Town of Mount Olive Mississippi

The FIRST LEGO League robotics team from Mount Olive Ministries won 1st in the Mississippi State Robotics Championships on Dec 3, 2011. The category they were selected the best in the state was in Product Creation and Presentation. This is a major award category and demonstrates the students ability to create an innovative product from research to presentation. Their presentation was a mock interview with themselves as researchers with some effective team choreography. Many thanks to all of you that came out on practice night to watch and encourage the team.

“Come Home to Mount Olive” is the theme of a Homecoming Reunion event being planned for October 14 and 15 by the Mount Olive Booster Club, Mount Olive Attendance Center, and a group of enthusiastic MOHS alums.  All Pirate graduates are invited to gather up their classmates and come home for the weekend. Alums and school supporters are invited to attend Open House at Mount Olive High School on Friday, October 14 beginning at 5:00 P.M. and concluding at 6:30 P.M. in time for Pirate fans to take their seats for the crowning of the 2011 Homecoming Queen and the 7:30 P.M. kickoff when the Pirates host Resurrection on the John Brewer Field.  MOHS “01 graduating classes (’31, ’41, ’51, ’61 etc.) are encouraged to display memorabilia during the open house. Contact Paula Johnston at ohmypaula@yahoo.com for more information.

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In case you have not noticed, the Mount Olive Volunteer Fire Department has found a new home.  The Fire Department Chief, Danny Smith, said the decision to move came about when the privately owned Post Office building went up for sale a few years ago. According to Fire Chief Smith it wasn’t a hard decision to make. continue reading…

A nostalgic story by Jack Knight, a personal friend of Mr. Miller

I still play golf with the folks I started with more than two decades ago. Some have passed on, others are up at the State Veteran’s Home, but that does not dampen the spirit.  Our game will keep going until the last “hacker” is left standing.  Golf buddies form special bonds which last for a life-time. This relationship is similar to those forged between the warriors who serve our country; the difference, golf is not up close and lethal but the game truly hacks one’s sole.

The most memorable friend I was fortunate to know and play golf with was Winton Miller, the mail rider. He was a rural mailman by trade and a human being by birth.  God ain’t making too many more Wintons, you see he was bonafide; a quiet man, the main man, so to speak. He was truly a person of character who played a relaxed game of golf. Winton’s game was short in distance but he was straight and consistent. The missed 4-foot putts really skewed his game but that didn’t seem to bother him.  He would chase the missed putt and attempt to herd the ball in the hole.

The mail rider was partial to good lies, and he would if necessary improve a bad lie by taking a 7 iron and hacking up a mound of dirt the size of an ant hill for his ball to rest on. Miller also had an aversion for the two lakes which lay between the fairways and the greens on our course. Consequently, he carried a bag of ugly red-striped balls which he called “river balls”.  It was always “Miller time” when attempting to hit over the lakes.  He shared the river balls with us all.  You see, Winton never lost a ball in his life.  This success was attributed to scissored holes in his front pockets.  He also had a backup; he would never tell us the brand of his lost ball until we told him the brand we found. The main man was never out of bounds because he had the best rugged, right-legged Thom McCann putter on the course.

One summer afternoon he killed a snake with a 9 iron on the 16th hole. I asked him if he hit the snake with a 7 and he hesitated for two seconds and replied, “Aw just a 4″. Winton also carried a driver that looked like the rear leg of a race horse. The man said the head was made from a secret high-grade Teflon. When he struck the ball off the tee with that driver, the pine burrs, straw, and dazed squirrels would fall for several minutes.

Over the years Winton became a part of our lives. The mail rider was our golf brother. On his 80th birthday the entire town of Mount Olive showed up for the party.  This speaks infinitely many words about the character of the mailman.  It was not long after his party that he crossed to the other side.

Golf is akin to life itself. It is unconquerable, unforgiving and a forever struggle and we continue to play with great gusto. I have learned what character truly means. You see, I teed up with Winton Miller, he was bonafide; a quiet man, the main man, so to speak.

This story was written by Jack Knight, a retired Los Angeles City School math teacher who resides in Collins, Ms. Permission to post the story on the website was granted by the author, Jack Knight.