MARGARET'S GROCERY AND MARKET
Highway 61, Vickburg, Mississippi

Margaret's Grocery and Market, The Home of the Double Headed Eagle (Route 4, Box 219, Vicksburg, Mississippi) is owned by Margaret Rogers Dennis and her husband Reverend H. D. Dennis, who is responsible for the architectural look of the place. Dennis was born in 1916 in Rolling Fork, Mississippi and married the widow Rogers, his fifth wife, in 1979. Most of his structural additions to the store are built of cinder blocks painted red and white.

The interior of the market-church is decorated with elaborate candelabras and chalices as well as conventional shelves for groceries. Reverend Dennis also owns a church bus, outfitted with a pulpit and pews.

Hand-painted signage not fully visible in this picture includes the following messages:

THE CHURCH
OF CHRIST
IS THE ONLY ONE

ALL IS WELCOME
JEWS AND GENTILES
HERE AT MARGARET'S
GRO. & MKT.
AND BIBLE CLASS

I ran across this beautiful vernacular sacred site in a magazine called "Raw Vision, the International Journal of Intuitive and Visionary Art." What the author of the article, Cynthia Elyce Rubin, failed to note -- and what will be apparent to any Freemason viewing this illustration, is that the Double Headed Eagle atop the signage is not just any eagle: it is that of the 32nd degree of the Scottish Rite. Furthermore, the two pillars flanking the door of the store are marked with the golden letters B and J, initials familiar to all Masons. A smaller illustration from the magazine, not shown here because it is far too dark to reproduce, details one of the front windows, which carries the symbol for the Order of the Eastern Star; i think it is a fair guess that the matching window on the other side of the facade bears the Master Mason's symbol of a Square and Compasses with the letter G. Considering the region in which this site has been erected, one can safely assume that Reverend Dennis is a member of a Prince Hall Masonic lodge, for most of the members of that jurisdiction are African-American.

Bill Swislow, who maintains a fine site called Roadside Art Online: Environments has also documented Margaret's Grocery.

  • Go to Swislow's exterior views of Margaret's Grocery.

  • Go to Swislow's interior views of Margaret's Grocery.

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