that because so many women were coming in and out the back door all day that it was causing their hens not to lay.
Opal said the prices would still be the same: shampoo and set for 50c, and a permanent for $1.50.
I, for one, am delighted at the new addition to our busy street. Just think, now you can mail a letter, have a meal, and get your hair done all on the same block. All we need now is a picture show to open up, then none of us would ever need to go over to Birmingham again. Mr. and Mrs. Roy Glass had the Glass family annual reunion in their backyard, and all the Glasses came from all over the state to be there, and Wilma said the cake tasted better than it looked.
By the way, my other half hooked his own finger the other day when he was fishing, so I've had him at home again, moaning and groaning.
. . . Dot Weems . . .
NOVEMBER 18, 1931
By now, the name of the cafe was written on the walls of hundreds of boxcars, from Seattle to Florida. Splinter Belly Jones said he had seen it as far away as Canada.
Things were especially bad that year, and at night the woods all around Whistle Stop twinkled from the fires at the hobo camps, and there wasn't a single man there that Idgie and Ruth had not fed at one time or another.
Cleo, Idgie's brother, was concerned about it. He had come over to the cafe to pick up his wife, Ninny, and their little boy, Albert. He was having a cup of coffee and eating peanuts.
"Idgie, I'm telling you, you don't need to feed everybody that shows up at your door. You've got a business to run here. Julian told me that he came by here the other day and there were seven of them in here eating. He says he thinks you'd let Ruth and the baby go without to feed those bums."
Idgie dismissed the thought. "Oh Cleo, what does Julian know? He'd starve to death himself if Opal didn't have the beauty shop. What are you listening to him for? He doesn't have the sense God gave a billy goat."
Cleo couldn't disagree with her on that point.
"Well, it's not only Julian, honey. I worry about you.
"I know."
"Well, I just want you to be smart and not be a fool and give away all your profits."
Idgie looked at him and smiled. "Now, Cleo, I know for a fact that half the people in this town have not paid you for five years. I don't see you throwing them out the door."
Ninny, who was usually quiet, piped up, "That's right, Cleo."
Cleo ate a peanut. Idgie got up and grabbed him around the neck, playing with him. "Listen, you old bone cracker, you've never turned a hungry man away from your door in your life."
"I never had to. They were all over here," he said and cleared his throat. "Now, seriously, Idgie, I'm not trying to run your business or anything, but I just want to know if you're saving any money, that's all."
"What for?" Idgie said. "Listen, money will kill you, you know that. Why, just today, a man came here and told me about his uncle, who had a good-paying job working up in Kentucky at the national mint, making money for the government, and everything was going fine until one day he pulled the wrong lever and was crushed to death by seven hundred pounds of dimes."
Ninny was horrified. "Oh no. How awful."
Cleo looked at his wife like she was crazy. "Good Lord, woman, I think you'd believe anything this nutty sister of mine told you."
"Well, it could have happened, couldn't it? Was he really killed by dimes, Idgie?"
"Sure was. It was either dimes or three hundred pounds of quarters, I forget which, but in any case, he was killed all right."
Cleo shook his head at Idgie and had to laugh.
JANUARY 29, 1986
Every Sunday on visiting day, Ed Couch and his mother, Big Momma, would just sit in her cramped little room all afternoon and look at television. Today, Evelyn thought if she didn't get out of there soon, she would scream. She excused herself and said she was going to the bathroom down the hall. She had really planned to go sit in the car but had forgotten that Ed had the car keys; so there she was—back again ... in the lounge with Mrs. Threadgoode, unwrapping a package of coconut Snow Balls from the Hostess company while Mrs. Threadgoode was telling her about last night's dinner at Rose Terrace.
"So there she was, honey, sitting at the head of the table . . . all puffed up and braggin'."
"Who?"
"Mrs. Adcock."
"Mrs. Adcock?"
"Mrs. Adcock! You remember Mrs. Adcock—with the fox furs—Mrs. Adcock!"
Evelyn thought for a minute. "Oh, the rich one."
"That's right, Mrs. Adcock, with the dinner rings."
"That's right."
Evelyn handed her the open package.
"Oh, thank you. I love a Snow Ball." She took a bite and after a while she said, "Evelyn, don't you want a Coca-Cola to wash it down with? I've got some change in my room, and I’ll get you a cold drink if you want one. They've got a machine down the hall."
Evelyn said, "No, Mrs. Threadgoode, I'm all right, but would you like one?"
"Oh no, honey. Normally I would, but today I've got a kinda gassy-like feeling, so I'd just as soon have some water, if you don't mind."
Evelyn went outside the door and got them both little white cone cups of cold water.
"Thank you kindly."
"What about Mrs. Adcock?"
Mrs. Threadgoode looked at her. "Mrs. Adcock? Do you know her?"
"No, I don't know her, you were just saying that she was bragging about something."
"Oh, that's right, I was . . . well, Mrs. Adcock was telling us at the dinner table last night that everything in her house is a genuine antique . . . over fifty years old . . . said everything she owned was worth a lot of money. I told Mrs. Otis, 'Here I started out in life not worth much of anything, and I've turned out to be a priceless antique. Probably worth a fortune on the market.'" She laughed, tickled at the idea, and then thought for a moment.
"I wonder whatever happened to all those little china-doll dishes and that little goat cart we used to play with?
"On Saturdays, we'd go for a ride in this goat cart that Poppa had made for us girls, and we thought it was better than a trip to Paris. I wouldn't be surprised if that old goat was still alive. His name was Harry . . . Harry the goat! He'd eat anything!" She laughed. "One time, Idgie fed him a whole jar of Leona's Mum underarm deodorant, and he lapped it up just like it was ice cream . . .
"We played all lands of games—but nobody loved to play dress-up any more than the Threadgoodes. One year, Momma dressed us four girls up as the four different suits in a pack of cards for the contest they were having over at the church. I was the clubs, the twins were hearts and diamonds, and Essie Rue was spades, and here comes Idgie, tagging along after us, as the joker in the pack. We took first prize!
"I remember one Fourth of July, all of us girls had on our stars-and-stripes dresses, with our paper crowns. We were all out in the backyard, having our dish of homemade ice cream, waiting for the fireworks to start, when here comes Buddy Threadgoode down the back stairs, all dressed up in one of Leona's middy dresses, with a big bow tied on his head, and he commenced to prissing and mincing. He was imitating Leona, don't you see? Then, to make matters worse, Edward or Julian or one of the boys had carried the Victrola out in the yard and was winding away on it, playing ‘The Sheik of Araby' while Buddy hootchy-kootchied all around the yard. We've laughed over that for years. Later, Buddy gave Leona a big kiss. You could forgive Buddy anything.