A Fall Celebration on Mason’s Lower End
Every October, the town of Mason in Tipton County, Tennessee sponsors a Unity Fall Festival on the square, in front of what is left of …
An Old and Forgotten Rural Community on Memphis’ Henrietta Road
It was a blistering hot summer’s day, probably about 1977 or so. The ice cream truck had come past our house but I missed it, …
Commemorating a Holy Site of the Bentonia Blues
2019 was the 71st anniversary of a community institution in the town of Bentonia, one of the last Mississippi juke joints. Jimmy “Duck” Holmes’ family …
Toll Gate: A Hidden and Historic Cemetery in Bartlett
While browsing online one afternoon, I came upon a 1965 United States Geological Survey topographical map of the Ellendale area east of Bartlett, and along …
The Human Jukebox and the Mighty Sound of the South Fight It Out in Memphis
The historically-Black college band tradition of the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC) and the corps-style tradition of the University of Memphis are vastly different, and while …
Celebrating The Legacy of R. L. Boyce at Como, Mississippi
What Sherena Boyce, daughter of Hill Country bluesman R. L. Boyce, started as a birthday party for her dad in August of 2017 has now …
The Last Black Fife and Drum Picnic in America
Fife and drum music was once found in Black communities throughout the South, but by 1970, it was found only in Mississippi, Georgia and Tennessee, …
A Breakfast At Rossville
Rossville, Tennessee, in Fayette County, was once called Lafayette Depot, but there was another Lafayette in Middle Tennessee, so sometime during Reconstruction, the town was …
Haute Cuisine and Hill Country Blues at Home Place Pastures in Como
Home Place Pastures was originally founded in 1869 or 1871, depending on the source, as a cotton plantation in the wilderness east of the railroad …
A Sunny Afternoon in Memphis
After a breakfast at the Brunswick Kitchen at Brunswick near Lakeland, I decided to spend the afternoon putting up flyers for the R. L. Boyce …