Delta Blues Museum
Mission StatementThe Delta Blues Museum is dedicated to creating a welcoming place where visitors find meaning, value, and perspective by exploring the history and heritage of the unique American musical art form of the blues.
HistoryThe City of Clarksdale, located at the intersection of Highways 61 and 49 ("the crossroads"), and the surrounding Delta region are known as "the land where the blues began".
Since its creation, the Delta Blues Museum has preserved, interpreted, and encouraged a deep interest in the story of the blues. Established in 1979 by the Carnegie Public Library Board of Trustees and re-organized as a stand-alone museum in 1999, the Delta Blues Museum is the state's oldest music museum. A five-member board appointed by the Mayor and Board of Commissioners of Clarksdale governs the museum. Funded by the City of Clarksdale, admissions, memberships, gift shop revenue, granting agencies and donations, the museum uses public and private funds to carry out its mission.
Museum SitesSince 1999, the Delta Blues Museum has been housed in the historic Clarksdale freight depot, built in 1918 for the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad. The building was designated a Mississippi Landmark Property in 1996. The former freight area and the adjacent Muddy Waters expansion - about seven thousand square feet of ground floor space - is devoted to permanent and traveling exhibits.
A 2013 recipient of the IMLS National Medal for Museum and Library Services - the nation's highest honor for museum and library service to the community - as well as a 2014 winner of the National Arts & Humanities Youth Program Award, the Delta Blues Museum is dedicated to creating a welcoming place where visitors find meaning, value and perspective by exploring the history and heritage of the unique American musical art form, the Blues, as a Great River Road Interpretive Center.

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Catch up on your Blues History and various Blues Artists through our Explore & Learn Programs.
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Lera Kinnard, Secretary
Tom Jones
Ralph Simpson
Dr. Mary Williams
Dr. William Booker, Board Chair
Shelley Ritter
Director
shelley@deltabluesmuseum.org
Maie Smith
Operations & Facilities Manager
maie@deltabluesmuseum.org
Exhibits & Programs
Coordinator
info@deltabluesmuseum.org
Gift Shop
Online/In Museum Shop
giftshop@deltabluesmuseum.org
April Shaw
Gift Shop Manager
april@deltabluesmuseum.org
John Howell
Retail Consultant
john@deltabluesmuseum.org
The Delta Blues Foundation is a qualified 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization. All funds solicited through the Delta Blues Foundation are raised on behalf of benefiting the Delta Blues Museum. On-line tax deductible contributions to the Delta Blues Foundation include the Deeper Roots program and the General Fund (a monetarily unrestricted contribution made to the foundation in support of the museum). Memberships and the Buy a Brick program are funded directly to the Delta Blues Museum and are not considered tax deductible.
This site made possible through the support of Mississippi Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Humanities and the Rock River Foundation.
This site made possible through the support of Mississippi Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Humanities and the Rock River Foundation.
Support for the Delta Blues Foudation, Inc has been provided by explore.org, a direct charitable activity of the Annenberg Foundation.
Museum Links
Museum Contact information
Clarksdale, MS 38614
Phone: 662-627-6820
Email: info@deltabluesmuseum.org