Sweet Home Alabama: Then and Now – 12 Years Later

Town of Pigeon Creek (Real name: Crawfordville, GA)
This is the famed town in the movie where Melanie “Smooter” grew up and married her childhood sweetheart before she moved to the Big Apple and changed her identity to Melanie “Carmichael.”

The town of Crawfordville has served as the backdrop for a dozen films over the last 35 years. It was founded in 1825 and is the county seat of Taliaferro County, one of the poorest and smallest counties in the state. Although the town is popular among the Hollywood folks for filming movies, scouts accidentally stumbled upon this small town in rural Georgia while they were searching for filming locations 700-800 miles around Atlanta.

In late November 2001 film crews rolled into town to shoot for about a month or so since the majority of the movie was filmed in Crawfordville. The town housed several of the venues we see in the film such as Stella’s Roadhouse, Sheriff’s Department, Post Office, and the Bank. It was also home to the Coon Dog Cemetery and the Catfish Festival.

Sadly, at the time of this writing, approximately 95% of the stores in town are closed for business and display a “For Sale” sign in the window. I kid you not, this place looks like a ghost town. Melanie wasn’t kidding when she said “People need a passport to come down here!” Alright, moving on…

So this is the very first storefront we see in the movie when Melanie crosses the Pigeon Creek town line. It can be seen briefly as she drives through town on the way to Jake’s house. Unfortunately, like many of the stores on the block, this antique store is now out of business.

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