Tifton - Slums

Tifton Streets

Tenement halls dominate the residential area, though a few aging and decrepit town homes still stand in mute and fading testament to the area’s former prosperity. A handful of shops break the otherwise uninterrupted chain of empty storefronts, and a decaying church, Our Lady of Infinite Mercy, lends an air of gothic entropy to the otherwise jagged and artless architecture. Just beyond the dying grass and grayish sand of Tifton Park, past a chain link fence and across one of the city’s concrete veins, the rotting corpse of the city’s once vibrant industrial economy looms, a labyrinth of alleys and dead ends, choked by the wreak of the factories, long since stilled. Wild rumors abound concerning the nocturnal happenings in the Barrens, and the lack of Police presence, or any semblance of civilization, the area draws those desperate for a thrill, or just plain desperate…

Tifton Park

The park is emblematic of the struggle for the heart and soul of the community, and is both a literal and figurative battleground. The few remaining patches of grass struggle pull nourishment from the depleted soil and the myriad of pollutants have turned the sand in playground a dull gray. Despite a seemingly endless succession of paint jobs and superficial cleanings, the park carries a vague impression of griminess that has proved near impossible to erase, defying all community efforts. Every Sunday morning the park plays host to a “weeds and seeds’ farmer’s market, but in order to do so, volunteers from Our Lady of Infinite Mercy spend the early morning hours diligently removing the hypodermic needles from the sandboxes, and the used condoms from beside the swing sets. In the afternoons, children from the TLC Daycare center can be seen playing, the evenings bring teenagers with cheap beer and marijuana, and the late hours of the night bring all manner of drunks, junkies, pushers, perverts and vagrants to the park.

Our Lady of Infinite Mercy

The stone facade of the church is weathered, though it seems to be as well maintained as anything in Tifton. Constructed in the gothic style, if not the gothic scale, the spire boasts some of the city’s finest architectural sculpture, a watch of four angels, each winged and carrying a flaming sword looking outward in the cardinal directions. In the church’s annex there is a soup kitchen, thrift store and clothing bank as well as a few offices for the rector and other essential staff. All of the doors save those to the sanctuary show signs of restoration where graffiti once marred them, and all are thick and heavy, lending a fortress-like feel to the complex.

Tifton Community Center

The center is an anomaly in Tifton; a clean, well lit place with smiling faces. These faces are a mix of recent college graduates, Teach for America rejects ‘trying to make a difference,’ and older residents, men and women who have lived here too long to fear anything, or have very much to lose. Among the upright citizens of Tifton, the center is well regarded; its community outreach programs do everything from help with taxes, arranging legal aid attorneys to fight evictions, or neighborhood watch to a controversial needle exchange program. The real powers behind Tifton, the drug dealers, slumlords, and gangs regard the Center and its workers as meddlesome; profits are down and the Center has given an otherwise cowed populace some spine. Attacks on Center employees or the center itself are frequent enough that the doors are locked and metal shudders drawn promptly at nightfall.

Heebee Jeebees

Founded almost two decades ago by some junkies after a big score, “Heebs” as it is known to the locals has become the definitive home of Bohemian culture in Tifton and the surrounding areas. The bar fell into the national spotlight briefly in the early Nineties when a string of successful bands (Citizen Prick, the Mongoloid Smilies, and Intravenus DeMilo) suddenly defined the genre of Grunge and made flannel cool again. The club boasts a small bar that serves beer and liquor at extremely low prices and there is almost never a cover. Only one of the founders, Andrew Woodal, still operates the place, tending bar and adding a little poignancy to the notion of ‘tragically hip.’

The Emperor's Screen

A squat rectangular building of two stories, the Emperor's Screen caters to a specific clientele in seedy Tifton: the addicts of chance and skill. Devoid of the trappings of common bars or pool houses, this hall focuses on the individuals who are playing. The central area consists of several pool tables sunk into the floor so that a playing and spectator area are formed. Initially hidden from view by a set of Chinese themed wooden screens that guard the entranceway almost as well as the few rough locals hired to protect the clientele, the pool hall has an aura of secrecy. What serves as a bar is really just a way station in the corner for spectators chatting or roaming between the tables or booths arranged along the edge of the walls. A hallway containing the bathrooms and a guarded door leading into the storage room is the only other exit from the billiards section. The storage room has access to an office which services drug deals, and where basic finances are worked through. There is also a set of stairs leading up and down into other parts of the building. The basement is extremely well-furnished and the most Chinese themed place in the building. A door leads into the Ma Jong room which contains many low cushions for seating and dimly lit tables filled with playing pieces. The Ma Jong room is often called the "Dragon's Nest" because venerable members of the Chinese community and Triad come to partake of the traditional game in a restful environment. The top floor of the building is the poker room and also Todd's office (locked). Three doors are available upon exiting the stairs. The middle one is Todd's office, a well-furnished realm containing sleek fashions and strange arcana that don't befit his street upbringing. The other two doors lead to poker rooms where exclusive patrons play, one table per room. A dealer is in each room waiting for any group to assemble to play.

The Barrens

Deriving its name both from its general feeling of desolation and its main artery, Baron Street, the area known as “The Barrens” is a formal industrial and shipping sector that spans about 40 city blocks, though there are few marked streets. Loading docks, recessed alleyways and cut-troughs create a labyrinthine sprawl that has become the home of the city’s most dangerous and destitute. Warehouse raves are not uncommon, but if rumors are believed, dungeons, brothels, shooting galleries, and snuff houses also abound. Because the area is largely self contained and houses few, if any, ‘legitimate’ tenants, the Barrens is largely devoid of city services, though a few working streetlights, water sources, and electrical outlets are known to exist, and are guarded jealously.

Duchess Station

Once a large hub for the movement of commercial rail and trucks, the area known as Duchess Station is the largest and most populace of the squatter encampments, a neo-primitive village within the city. Groups of three or four share the massive shipping containers that line the gravel tracks, becoming fiercely territorial. The interior of the building contains running water, though it spews from decrepit and rusting pipes, and the area and access is shared, a sort of proto-social contract having developed among the Station residents. Theft is common, though punishment is often terrible for such a transgression; most often, due to the prevalence of gravel, those who disrupt the balance are met with the traditional Biblical sanction of stoning. Unlike most of the other camps, which move frequently, the Station is well established, and even the Police are aware of its existence. While dirty and squalid, the place is a clearinghouse of information, and almost anything happening ‘on the street’ can be learned of here, for the right price.