The Chronicle-star combined with the Moss Point advertiser., 1947-02-14

persuade us 10 DO something ABOUT our
even greater opportunity before it has been
completely dissipated. For we have three
times as much frontage on the Gulf as does
Alabama. At the same time, the coast
from Louisiana to the Alabama line is be-
ing cheapened and ruined at a dishearten-
ing rate. If we are going to do something
to reverse this process, it had better be
done quickly.
Very recently we drove at night from New
Orleans to Pascagoula and found it somehow
a saddening experience. Once the balmy air
of pine forests was Immediately recogniz-
able as soon as the car crossed the RigoletS
bridge and passed into St. Tammany parish,
and then into Hancock county over the Mis-
sissippi line. Now the atmosphere has chang
ed. But something else has taken their place
IA jungle of glaring neon signs which begin
back of Bay st. Louis and light the way with
their feverish and sickly glow from one end
of the coast to the other. Our coast has been
changed, cheapened and in some respects
ruined in the space of a generation. Twenty
five years ago one felt that he was literally
in Gods country" when he drove through
tn pine woods and past the wooded lots, the
graceful oaks along the beach, the quietly
lighted homes. Now the beach road for long
stretches has become a carnival midway
rivaling Coney Island in garishness. The
new double-laned highway will make driving
safer and quicker, and that of course is pro-
gress. But at the same time the beautiful oaks
and other trees which made the coast vista
what it was are being cut down by the scores;
and we can expect to see even more road
houses and tourist cabins along the way.
As for the question, what can be done
about it," Obviously nothing can be done to
prevent property owners from putting their
property to whatever usage is not forbidden
by law. But between Bayou Casotte just east
of Paseagoula, and Bayou Cadet just west
of Clermont Harbor, there are many miles of
beach undeveloped and untouched by the
cheapening hand of time, profit, and war
time crowding. The state of Mississippi could
do what Florida has already done, and what
Alabama is planning to do, by securing rights
to great stretches of this land, developing the
beaches, and turning them into public parks
on a sound commercial basis. Along the whole
stretch of coast this has been lone only on
one relatively small tract, Magnolia State
Park near Ocean Springs. But this is hardly
even a beginning. Most of the people of the
state hardly know of the existence of Mag
nolia park. For most of them it is merely a
gate and a small obscure sign on the highway.
Not many of them ever go in-but even this
relative few crowd the parks small capacity
in the summer months.
Between the state and the counties, miles
of the Gulf Coast could be preserved and de-
veloped and made into a real playground for
Mississippians and for the tourists who de-
sired to vacation amongst us. Our Coast used
to be something like this in days gone by.
But it has become something else-sacrific-
ing woods, beach and scenic beauty, to be-
come the kind of road-house spangled high
way that one can see outside any big city in
the United States, whether it be in the Stag
heaps of Pennsylvania mining country; the
badlands or the desert. We have a potentially
magnificent coastline. Let's do something
about it before the chance is gone forever.
sense; and maybe that sit