Wallace Wooten’s passing marks 137 years of his family’s presence in this community
In 1888, the Mississippi Delta was a muddy, undeveloped swampland, only just beginning to be cleared for farmland and orchards. Abner Wooten, a young man coming of age in Memphis, TN, was hired to travel up and down the railroad, a beautifully illustrated catalogue in hand, to sell fruit trees. As he got to know the land and the people, he came across a small community being formed by the Shelby family. Abner believed he could contribute to creating the town, a business, and a community.
For a few years his family, wife Mary Treanor, and two young children Lucille Alicia and Abner Wallace, stayed in Memphis where the children were in school. His son, Wallace, came home from school one day with a friend, Lee Owen, who had lost his parents to a fever epidemic. Lee’s older brother, George, was already in medical school at the time. They had no living family, so Abner and Mary took them in. Lee was raised as Lucille and Wallace’s brother, and Abner and Mary later set George up in a medical practice in Shelby.
Down in the Delta, Abner bought a piece of land in the center of the fledgling town near the railroad from Shelby Wilson, an African-American landowner, and opened one of Shelby’s first general stores, A.M. Wooten & Company Mercantile. He had added to his own name a new middle name, Marcus, after the mentor in Memphis who had given him the tree sales job. His family moved down from Memphis and lived in the back of the store.
As the town grew, Abner began to acquire parcels of land, bit by bit, to piece together enough acreage to run a workable farm. He cobbled together a house for his family from nearby cabins, and built a commissary, a mule barn, and housing. He named the working farm after his wife – Maryland Plantation. Abner began to farm full-time, and leased out the general store.
After Abner died in 1923, his widow, Mary Wooten, ran the farm with her daughter and son, Lucille and Wallace. They built the farm up, and Wallace oversaw the construction of a new house for his bride, Alle Barnes Carr of Clarksdale. In 1927, they married and were expecting a child, when Wallace was killed in a gun accident in July 1928. On August 11th, 1928, Abner Wallace Wooten II was born in Clarksdale. His grandmother, known in the family as Mother Mary, his Aunt Lucille, and Lee Owen Sr., continued to run the farm.
When James Chow immigrated to Shelby from China in the early 1930’s, he rented the building for his grocery store from the Wootens, beginning a close friendship between the two families that continues today. As Chinese-Americans in the Delta, the Chows experienced prejudice from other locals. The Wootens and Lee Owen Sr. were instrumental in supporting them in their business and education. They later sold the building to the Chows. In Shelby, you can see James’s name still on the store across from the railroad.
One summer, when little Wallace was two years old, Alle retreated from the Delta heat to the Shenandoah Valley mountain resort of Orkney Springs. There she met William Smith, who had survived being gassed in the first world war, had become a math teacher and was working as a clerk in the hotel during the school summer holidays. They married, and from there, Wallace’s life alternated between his Virginia family and his Mississippi Delta roots. He attended Christchurch School where his stepfather, Bill Smith, had become the headmaster.
Summers were spent at Maryland Plantation where his grandmother and aunt still lived with Lee Owen Sr, his wife, and young son, Lee Owen II.
Wallace then left both homes and attended, first Vanderbilt University, and then Ole Miss law school.
Mother Mary passed away in 1949, and Lucille continued to run the farm on her own, becoming an integral leader of the Shelby community. When the Korean War broke out, Wallace, newly graduated from law school, signed up for the army and went to boot camp in Pennsylvania to train for combat. Instead he was sent with the occupational forces to Heidelberg, Germany as a journalist.
Home after his duty, he returned to Maryland Plantation to keep the plantation books for his Aunt. With strong women in his background, an erudite stepfather and a spirit of inclusion and adventure inherited from his families in Clarksdale, Virginia, and Shelby, he met the love of his life, a dance educator, sculptor, choreographer, and writer, Bettie Jane Owen. She was to return to Eugene, Oregon, where she taught dance at the University of Oregon, and Wallace was willing to move with her so that she could continue her career. But, Aunt Lucille passed away, and Wallace, along with Lee Owen Jr., inherited the farm. He was needed on Maryland Plantation, and Bet was needed with him. They married in 1955. For the next 70 years, they split their lives between Maryland Plantation, Ft. Lauderdale and France. Wallace entered into a 50 year partnership with Jim Goodman, a Bolivar County agricultural extension agent.
Wallace and Bet had three children: Abner Wallace III, August Mark, and Treanor. Their first grandson, Henry Wallace, was born on November 1, 1997. Their second, Geoffrey Owen on October 22, 1999.
On November 1, 2025 Bet will celebrate her 100th Birthday. Wallace died on October 21, 2025, at his home of 97 years, Maryland Plantation.
Co-Author- Bet Wooten