Middleton Lake is one of numerous oxbows of the Altamaha River. Here in Long County, the fabled river is nearing its rendezvous with the Atlantic Ocean and is at its wildest.
This is a relatively unspoiled area, known mostly to local fishermen and a few naturalists.
Though it has been logged in the past, it’s now largely protected. Tupelo (Nyassa aquatica) of a size large enough for a couple of men to stand inside are not unheard of.
An interesting feature of Middleton Lake is this walkway, which I first thought might have been a log tramway. Ronnie Goode explained: This walkway was built by my brother Jackie Goode & Frank McClelland Jr. around 1966. They built it for Brown Jones who was sheriff at that time. My granddaddy, Mr. Preston Gordon lived in a small cabin at the lake during the summer months and watched over the fishing in the lake. He lived there probably from 1952 till about 1958.
Vanishing Georgia: Photographs by Brian Brown 
Brian,
Your images of Tupelo trees bring back many memories of fishing on the Old River, an Oxbow of the Ocmulgee as it entered Jeff Davis County. There were sections of that backwater that was covered by huge trees, many which had gapping hollows. When the water was swift and pushed through these stands of Tupelo, fishing in the hollows often produced a mess of Red Breast Bream and Warmouth Perch. Once while fishing with my daddy back in the mid 1950’s, we had left our water jug at home and just had to have a drink so we kneeled at a fast flowing spot and drank our fill of the red tannin stained stuff. After fishing up the stream for a short distance, we discovered a bloated dead swamper with flies swarming, hung on a limb slap-dab in the middle of the flowing water. Though we felt like vomiting, we never came down with anything serious.
Jesse Bookhardt