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Mossy Grove was mainly a farming community where the hub of activity thrived at the little school, which is now a restaurant.  From March 5, 1995, is an article from the Southern Style section of the Troy Messenger.

When many people in Troy hear the words Mossy Grove, they think of a seafood restaurant located inside a restored schoolhouse that sits beside a cemetery.

But to residents of that area, Mossy Grove is a community that revolved around the school until consolidation in the early 1900s.  Then, the schoolhouse was used as a community building.

To residents, Mossy Grove was also a quiet little settlement that consisted of a main road that was sandy.  The community is located just outside the Troy city limits on Elba Highway going south.

Lifelong resident W. W. Curtis said the Elba Highway was paved in 1931 or 1932.

“It was just a clay highway,” Curtis said.  ‘Before they built the highway, it was just deep sand.  It was hard to make it up to Mossy Grove with a heavy load in a wagon because of the sand,” Curtis said.

The area was mainly a farming area.  Residents raised peanuts, cotton, and corn.  In later years, soybeans were also raised.  Eventually, peanuts became the main crop, Curtis said.

Curtis has never left Mossy Grove.  He said the community has never had much activity or entertainment because of its proximity to Troy.

“When I grew up, it was the depression,” Curtis said.  “Mossy Grove was too close to Troy to have entertainment on its own.  Way back yonder, they used to play baseball in the summer.  That was our main recreation in the summer.”

The community got its name from the moss of the trees.

The main hub of activity in Mossy Grove came from the school in the early 1900s.

“Mossy Grove school was consolidated a year or two before I went to school,” he said.  “It was consolidated with Springhill.  The children were bussed down there.”

After the school consolidated, the schoolhouse was used as a community building.  Then, the property was deeded to the previous owners, The Bradelys, who were landowners in the area.

Other than the schoolhouse, Mossy Grove had a store in the community that had been there since Curtis could remember.  His grandfather, James J. Curtis, owned and ran the store “a long time ago.”

“It was handed down to my father and then my uncle,” he said.  “It was just a country store.”

Although the community is quiet, Curtis said it’s home for him.

“My great-granddaddy came from Georgia and homesteaded here,” he said.  “This is the only home I ever knew.”

All of these articles can be found in previous editions of The Troy Messenger.  Dianne Smith is the President of the Pike County Historical, Genealogical, and Preservation Society