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Photography
Photography

Photography

Club Tay-May, Mason TN, Summer 1991

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Back in the summer of 1991, when I was hanging out with a lot of fellow UT-Martin students who lived at Gainsville just outside of Mason, a local festival gave me the excuse to be down on the Lower End taking pictures. I had almost forgotten that I had them. I even got a picture of the legendary Club Tay-May, which burned to the ground not long after. 

UPDATED: Tay-May was the big club in Mason, and had existed in several different locations, the last one being the one pictured here. Since it could hold hundreds, it routinely featured artists like Johnnie Taylor and Little Milton, and was rumored to be the place where Rufus Thomas invented the Funky Chicken! I will always be sad that I never went inside it.

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The Lower End, Front Street, Mason TN, Summer 1991

001 The Lower End002 The Lower End003 Chilling In Front of the Green Hut004 The Lower End005 Purple Rain Lounge006 The Black Hut007 The Black Hut008 Still The Real Deal009 Godfather Lounge, Brown Hut & Real Deal010 The Lower End

Mason, Tennessee, Front Street, The Lower End, Summer 1991. 

This was the summer that I was spending a lot of time in and around Mason and Gainesville, Tennessee. I had gotten some black and white film, and was having fun with my camera, and I was always fascinated by the “cafes” in Mason, as juke joints were called in those days. Of course, I had no idea back then that most of these buildings would be torn down and destroyed, so the pictures are maybe a little more important now than I had imagined.

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The Postcard Inn on St. Pete Beach

I had expected to get into St. Pete Beach around 1 or 2 in the morning, but given the time I killed in Tallahassee kicking it with the folks at Da Plugg Music and More, I ended up getting there at 4 AM instead. My beachfront motel, the Postcard Inn on the Beach, was a boutique hotel, an old motel that had been interestingly restored. Unfortunately, due to the late hour I arrived, by the time I woke up, it was almost time to check out, so I did not get a chance to get in the water, but I did manage to snap a number of photos.

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Hi-Fi Jazz Cafe, Tallahassee

When i got to Tallahassee, near the Florida A & M campus on Adams Street, I happened upon this really cool-looking jazz cafe. Unfortunately, it was not open on Thursday night, but I took some pictures anyway.

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Ebony, Arkansas

Ebony, Arkansas was probably never much more than a wide spot in the road, but time and the new intermodal railroad yards have encroached on it to the point that there is little left except this spectacular art-deco building that was probably once a general store and is now a furniture store. 

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Hard Times on Main Street, Earle AR

On Main Street in Earle, almost every business is abandoned. Except for a fairly busy barbecue joint and a grocery, the buildings seem to point back to a time when Earle was a bigger and wealthier town.

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Sundown in Crawfordsville

Crawfordsville, Arkansas, about 12 miles west of Marion, is the hometown of blues legend Johnnie Taylor, although there is nothing in the little town to mark that fact. Like all Delta towns, Crawfordsville has seen better days, but gets the occasional visitor due to Uncle John’s, a local institution famous for Italian food, catfish, steaks and ribs. 

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Pursuing the Hill Country Blues Tradition in Como

Perhaps no town is as much a part of the Hill Country Blues tradition as the small town of Como, Mississippi in Panola County. It was the hometown of Mississippi Fred McDowell, and of Otha Turner, whose Rising Star Fife and Drum Band may be last band of its kind in America. Today, it is home to great restaurants like the Como Steak House and the Windy City Grill, the Como Inn bed-and-breakfast, and Jimbo Mathus’ Delta Recording Service, where great music is still being recorded. It’s also worth noting that at some point, Tallulah Bankhead briefly lived there!

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