EDWARDS — She has visited all seven continents and has sailed on all the oceans except the Arctic, has seen six of the seven Wonders of the World, but Lillie Lovette’s favorite place is called, “Home.”

Travel should be her middle name, for Lillie has been on the go since her college days at Ole Miss, suggesting the truth in the old Southern saying that she heard the call of the wild goose when she was born. She said her desire to travel is probably rooted in the stories her grandfather told her when she was a child, about his adventures in France during World War I.

“It sounded so exotic, it sounded like it was in another universe,” Lillie said, “and I would say, ‘Boy, I want to do that some day.’ After college my priority was to save my money and take a trip.”

That first trip was to Paris. She’s now been there six times, “and I loved it,” and if she has the opportunity she’ll go back.

Lillie grew up in D’Lo, a Simpson County town that had the patriotic distinction in World War II of providing more men and women in the armed forces, per capita, than any other place in America.

Its unique name came about, possibly, because when a railroad was being constructed there the workers found it “too darned low” as their shovels struck water. The other legend, which Lillie wants to believe because, “I would like to think we were a little more up-town is that it came from a French word meaning water, but I’m not so sure.”

Lillie jokingly said her hometown is one reason she loves to travel. “When you’re from D’Lo you want to get out of town. Maybe we weren’t that patriotic (in World War II). Maybe we just wanted to leave,” but she seriously said of the place where her mother was the first woman on the town board, “D’Lo was a great place to grow up.”

In college, where she earned “more degrees than a Drexel thermometer,” she majored in political science and sociology and wrote a master’s thesis on male prostitution, “but before you discount that, the glossary of terms I put together has been used in youth courts and by law enforcement officials in providing the knowledge to deal with such cases.”

It had another plus for Lillie: the panel of professors to hear her defend her thesis were all males “and they didn’t want to sound too interested.” Her questioning by the panel lasted all of 10 minutes.

She was on the faculty of Holmes Community College at Goodman and then at the school’s campuses in Grenada and Ridgeland, where she won every award from faculty and students a teacher could receive. She remembers it as, “the golden time of my life. I loved it.” However, with increasing hearing problems which made classroom teaching more and more difficult, “I decided to leave on a high note.”

It was during those years she co-authored two textbooks, and she also was granted a Fulbright scholarship, going to Russia for three months in 1989. That year, the country was still under Communist rule, but was going through a tremendous amount of change though Lillie “didn’t see any of it myself. The people were afraid, didn’t look you in the eye, and dreaded the secret police.” She found nothing in the stores she would even think of buying.

Recently she made a return trip and found Russia “like any other part of Europe, except it’s more fashionable.” The once-drab stores are now elegantly decorated with chandeliers, and they sell high-end and name-brand products, “and the people are buying, not just looking.” Though organized crime has replaced the Marxist regime, she found the people very friendly.

“It’s a whole different world there,” she said.

Lillie refers to herself as a “monument hopper,” for when she travels she visits historic places, such as the palace of Catherine the Great where she saw the crown jewels and other national treasures.

Other travels in recent years include Argentina and Chile, both of which she loved, and Egypt. She’s been there twice for, “There is so much to see — the museums, the antiquities. It’s unbelievable that you’re walking where Cleopatra, Julius Caeser and Mark Antony once wa1ked.”

Antarctica, though, “was like nothing I had ever seen before.” In addition to the extreme cold, there were the countless penguins and the albatross of literature and history fame. It was the ice, however, that captivated her: “The older ice is blue, and the sunlight shining through it was like jewels.”

She’s not one to take a lot of pictures and though she takes some photos for souvenirs, “I don’t want to miss the experience of seeing with my own eyes. Your friends really don’t want to see those pictures. Pull ’em out and they’ll scatter like the great speckled bird.”

Lillie describes herself as “a true Southerner,” and when in traveling if you meet someone else from the South “you feel like you’ve almost been with family.” She lets people know where she’s from — she wears an Ole Miss shirt.

She has her favorite things, such as a real book in her hands, not something computerized, because “I like to turn a page.” Math? “I just don’t like it.” She said she’s “the epitome of everything you’ve ever read about a Taurus. It hits me right on the money — down to earth, slow to anger. But once I do get mad, you’d better get out of the way. It takes a lot to get me there, but I will paw the ground at that point,” She’s “so practical I’m almost boring with it,” finds simple ways to handle most problems and is amazed when people don’t see it that way.

A dozen or so years ago Dr. Barbara Carpenter, who heads the Mississippi Humanities Council, prevailed upon Lillie to help with one special project, but since then she’s helped coordinate every one of them, such as the Smithsonian exhibit that was in Vicksburg a few years ago.

The next exhibit, she said, will be “The Way We Worked” and is about jobs that don’t exist anymore such as pumping gas, operating elevators, or talking to a real person on a phone rather than pushing a button.

Lillie has spoken on a variety of subjects for the Humanities Council but told Dr. Carpenter, “The only thing I plan to talk about for the next 10 years is Merle Haggard.” It was said tongue-in-cheek, but Dr. Carpenter took her seriously and listed Lillie in the speakers bureau.

The result was “The Lyrics of Merle Haggard.” She’s made the presentation numerous times and believes “it’s a really good way to teach history. He (Haggard) was a protester’s protester who spoke for the silent majority who weren’t being heard during the Vietnam War.”

Haggard’s lyrics were about “taking responsibility for yourself rather than blaming outside forces. His songs are toe-tapping. I have to throw in a few drinking songs, like ‘Mama Tried.’ He was a really good songwriter whose lyrics call for a return to more conservative times.”

Lillie hasn’t yet tried her hand at creative writing, though she might one day. The stage isn’t for her, though she has performed in “Gold in the Hills.” She’s a member of the advisory council at the Old Court House Museum and enjoys the role of Mrs. Balfour at the annual Confederate Christmas Ball.

Of her many travel experiences, there is one close to home that she’ll not forget. Some years ago in New Orleans with friends at a public function she saw an elderly man sitting all alone, being totally ignored. There were seats around him, and Lillie asked if she might sit by him and made small talk.

When it came time for him to go, she warned him about how unsafe it was in some areas. When he started to his cab, Lillie walked with him, seeing him safely inside. He thanked her and told her he had known women, but she was very much a lady. Returning to the building she learned who he was — Carlos Marcello, famous mob boss of New Orleans!

Lillie has never lived outside the South and never has had the desire to. She’s “very privileged to be a seventh-generation Mississippian,” adding, “our generations were long ones — we didn’t have children at 15.” As to her ancestors in the 1860s, she said with her best Southern drawl, “You know which side they were on.”

When Lillie was a child, she would visit her uncle and aunt, Ray and Verna Grantham, who owned a dry cleaners in Edwards. She and her parents would spend pleasant times watching “The Untouchables” on TV, eating, and sometimes walking around town. Holding her daddy’s hand, they’d pass this house that Lillie liked and she’d say to her father, “Oh, wouldn’t you like to live there? And of course he wouldn’t.”

Today Lillie owns that house, built in 1860 by a transplanted Kentuckian, William T. Withers, who became a Confederate soldier who, tradition says, fired the last shot “in defiance” at the surrender of Vicksburg. Later he sold the house, moved back to Kentucky, raised horses and sold one to U.S. Grant

Restoration is a work in progress, and Lillie said her dream of the house, like one of Tennessee Williams’ characters, is not as beautiful as the dream.

“After I bought it, I was sitting on the porch and heard Mother tell a friend, ‘You know, I worked all my life so Lillie wouldn’t have to live in a house like this,’” but Lillie said, “I’ve worked all my life to be able to live in it.”

Travel and study have their rewards, and Lillie has seen a lot. But she still has a major desire. “I want America back the way it was.”

Traveling provides great experiences, she said, and, “you see things you’ve never seen before. There’s a wonderful, exotic, new world out there. But the feeling of coming home is always so great. My favorite place is home.”