The Phoenix Naval Stores Paymaster's Office

Preserving the History of Turkey Creek

The recently-completed renovation of the Phoenix Naval Stores Paymaster's Office is a vestige of African American Life in Mississippi post Civil War

By Jordan LaHaye Fontenot

In 1866, a group of formerly enslaved individuals made a home along a tiny creek running parallel to the coast, just north of the bustling city that would later become Gulfport, Mississippi. On those three hundred and twenty acres of land, where local lore says wild turkeys roamed, their families settled in. Their isolation allowed them a sense of autonomy that continued through the Jim Crow years, during which their land wealth, self-governance, and steady employment at the nearby Yarayan Co. (and later the Phoenix Naval Stores Co.) plant allowed the people of Turkey Creek to thrive, cultivating a distinct heritage and identity as a community.

In late 2021, a long-anticipated project honoring this history was completed in Turkey Creek: the renovation of the Phoenix Naval Stores Paymaster’s Office.

From 1909 to 1958, a large percentage of Turkey Creek’s majority-Black residents were employed by the Yaryan Naval Stores Co., which was later purchased by the Phoenix Naval Stores Co. Manufacturing turpentine, creosote, and other pine sap products—the plant provided much-needed income to the community, though at a cost of the danger and health hazards that the jobs presented. In 1943, an explosion at the plant killed eleven men and wounded two others.

With the decline of the naval stores industry nationwide, the Phoenix Naval Stores Co. halted production in 1958, removing the machinery and plant from Turkey Creek. The only remaining remnant of this era is the Paymaster’s Office, built in 1920 with a fireproof roof and walls. From 1950 until the late 1990s, the building served as a family home.

In 2003, community activist Derrick Evans purchased the property in hopes of promoting its restoration as a monument to Turkey Creek’s significance during the history of post-Civil War Mississippi.

In a letter of support written to accompany the project’s application for the National Parks Service Civil Rights Program Grant, Evans expressed the historical significance of the building: “An early and longtime site of African-American industrial work in coastal Mississippi and the Deep South (including its social inequalities, vulnerabilities, and workplace tragedies), the one-time Phoenix Naval Stores turpentine plant office is now a rare and endangered vestige of the inherently interdisciplinary civil rights history and heritage of our community, nation, and state—including decades of seen and unseen advocacy for fair wages, worker rights, job safety, public health, and environmental justice for African American citizens of Gulfport, Harrison County, the state of Mississippi, and beyond.”

Since 2015, the Phoenix Naval Stores Paymaster’s Office has been listed on the Mississippi Heritage Trust’s “Ten Most Endangered Places,” and unabridged Architecture has been providing services towards the project in the form of historic research, materials investigations, design, gathering oral histories, and more.

Funded by a National Parks Service Civil Rights Program Grant, the renovation was completed in August 2021, transforming the building into a community history center and archive for the Turkey Creek community.

Visitation is by appointment only, via (228) 688-0846.

Celebrating the rehabilitation of Phoenix Naval Stores Paymaster’s Office are: Judy Steckler, former Executive Director of the Land Trust for the Mississippi Coastal Plain; Derrick Evans, owner; Rip Daniels, general contractor; Helen Aycock, former resident of the Gulf Coast Creosoting Plant; John and Allison Anderson, architects; and Lettie Evans Caldwell, long-time resident of Turkey Creek.

Photo courtesy of unabridged Architecture.