stumbled upon a tombstone that inspired the birth of a story

By

Joan Gandy

The Natchez Democrat

Rain drizzled on visitors hiking the steep rocky hill leading to Grand Gulf’s ancient cemetery. Pink crape myrtle trees bloomed on top of the trail, softening the otherwise bleak colors of a gray-green July day &045;&045; muggy, mosquito-friendly weather, perhaps not unlike the day when Martha Rachael Holloway was buried in 1858.

Time has taken its toll on the monuments, walls and ornate iron fences, but evidence of a place once loved rises in names, dates, epitaphs and obelisks that hold stories mostly buried along with the bones.

The cemetery took hold of Mack May one day about four years ago, when he walked that steep hill with his wife, Claire, an employee at Grand Gulf Military Park near Port Gibson.

Intrigued by words he read on two of the stones, he felt moved to write about the people whose lives he knew not at all. The inspiration went first into a short story, which in time became a novel, &uot;The Consort,&uot; his first book, published earlier this year.

&uot;I came with my wife in January 2000 to take pictures of the erosion. She was working on a grant to get help for the cemetery,&uot; May said, as he walked up one hill and down another to the spot where the idea for a story came to him. &uot;I was just walking around looking at the names on the tombstones. The word ‘consort’ caught my eye.&uot;

Familiar with the history of the town of Grand Gulf, May began thinking about the years when the town was a busy commercial center, the third largest port on the lower part of the river. In 1836, about 20 steamboats stopped at the port each week. In one cotton season, September 1834 to May 1835, steamboats took 47,770 bales of cotton to market from Grand Gulf.

&uot;It was one of the most important ports on the river. There were many streets, several hotels, a bank, a jewelry store,&uot; May said. &uot;Then in the early 1850s, the town burned. In 1856, the river washed away the rest of the town.&uot;

May began to look into the lives of W.P. Holloway and Martha Rachael Holloway, two of the monuments that had caught his eye that day at the cemetery.

&uot;Holloway had a lot of hardships. He moved out of his house, lost his business, his son and then his wife,&uot; May said. &uot;And then another thing happened, almost ghostly. I’d been searching around for information and then in the museum there was a card. I had a hard time reading it through the glass.&uot;

He had found an artifact that related to the life of the man whose story he was re-creating in his work of fiction.

In addition to drawing on the history of Grand Gulf during its busy, pre-Civil War period, May has taken ideas from other writers, such as one who describes the life of early circuit-riding preacher Lorenzo Dow.

May is new to writing. A native of Brookhaven, he has lived in the Port Gibson area since 1971, when he came to work at Grand Gulf Nuclear Station as a nuclear instrument technician. He now is a senior instructor at the station.

Combining his writing with a full-time job has not been a problem, he said. &uot;I write at night. I almost go into a trance,&uot; he said. &uot;I get into the right brain, and it takes me places I never thought I could be.&uot;

May was both surprised and pleased as people who read his book gave him good reviews. &uot;I’m not an eloquent person, but when I write the words flow out &045;&045; different kind of words than I normally would use when I talk.&uot;

He chose to self publish after trying to interest publishers in his work, he said. &uot;I tried to go the conventional way and got many rejections. I knew someone who used Author House, and she said it was a good company. And now I do think it’s a good thing for a beginning author to do.&uot;

Still, he is responsible for the marketing. &uot;I’m doing everything I can think of,&uot; he said. He has contacted newspapers and bookstores and has suggested to Mississippi Public Broadcasting officials that they consider a program to showcase work of undiscovered Mississippi authors.

May knows the challenges of becoming successful as a novelist. He is humble about his first efforts but determined that he will succeed. His second book already is taking shape in his mind.