Wayside, Mississippi

Wayside is an unincorporated community in Washington County, Mississippi, United States.^[1]

Wayside, Mississippi
Unincorporated community
Belmont Plantation in Wayside is listed on the National Register of Historic Places
Wayside, Mississippi
Coordinates: Mississippi#USA 33°16′08″N 91°02′01″W
Country	United States
State	Mississippi
County	Washington
Elevation	121 ft (37 m)
Time zone	UTC-6 (Central (CST))
• Summer (DST)	UTC-5 (CDT)
ZIP code	38780
Area code	662
GNIS feature ID	679401[1]

The settlement has a post office and water tower. Wayside is located on Mississippi Highway 1 approximately 8 mi (13 km) south of Greenville.^[2]

History

The Belmont Plantation was located in Wayside. The plantation home was completed in 1859,^[3] and has been described as "one of the few antebellum homes in the region not burned by rampaging Union soldiers".^[4] The extant home was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.^[5]

Wayside was originally located directly on the Mississippi River at the eastern end of "American Bend", and the early settlement had a steamboat landing. The river changed course following a flood in 1858, cutting off the bend and creating an oxbow lake now called Lake Lee.^[6][7]

A branch of the Louisville, New Orleans and Texas Railway, completed in the late 1880s, passed through Wayside.^[3]

In 1900, the population was 65.^[8]

On October 9, 2009, a tornado destroyed three mobile homes, damaged 16 houses and knocked down trees. A fatality occurred in a mobile home, and two others were injured.^{[citation needed]}

References

1. "Wayside". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior.
2. "Wayside Post Office". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior.
3. Hall, Russell S.; Nowell, Princella W.; Childress, Stacy (2000). Washington County, Mississippi. Arcadia. pp. 21, 46. ISBN 9780738506555.
4. The Majesty of the Mississippi Delta. Pelican. 2005. p. 54. ISBN 9781455608249.
5. "Belmont". National Park Service. Retrieved November 12, 2016.
6. Halloran, Mary Helen Griffin (2009). A Mississippi Family: The Griffins of Magnolia Terrace, Griffin's Refuge, and Greenville 1800-1950. iUniverse. p. 98. ISBN 9781440142246.
7. Bragg, Marion (1977). Historic Names and Places on the Lower Mississippi River (PDF). Mississippi River Commission. pp. 135, 136.
8. Rowland, Dunbar (1907). Mississippi: Comprising Sketches of Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, Arranged in Cyclopedic Form. Vol. 2. Southern Historical Publishing Association. p. 945.