On Saturday I visited the boyhood home of Hank Williams in Georgiana, and then decided — since I was in the neighborhood — to drive a bit further into the woods and go to Monroeville, the hometown of Harper Lee. Its former courthouse was used as the model for To Kill a Mockingbird’s courthouse, and the building is now used as a museum.  The above photo depicts three Depression-era children reading To Kill a Mockingbird. 

Although I arrived in town long after the museum’s scheduled closing at 1 PM, out of utter luck the museum was hosting a production of a Mockingbird stage play that night, and was subsequently open until ten.  The two classic cars to the right of the building are used in the play; a would-be lynch mob arrives in them.

The second floor houses the courthouse and rooms dedicated to Harper Lee and Truman Capote (both of whom grew up in Monroeville), while the first floor shows off general history, with a model lawyer’s office circa 1930.