This issue explores the history of two well-known Berrien County country stores—Shebargie in the New Lois community and Sheboggy near Alapaha—both of which served as important rural gathering places for several decades. Shebargie, originally known as Whispering Pines and built in the late 1920s by Otto E. Summerlin, operated as a store, grist mill, and local social center featuring the community’s first radio. Through a succession of owners including Bernys Peters, K.M. Miller, Edwin Smith, and Milton Harris, the store functioned as a barter point, meeting place, and fuel stop before declining in the 1950s after the construction of Highway 37.

Sheboggy, founded in the late 1920s by Sherman “Bo” Smith along Highway 50, developed an even more colorful history as a service station, café, dance hall, and later a notorious entertainment and liquor stop. Ownership passed to the Jernigan family and later to the Moore brothers, whose additions of gambling machines, beer sales, and nightlife made Sheboggy a famous roadside landmark. The business continued into the postwar era under Julius and Bessie Brogdon, later operated by E.B. “Beuren Jr.” Jacobs, before being demolished around 1989. The newsletter provides photographs, local anecdotes, and census references documenting how both establishments shaped rural community life in Berrien County.

Subjects(Names): Brogdon, Bessie; Brogdon, Julius; Cooper, Bessie; Daniels, Charlie; Harris, Maudell; Harris, Milton; Jacobs, E. B. “Beuren Jr.”; Jernigan, Lewis; Jernigan, Sarah; Miller, K. M.; Moore, Clayton; Moore, Ocie; Peters, Bernys; Peters, Billy; Peters, Edna Davis; Sellars, Gene; Smith, Edwin; Smith, Janie Mae; Smith, Paulk; Smith, Sherman “Bo”; Strickland, John; Strickland, Johnny; Summerlin, Otto E.; Webb, Elwood; Webb, Emory; Webb, Garth; Webb, Hamer; Webb, Johnny Pat