
Hello Market in Bessemer, Alabama
Not that fancy “Down Home White Dirt” that’s professionally harvested in Griffin, Georgia either. I went all-in for local dirt that’s brought to market by bootleg dirt vendors tilling the clay hills of Alabama.

Hello Market 2729 12th Ave N, Bessemer, Alabama 35020
Those big fine American automobiles your daddy used to drive? The steel used in their production often came from Bessemer.

Hello Market 205-425-6990
When Motörhead came to Alabama to rock their Orgasmatron LP they didn’t come to Birmingham; they came to the Bessemer Civic Center, and brought the Bang Gang along for the ride. We loaded up a bunch of punks and heshers in our Hondas and Datsuns and took the 20 minute drive to Bessemer like life itself hung in the balance.

I love a well-stocked mom and pop curb store
Last month I was planning a visit to Birmingham and doing what I always do when I’m plotting a course; sifting through local media and just generally taking the lay of the land. WBRC, a Bham TV station had decided to send a reporter to Hello Market, a tiny, run-down meat market off Jaybird Road near the northern fringe of Bessemer’s old downtown.
Along with every kind of meat you could imagine, the reporter had also discovered “sour dirt” on the market’s shelves. People in the Deep South have been eating dirt for centuries. Known by scholars as geophagy, the practice continues today and not only in the rural south. People across the globe are eating dirt.

A young worker surveys a tray of sour dirt at Hello Market in Bessemer, Alabama
Sera Young of Cornell University has spent 20 years studying the practice – beginning in Tanzania where she was interviewing a pregnant woman who casually mentioned that she liked digging dirt out of her home’s walls and ingesting it twice a day.
Young was shocked and her path to scholarship was set. Over the next two decades she threw herself into her studies and became recognized as an authority on the ingestion of dirt. Most surprising is that the practice can become habitual and habit forming.

A patron weighs her options at the meat counter at Hello Market in Bessemer, Alabama
I have to try a little bit so I mention to Carlos, the shopkeep that I’d like a portion to gnaw on, he laughs “no problem my friend” as he reaches under a cooler and pulls out a cardboard tray lined with what appears to be small rocks.
I take a tiny bit and pop it into my mouth. As my spit mingles with the clay dirt an alarming paste is formed. I grab a bottle of water out of a nearby cooler and wash the mud down my throat. Maybe dirt’s an acquired taste.

Carlos is the proprietor of Hello Market in Bessemer, Alabama
“What else can I get you my friend?” he smiles.

RL Reeves Jr visits Hello Market in Bessemer, Alabama
As I ride along the near-shattered blacktop of the expressway I’m left to think of the curious luxury that sour dirt must be to some.

Hello Market in Bessemer, Alabama
Hello Market
2729 12th Ave North
Bessemer, Alabama
35020
Telephone
205-425-6990
Hours of operation
always call ahead

Bessemer, Alabama
Here’s the Motorhead set list from the show. I stumbled upon it when I was doing research for the piece. I remember not being old enough to drink so I smuggled in a flask of whiskey. The night soon devolved into a blur of flashing elbows in the pit of Motörhead’s monstrous drone.
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