Alligator Blues

Although I have passed by Alligator, Mississippi many times on my way to somewhere else, I have never taken the time to venture off the road into the little town to see what was there. Maps of the place intrigued me, as they showed the town sitting on a lake called Alligator Lake, and I wondered if there had really been alligators there. The place seemed a little far north for them, actually. But after I learned that Robert “Bilbo” Walker’s new juke joint is located in the rural area east of Alligator, the area took on a new significance, and so I decided to head into the town and see if there was anything historic. Unfortunately, like so many other Delta towns, the years have not been particularly kind to Alligator. Although the houses across the road from the lake are attractive and well-kept, the downtown area, particularly that along Front Street, has clearly seen better days. While there is a sort of mini-mart that welcomed “Blues Tourists” that is still open on Lake Street, none of the buildings on Front Street seem to be occupied, and one of them is clearly beginning to collapse. It has been boarded up, and the boards are covered with graffiti and strange, gothic symbols, while barrels placed out in front of it warn “Danger” and “Keep Away”. What with the all-seeing eye and other cryptic symbols on the place, I half wondered if the signs were there to keep people away from some center of cultic activity rather than merely a collapsing building. In fact, the word “worship” is spray-painted on the boards along with the symbols. Other than the decaying buildings, there is a blues trail marker discussing the blues history and heritage of the town of Alligator, and Robert “Bilbo” Walker was mentioned in it. With it being Memorial Day, a few men were sitting under a tree downtown having a sort of picnic. As for the town, that was about it.
Still, I ventured further out to where Robert “Bilbo” Walker’s Wonder City juke joint is under construction, and found that the area still resembles a construction site, and is quite aways off the beaten path, yet I can tell that it will be a popular destination for fans of the blues (Wonder City will open the weekend of June 16th and 17th). The road we took east from Alligator leads back to the New Africa Road (quite an intriguing name in itself), and along that road heading toward Drew, we came upon an abandoned gas station with pumps still intact. There are no signs to indicate what the place was called, but it seems a throwback to an earlier era indeed, out in the wilderness east of Alligator. Not all that far beyond it, the road brought us into Drew.