Windmill Down at Old Pike Road and a Man Got a Gun Trying to Shoot That Bird

Perhaps finding an image of himself in the birds, Mose Tolliver chooses to depict his nostalgic memory of home at a moment when a vulnerable animal is being threatened by a blond hunter as it tries to rest and roost. Although here they are colorfully portrayed, Tolliver’s memories of childhood are inescapably shrouded by threats and fear. His family moved to Montgomery to look for work in the 1930s when they could no longer survive as tenant farmers in the Pike Road community, and the move to the city brought new intimidation and trouble.