Have you ever tried to pull a practical joke and have it backfire—on you?
That’s what happened to Winterville City Councilman Ron Adams
about 40 years ago. I remember Ron's
telling me the story, so I went looking for the still-standing evidence—all 58
feet of it.
Winterville, population
1,731, is the smallest city in Clarke County, which is the smallest county in
Georgia. And when Clarke County and
Athens consolidated in 1991, Winterville said, “No, thanks.” It was and still is happy to do its own
thing. I like driving around Oglethorpe
County's next-door neighboring town. Restored
historic homes surround manicured green spaces, and civic pride
speaks—loudly—without saying a word.
Mayberry is fictional, but Winterville is for real.
That’s why Ron and his
wife, Mary, chose Winterville in the early 1980s, settling on Georgia Avenue,
which stretches parallel to Main Street.
Before long, Ron was scratching the political itch that runs in his
family. Ronald Adams, his late father,
was once a state senator and later a state court judge in Brunswick. Ron’s aunt, Mrs. Jean Adams Walker, was
married to Randall Walker, who once served as mayor of Jesup, my hometown.
Ron was elected to the
Winterville City Council during Mayor Wesley Whitehead’s tenure. “Mayor Whitehead called Councilman Don Bower
and me Gold Dust One and Gold Dust Two,” Ron told me.
In 1989, Ron resigned
from C&S bank in Athens and moved to Glynn County. He needed to be closer
to his ailing mother. I met Ron in
Brunswick. He was a loan officer at
American National Bank, and I was on the board of directors. And that’s when I first heard about the
Winterville political hijinks.
When I told Ron that I had unfurled my 100-foot measuring tape to document the evidence of his gone-awry joke, he started laughing. I laughed, listening to him laugh.
Here’s how it goes.
When the railroad
decided to take up the tracks that ran between Main Street and Georgia Avenue,
that left a long, grassy stretch on the west side of Winterville. Motorists had to go “too far” to cross over
from Main to Georgia and vice versa.
The solution was to cut
a short street—about midway—to connect the strips of asphalt. And that’s when Ron’s humor kicked in. He recommended to the commission that the
58-foot road be named the Wesley Whitehead International Boulevard. The room erupted in good-natured chuckles.
At the next meeting,
Ron interjected, “I don’t think we ever recorded the vote on the Wesley
Whitehead International Boulevard.” A
few more snickers rippled around the table, but no action was taken.
Not long
thereafter, Ron came home from work, and Mary asked, “Did you notice? They put up new street signs today.” Walking outside, Ron saw that the mayor and
council had flipped the joke back onto the jokester. Two green signs—mounted 58 feet apart and
atop facing stop signs—read "Adams Alley."
Four decades later, Ron
Adams, Glynn County's clerk of superior court, is still laughing about the
“honor” of having the shortest street in the smallest town in the smallest
county in Georgia named after him.
Next time you're
in Winterville, look for Adams Alley.
Enjoy a laugh. That would tickle Ron.
