Clarksdale, Mississippi has been a center for blues culture since the 1920s.
Its location as a transportation hub—where Highways 61 and 49 connect,
where the Illinois Central and other railroads maintained depots and
passenger terminals, and where the Greyhound Bus Company built a
station—made Clarksdale an economic boom town. Flush times
created audiences with money to spend for entertainment, and
the blues flourished in the city. Many now-legendary musical artists
were born and raised in and around Clarksdale: Muddy Waters,
John Lee Hooker, Son House, Ike Turner, Jackie Brenston, Sam Cooke,
Junior Parker, and W. C. Handy, among them. Clarksdale was a major
market for the Delta’s constantly traveling musicians, and the likes of
Robert Johnson, Howlin’ Wolf, and Charley Patton are also associated
with the city. Today, that historic blues culture is preserved for visitors
while contemporary musicians carry on the great Delta blues tradition.

What to See


In Clarksdale

• Delta Blues Museum The state’s oldest music museum “delivers not only the music but also the culture that produced it.” (NY Times).

• Greyhound Bus Station This 1930 Art Deco-style passenger terminal is perfectly preserved, and now serves as a setting for Delta Blues Museum exhibitions and special events.

• Lambfish Art Company A gallery of art and pottery by Joey Young. Located on Third Street, a short walk from the Delta Blues Museum. Open Saturdays and by appointment. Live music on occasion. Lambfishart@yahoo.com 662-934-4226
www.myspace.com/lambfishart

Rock 'n Roll & Blues Heritage Museum This museum preserves the history and evolution of Blues music to Rock 'n Roll from its roots to its derivatives from the 1920's through the 1970's and its impact on the popular music around the world. The museum has 6 rooms (appr.3000 sq. ft.) packed with memorabilia, posters, autographed photos and a giftshop. It includes photo exhibits of today's Clarksdale musicians.
www.rockmuseum.biz

• Carnegie Public Library the original home of the Delta Blues Museum, the library now houses its archives, plus an incredible exhibit of Native American pottery.

• Riverside Hotel History you can experience first-hand (see above, “Where to stay”). The Hotel has been honored with a historic Mississippi Blues Trail marker from the Mississippi Blues Commission.

• The Crossroads A long-told legend has it that Robert Johnson, the quintessential Delta bluesman, sold his soul to the devil at a crossroads at midnight in exchange for the talent to play and sing his haunted, transcendent songs. The intersection of Highways 61 and 49, the Delta’s two main roads since the early 20th century, is marked by a giant “crossroads” sign of oversized guitars. In reality, the thousands of crossroads throughout the Delta were often the locations of local stores and a small cluster of homes where traveling blues musicians could find ready audiences.

• New World District The Delta’s counterpart to Memphis’ Beale Street, the district, with Issaquena Avenue as its main thoroughfare, was an active center of African-American cultural life until the 1940s. Now, this largely abandoned area awaits full-scale renovation.

• St. George’s Episcopal Rectory Named a national Literary Landmark in 2003, the former rectory was a childhood home of playwright Tennessee Williams, whose first collection of one-act plays was titled American Blues, who suffered from the “blue devils” his whole life, and who wrote nine plays about life in the Delta, among them Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

• Belle-Clark Mansion A model for “Belle Reeve,” the lost family home in Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire. Built by John Clark, the founder of Clarksdale, who had a daughter named Blanche considered eccentric even by the Delta’s high standards of idiosyncratic behavior.

• Cutrer Mansion This Italian Renaissance villa was home to Blanche Clark after she married into the Cutrer family. It is now in use as the Coahoma County Higher Education Center, a partnership between Delta State University and Coahoma Community College.

• Muddy Waters cabin site A Mississippi Blues Trail marker has recently been placed on the site of Muddy Water’s family home on Stovall Farms, just outside Clarksdale. See the surrounding cotton fields where McKinley Morganfield (his actual name) drove a tractor before being recorded on his porch by folklorist Alan Lomax in 1941, an event that inspired Waters to move to Chicago and make music history. See the cabin itself inside the Delta Blues Museum.

• Sunflower River Before the Delta was cleared at the end of the 19th century, the region’s rivers were the area’s principal “highways.” Many early Delta towns were founded on rivers like the Sunflower for ease of transportation through the tangled swamps.


In the Area

• Hopson Plantation About ten minutes south of downtown. Site of the first mechanical cotton picker field tests; one of the original pickers is on view. Also, see The Commissary, formerly the plantation’s headquarters. Next door to the Shack Up Inn and Cotton Gin Inn (see “Where to Stay”).

• Highway 61 Blues Museum. Located in downtown Leland, about an hour south of Clarksdale, this museum’s collection focuses on the area’s many mid-Delta musicians through a motley assemblage of posters, clothing, instruments, and clippings that gives a real feel for blues as a lived culture. Nearby streets feature murals honoring many of the same musicians. (662-686-7646/662-686-2063; www.highway61blues.com)

• Friar’s Point A one-time railroad center (for the Riverside line, as in Robert Johnson’s “Traveling Riverside Blues”) and therefore a travel and performing hub for Johnson, Robert Nighthawk, and other itinerant musicians, Friar’s Point is twenty minutes northwest of Clarksdale. There you’ll find the North Delta Museum, a throwback to the 19th century idea of the museum as an eclectic collection of esoteric “stuff.” Items range from Civil War artifacts and farm implements to a small Robert Johnson display. Call for hours: 662-383-2233.

• Moon Lake One of the many crescent-shaped bodies of water (called an “oxbow”) left when the Mississippi River shifted its main channel. Moon Lake is notable as the site of Blanche Dubois’ (in Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire) tragic romance with a young man who committed suicide there. (See Uncle Henry’s Place and Inn in “Where to Eat” and “Where to Stay.”)

• Helena, Arkansas While located in neither the Delta nor Mississippi, Helena played a large part in the development of Delta blues. Radio station KFFA’s “King Biscuit Time” show gave airtime to many of the Delta’s musicians and was a potent vehicle for selling records and promoting appearances. The Delta Cultural Center, housed in an historic depot, contains exhibits about local history while the DCC Visitors’ Center, on downtown’s main avenue, Cherry Street, features displays about the area’s musicians and hosts live weekday broadcasts of “King Biscuit Time.” About a half hour northwest from Clarksdale, across the Mississippi River. (www.deltaculturalcenter.com)

• Mississippi River The Great River Road Network of museums and interpretive centers runs through 10 states along the river and includes the Delta Blues Museum. See the Mississippi when you cross at Helena, or from the levee at any point along Highway 1, which parallels the river west of Clarksdale. (www.mississippiriverinfo.com) John Ruskey of Quapaw Canoe Co. in Clarksdale will take you on a canoe tour of the Big Muddy’s waters. (662-627-4070; www.island63.com)