Maxeys, Georgia

There’s a little community, about a dozen miles southeast of Athens, that I’ve wandered through many times. A couple of old buildings, what looks like a repurposed train station and an abandoned set of tracks that will become part of a bike trail between Athens and Union Point.

I saw online this morning that one of the only businesses there burned down Saturday morning, a building I’d photographed before and a business I’d wandered through. Something called, so I wandered out.

Still smoldering, there was a steady stream of folks coming by to assess and reminisce. I spent a while listening to one woman, tears in her eye, tell me about the couple who ran Maxeys Country Store. The husband didn’t make it out she had learned.

The store was adjacent to the joint city hall, post office and volunteer fire department building. Twenty feet away and they couldn’t save it.

Even the wood sign was charred.