Pierson, Fla. Keeps Up With Chipper

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Pierson, Florida -- In the peculiar geography of modern-day Florida, this sleepy backwater that proclaims itself the fern-growing capital of the world is just for enough north that it's still Southern.

Folks here tend to drive pick-up trucks, not flashy little imported cars.

They work with their hands, tilling the sandy earth that yields the famous leatherleaf ferns and other ornamental plants that are the town's lifeblood.

And when they open their mouths, a drawl as thick as winter molasses pours out, nearly always accompanied by a grin or at least a friendly smile.

All of those are reasons enough that Pierson might tend to be an Atlanta Braves stronghold, a place where the appeal of the upstart Florida Marlins hasn't overcome tradition.

But the Braves have a stronger pull on Person than just geography of culture.

It's etched right into wood of the town's proud new signs, one mile apart, one greeting northbound traffic on U.S. Highway 17, one greeting southbound -- don't blink, or you might miss them.

"Pierson," the signs read, "Fern Capital of the World." And then below, in bold letters right next to a small white baseball, "Hometown of Chipper Jones."

Pierson may be in Florida, but you can search all day long and not find a Marlins fan here.

Folks will tell you they know of one or two -- the guy who lives in the double-wide off the dirt road; the fella who wrecked his truck and lost his baseball cap; the waitress at the cafe who moved here from some place else -- but a day of poking around town produces only fleeting descriptions, no actual sightings.

"I expect you'll find most people from this particular area are going to be for Atlanta," allowed Greg Dixon, 37, who works at the Ace Hardware store. "Now you go a little further south and you might find some Marlins fans. But I wouldn't know from personal experience. I've never been further south than Orlando, and that's as far as I ever care to go."

Here in Pierson, Miami isn't exactly a dirty word, although there are floks who seem to scrunch their mouth up when they speak it, as if it tasted like sour apples.

"I know plenty of people who go to Atlanta to see the Braves play," said Brian Dixon, 25, who knows Chipper personally, and like everybody else, seems to think the world of him. "My brother went to Miami to a game once, but he only went to see the Braves, so that don't count."

But Piersonites swear they would love the Braves even if it weren't for Chipper. Sure, Chipper's dad -- that's Larry Wayne Jones Sr., not Chipper Sr. -- taught half the town math at Taylor High School. But he was popular and respected even before his son got famous.

No, Pierson probably would be a Braves town even without Chipper.

It's slow, and Southern. It's off the mani highway, a place where some kids listen to the games on radio because that's the only way they can get them. They have to draw the plays out in their mind's eye, and that very act proves a powerful force for building boyhood dreams.

Pierson is so small it only has a couple of stoplights. There's on bank, one or two restaurants, a couple of hardware and farm-supply stores, the post office, and that's about it.

But there are four baseball diamonds at a city complex with a dirt road recently renamed "Chipper Jones Lane."

Dreams can grow big on small diamonds like that, maybe because there's not much else around Pierson to clutter up those dreams. It's a town that seems happily stuck in a simpler, friendlier time -- a throwback, just like they call its favorite son.

Sometimes, on a balmy summmer night, the whole town -- or what seems like it anyway -- might turn out for a good Little League game.

And the fact that one of the local boys really did grow up, go off and make it in the Big Leagues makes the magic all that much more powerful.

Most folks here claim they've always pulled for the Braves. Many of them remember their excitement back in the 1960s when they heard there was finally a real major-league team moving to a city in the South.

They became Braves fans then, and they stuck with the club through some long, hard years. They're sticking with them now, even if another new team has opened up shop in a city even nearer, a city in their own home state.

People in Pierson stay local to their roots.

"I've always liked the Braves," said Chad Norris, 22, who also works at Ace Hardware. "Even before they go Chipper. I've got pictures of me from when I was only this high," -- he chops the air somewhere about his waist -- "wearing my Braves cap and jersey."

Still, there must be at least one Florida Marlins fan in Pierson. "My brother is," admits Melissa South, a waitress at Carter's Restaurant, wherer Chipper is known to eat and sign autographs when he's in town. "He's the only one in town who will come right out and say it. He believes if you live in Florida, you ought to back a Florida team."

So, new traditions may be growing alongside the old, even if they catch on slowly, one fan at a time.

But the old ones die hard.

"My brother may be a Marlins fan, but my son is an adamant Braves fan," South said. "All the little kids here love the Braves, and they all love Chipper."

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