Legends - April / May 2016

THE WORLD-FAMOUS IHOP “SINKHOLE” AND THE REAL PEOPLE BEHIND THE STORY

APRIL.MAY 2016

JOHN SCHNEIDER:

Making movies from Hazzard to Holden

M I S S I S S I P P I ’ S A W A R D - W I N N I N G C O N S U M E R T R AV E L P U B L I C AT I O N W W W. R E A D L E G E N D S . C O M

WIN A FREE WEEKEND! WIN a Weekend for Two at Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott Meridian, two Weekend Passes to the JIMMIE RODGERS MUSIC FESTIVAL, plus two tickets to the Jimmie Rodgers Museum!

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LUCINDA WILLIAMS, HEADLINER 2016 JRMF

See page 36 for full story

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Editorial - 601-604-2963 | Editor@ReadLegends.com Advertising - 601-938-0802 | Adrienne@ReadLegends.com Contributing writers: Meghan Holmes, Kara Martinez Bachman, Riley Manning, Julian Rankin, E.S. Martin Contributing photographers: Rusty Costanza, Michael Barrett, Joe Worthem LEGENDS welcomes your calendar submissions. Submissions are posted free of charge on our website at www.ReadLegends.com. Calendar submissions for consideration in LEGENDS’ print calendar may be sent to

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Copyright 2016. All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or reprinted without express permission from the publisher. The opinions and views expressed by our contributors, writers and editors are their own. Various views from other professionals may also be expressed. Neither LEGENDS nor Blue South Publishing Corporation is endorsing or guaranteeing the products or quality of services expressed in advertisements. All advertisers assume liability for all content (including text representation and illustration) of advertisements printed and assume responsibility for any resulting claims against LEGENDS or its affiliates. Materials, photographs and written pieces to be considered for inclusion in LEGENDS may be sent to P.O. Box 3663, Meridian, MS 39303. Unsolicited materials will not be returned. LEGENDS is sold on bookstore shelves in 38 states. Additionally, Blue South Publishing Corporation provides more than 20,000 free copies in its coverage area to tourism offices, welcome centers, hotels, restaurants, theaters, museums, galleries, coffee shops, casinos and institutions of higher learning. If your business, agency or industry would like to be considered as a LEGENDS distribution point, or for a list of retailers, please contact us at Editor@ReadLegends.com.

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LUCINDA WILLIAMS LUCINDA WILLIAMS, HEADLINER 2016 JRMF CONTENTS APRIL / MAY 2016

MUSIC 10 The New Orleans Ragtime Festival America’s music, given its due

38 Meet Me in Meridian

Musical legacy meets Southern renaissance at Junction 59/20

CULTURE 18 So, You Thought You Knew Bo?

John Schneider still making movies, from Hazzard to Holden

34 Rock Star Art

A celebration of modern art in Mississippi

59 The World-Famous IHOP “Sinkhole” The real people behind the story

64 When Dogs Howl and Nature Beckons Running the hounds in Grenada

69 A Visit with History

The tale of Vicksburg’s Duff Green Mansion

CULINARY 26 The Story of the Real “Help” ABOUT OUR COVER You know him best as Bo Duke, racing around Hazzard County in the General Lee with his sidekick cousin, Luke. These days, John Schneider spends his time at his film studios in Holden, Louisiana, where he and producer Alicia Allain have created five movies to date and are soon to begin work on a sixth.

(Photograph by Marianne Todd)

6 • APRIL / MAY 2016

Clean your plate at Johnnie Mae’s

32 A Taste of Mississippi’s Best Blue Plate Lunches & Road Food

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STORY FROM NEW ORLEANS, LA.

America’s music, given its due at the first ever

By E.S. MARTIN Photography by Rusty Costanza

D

usky smells rise from damp bottomlands on hot southern Louisiana nights.

Lightning bugs flash randomly, while crickets saw out tunes like maniacal fiddlers competing with buzzing cicadas. Tree frogs chirp in concert, singing to the clouds for a little more rain.

Soft Southern drawls lilt on the breeze. Mothers shoo children off the porch for a night of play. Men gather, jug in hand, telling lies as women giggle and gossip. From St. Louis to New Orleans, along the swirling coffee-colored water of the Mississippi River, this music flows.

Old Man River knows a thing or two about this music. He’s heard it all. It comes his way from the plantations, the shantytowns and the elegant paddle wheelers that steam up and down his long, snaking way.

In 1897, this is how the music began to develop and spread. From this gumbo of multicultural ingredients, America’s first original music was invented. It was called ragtime.

THE MUSIC

Ragtime is elegant music. It is also happy music. It derived its name in 1896 from the African-American practice of “ragging,” a musical technique using a unique, syncopated rhythm – an erratic pattern

instead of a regular one.

Music at one time had only upbeats and downbeats. Ragtime added a note in between. Two-step melodies are called heavy rags due to their more complicated styling and because they are a challenge to play. One-step melodies, or cakewalks, are called light rags because of their simplicity. The origins come from a plantation dance called Pride Walk, performed by slaves who parodied their masters’ European style of ballroom dance.

Ragtime, like jazz, is a product of slave music; however, it is heavily influenced by Appalachian Mountain musicians of Irish and Scottish decent. These people played a huge role in ragtime’s development, as did their instruments, the banjo, the guitar, the mandolin and the violin.

THE HISTORY

The story of ragtime began in the 1880s saloon and brothel district of St. Louis, Missouri. Before long, the tunes made their way into the red-light districts of New Orleans. Ragtime’s big leap forward happened at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, where more than 27 million visitors enjoyed the sounds of ragtime jazz for the first time.

A distinctive American era was born from the curiosity of ragtime

OPPOSITE: Ingrid Lucia, who performs with the Squirrel Nut Zippers, will perform at the first-ever New Orleans Ragtime Festival, an event honoring America’s first original music.

10 • APRIL / MAY 2016

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Tom Hook, left, and Wendell Brunious are ragtime aficionados. Hook is the leader and founder of the New John Robichaux Society Orchestra, who will perform original Robichaux arrangements at the April 2nd festival. Brunious is a NOLA jazz trumpeter who says the festival is long overdue.

and its syncopated melody that had never been heard before. This new musical invention was so shocking that doctors of the day were concerned that ragtime was a public health hazard. Many thought the uneven rhythms would cause heart palpitations, resulting in brain dysfunction and making listeners go insane. But by the 1900s, ragtime was everywhere – in sheet music, phonograph records, piano rolls, theaters and music boxes.

Its wild popularity lasted until World War I when interest gave way to the more performance-oriented style of jazz. It lay dormant until 1973, when the release of the movie, “The Sting,” featuring Scott Joplin’s “The Entertianer,” rekindled interest.

Although many artists are credited with contributions to the proliferation and advancement of ragtime, it was Joplin’s 1899 release of “Maple Leaf Rag” that became one of the most influential pieces of its time. His composition brought sophistication to the ragged rhythm and it became a lasting hit. Joplin is considered the King of Ragtime, composing in his lifetime 44 ragtime jazz pieces, two operas and one ballet. Ragtime has influenced a multitude of artists over the past

12 • APRIL / MAY 2016

century and continues to be appreciated by composers and performers, as well as millions of fans.

THE NEW ORLEANS RAGTIME FESTIVAL

Last summer, founders and producers Patrick Mackey and Tonya Excho decided to create a festival honoring ragtime. “This year’s event is free. It’s a chance for all of us to pull together to see what is possible,” says Excho, who says the first festival will build momentum for a planned three-to-five day music festival in April, 2017.

“People are excited. We just posted a video of Tom McDermott playing ragtime on Facebook. We’ve received 6,000 hits in just seven days, with 2,000 full views, and our analytics show that 60,000 people are talking about it,” she says.

Mackey is concentrating on the roster of musicians, whom he says want to play and explore ragtime. “They believe not only in the importance of ragtime, but more importantly, the entertainment value.

They believe in it enough for me to be able to put this idea together.”

The New Orleans’ version of ragtime is closely associated with

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ABOVE: Ingrid Lucia performs with Charlie Miller at the Little Gem Saloon in New Orleans. RIGHT: Patrick Mackey, a festival organizer, will perform as band leader of his own project, The Silver Swan Ragtime Quartet.

jazz, and varies from the ragtime that came out of Missouri, says Bruce Raeburn, curator of Tulane University’s Hogan Jazz Archives and assistant dean of libraries for special collections. Excited about the potential of the festival, Raeburn isn’t afraid to pick favorites.

“I’m looking forward to hearing from these players, people like Tom McDermott and Tom Hook. It took us a while to get a ragtime festival organized and once people are exposed to it, they’ll want more.”

THE MUSICIANS

Givonna Joseph, director of Opera Creole, says opera gets separated from other musical forms, “and it shouldn’t. There are more relations between opera, ragtime and jazz than people generally think.

In a different venue like this, people get to experience it in a different way.” Opera Creole is slated to perform parts of Joplin’s second opera, Treemonisha. The music may come as a surprise to some for a ragtime fest, but Joseph says the performance will help audience members intimately gain access to a sound they might not have otherwise.

Ingrid Lucia, lead female singer for the Squirrel Nut Zippers, and Charlie Miller, will explore ragtime and three-quarter waltzes. “Music brought people together at the turn of the century though musical forms that were played in family parlors. When I was a little girl, my great grandma, with her perfect red Irish hair and her piano, would play waltzes for me. It was a very nurturing feeling. It kind of makes you feel like you belong somewhere. With where we are now as a society, we

14 • APRIL / MAY 2016

really need to reconnect to our roots, or else we are just lost.�

Wendell Brunious, a New Orleans jazz trumpeter, has taught at the Trombone Shorty Foundation and the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. The resurgence of ragtime in New Orleans and the creation of the Ragtime Festival means the music will continue to be passed down. “This festival is going to be something we’ve never seen. It’s a great idea to have this kind of concentration of ragtime music in one place.

It’s way overdue.�

about being able to take it out, blow off the dust and say, ‘Hey, look at this.’ No one has heard this music on this sheet or heard this song played in over 100 years.�

Ragtime jazz pianist Tom McDermott considers ragtime as America’s first pop music. “Unfortunately, the general listener thinks ragtime is played by that guy in the straw hat and the red striped shirt, cigar in mouth, with a beer on the top of the tin pan piano,� he said. “This festival can help change that perception.�

Mackey will also perform as bandleader of his own project, The Silver Swan Ragtime Quartet. “It’s an expression of my feeling for these compositions. I’m looking at primarily piano music and arranging out parts for my quartet, which is myself on banjo, a cellist Monica McIntyre, clarinetist Ray Morgan and Steve Glen on the tuba. We improvise a bit, but everything is on chart like a concert musical.� L

“This festival will showcase different types of orchestrations and different types of presentations of the music, which will be much more interesting both for the schooled listener and to someone new to the music,� said Tom Hook, orchestra leader and founder of The New John Robichaux Society Orchestra. The upcoming performance features original John Robichaux arrangements resurrected for the festival performance. The sheet music has been in a vault at Tulane. “I’m excited Great Louisiana BirdFest, Mandeville

Lars Edegran, the Swedish-born founder and leader of the New Orleans Ragtime Orchestra, played in Dixieland jazz groups throughout his native country before moving to New Orleans in 1966. Edegran is scheduled for a rare appearance to perform at the Palm Court Jazz CafĂŠ portion of the Festival.

Want to go?

The Festival begins on April 2nd. The first of two events, both held in the French Quarter, are scheduled from 11a.m. until 4 p.m. at the Old U.S. Mint on Esplanade Avenue. The second event is scheduled for 8 p.m. until 11 p.m. at Palm Court Jazz Cafe on Decatur Street.

For more information visit theneworleansragtimefestival.com.

Spring into Fun on the Northshore

We celebrate

Everything

in St. Tammany Parish, 45 minutes

north of New Orleans. Mark your calendar for these exciting upcoming events. For more info or to find your fun, just log onto www.LouisianaNorthshore.com/lgd.

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April 6-10 A Taste of Covington April 15-17 Great Louisiana BirdFest in Mandeville April 16-17 Covington Antiques & Uniques Festival April 23-24 Olde Towne Slidell Spring Antique Street Fair

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April 16 Crawfish Cook-off in Slidell May 14 International Dragon Boat Races in Madisonville May 28 Slidell Jazz and Blues Festival

w w w. L o u i s i a n a N o r t h s h o r e.c o m / l g d READLEGENDS.COM •

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April 1, 8, 15, 22, 29; May 6, 13, 20, 27 Downtown Morgan City | A free live music

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STORY FROM HOLDEN, LA.

John Schneider finds happiness in Hollywood South Story by KARA MARTINEZ BACHMAN Photography by Marianne Todd

T

he two longtime friends and actors sat in rocking chairs, chatting on the porch.

As they talked, fans trickled onto the grounds. Some had driven great distances, such as John Phillips, who drove from North Carolina in a General Lee replica in hopes of meeting actors John Schneider and Tom Wopat, stars of the ‘70s and ‘80s hit television series, “The Dukes of Hazzard.” He is one of thousands who deeply connected with “Bo and Luke” and have since remained fans.

On this day, the duo were preparing for a holiday concert, an

18 • APRIL / MAY 2016

event held at John Schneider Studios, a 58-acre working film studio in Holden, Louisiana, not far from Baton Rouge.

Wopat had himself years ago branched out beyond the limiting creative parameters of Hazzard County, making a name for himself on Broadway where he has built a career as a well-respected, Tonynominated actor. Based in New York City, he visits Louisiana often.

“I like it down here,” Wopat said, of Schneider’s serene studio landscape. “I like this place a lot, the remoteness. And,” he said, gesturing to Schneider, “I like the fact that he’s built his own little

COVER STORY

OPPOSITE: John Schneider watches one of his most recent films with producer Alicia Allain in the theater of his Holden, Louisiana, home. ABOVE: At John Schneider Studios, the actor/director/producer is relaxing in the barn, where he films some of his indie productions. To date, he and Allain have completed five films and are working on a sixth.

industry down here.”

Schneider has also remained active in music and television since the days of racing around Hazzard County in the General Lee. His recording career includes the chart-topping country hits “I’ve Been Around Enough to Know,” and “Country Girls.” He appeared in the long-running television series “Smallville” and is currently a part of the highest-rated series on the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), “The Haves and the Have Nots,” produced, written and directed by Tyler Perry.

Recently, though, his labor of love is in Livingston Parish, where the actor/director/producer is working to further develop his studios aimed at indie productions.

“I’ve been everywhere, and for my money, Louisiana is the most unique and original state in the union,” he said. “It’s a great place. It’s completely original. It’s beautiful to look at, which makes it perfect for cinema.”

The culinary climate doesn’t hurt either.

“The food is alive and wonderful,” Schneider said. “Oftentimes, you can get better food at a gas station in Louisiana than you can at a fine restaurant anywhere else.”

He rightfully called the state’s music “unbelievable and original.”

He said tax credits afforded to “Hollywood South” were another positive to settling where he did. In the past year, former Governor Bobby Jindal’s administration changed the film-friendly state’s incentive plan designed to lure productions. Some feared changes would run business off, but Schneider said from his perspective, it’s all been good.

“I think it has helped,” he said. “If people really looked at what

the changes were, it’s more friendly and more encouraging to the local Louisiana filmmaker. Because it lowered the threshold, you can make a movie for $50,000 now and generate tax credits, where before the number was $300,000. There are folks who will say that the change has been discouraging to the Universals and the Paramounts and the Warner Brothers of the world, but that’s not even really true. I think that’s propaganda put out by other states.”

He references Louisiana’s recent lowering of the tax credit cap to $200 million: “Louisiana has never given away $200 million in tax credits anyway. A state tax credit is really not designed to lure in Paramount anyway, it’s designed to encourage the local filmmaker,” he said. “The current one does that better than the old one.”

Schneider feels strongly and speaks freely about issues many celebrities won’t touch. He doesn’t hide that he isn’t always in perfect lockstep with prevailing winds blowing from Tinseltown. His recently released “Smothered” is a comedy horror, but his preference seems to be for tense thrillers with twisted plots and flawed good guys as protagonists, such as films like “Inadmissible” and “Hate Crime,” created with partner and producer Alicia Allain.

“I’m very conservative in some areas, and extremely liberal in some areas, as are most people,” he said. “No one is all conservative or all liberal – not a pastor, not a preacher, not an anarchist.”

He’s not concerned about putting it all out there.

“I am not yet at odds with my industry, because my industry is really unaware of me,” he said. “My goal certainly is to be valuable enough to have a platform where Alicia and I are making these films where the industry feels threatened by common sense. But it would be READLEGENDS.COM •

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Producer Alicia Allain said she and Schneider met when she cast him in her movie, “Hate Crime.” Their synergy has developed into more film projects and the building of a sound stage, an edit bay and a screening room.

a lie. It would be unfairly boasting to say that they give a rat’s ass right now.”

Allain is former president of the independent production company of Robert Evans, who is perhaps best known for his stint as head of production at Paramount when the studio turned out such classics as “The Godfather” and “Chinatown.”

Today, Allain produces and directs her own films under the Maven name. She met Schneider when she cast him in her movie, “Hate Crime,” now in post-production. To date, they’ve shot five films together at the studios.

“We are in post-production on three of them,” she said, and “the intention behind them is to go to festivals then bring them to the marketplace.”

“We shoot most of them on the property, in and around Livingston and across the river in Plaquemines, Louisiana,” she said, also mentioning Hammond, Ponchatoula and Denham Springs. “We’ve really began engaging the West Baton Rouge area, because that’s where I’m from originally.”

20 • APRIL / MAY 2016

A variety of projects also use the studios. A SyFy Channel show, “Ozark Shark,” filmed on site this winter. Last year, actor Pierce Brosnan’s son, Sean Brosnan, directed “My Father, Die” at the studios.

Commercials are filmed there in Holden. There’s always something going on.

They’ve only worked together a year or so, but the two seem to have a synergy.

“In that time, we have done five films, two concerts, one Shakespeare festival and a live radio show,” Schneider said, “and resurrected the Broadmoor sign,” a retro piece he relocated from a nowdefunct Baton Rouge landmark. They’ve also built a sound stage, an edit bay and a screening room.

“Alicia makes me better than I know I am,” Schneider said. “It is fulfilling, rewarding, to be championed by someone, and I hope I am reciprocating in some way. I think she’s pretty darn good.”

It seems locals are happy with Schneider’s presence. The land has served many purposes, but it’s most remembered for its 1950s era as a summer camp for kids.

“Not a week goes by without someone out of the blue telling me that they went to camp there, and the people that are telling me that are older than me, and I’m 55,” Schneider said. “It is a place that has endeared itself to the community for over a century, and I’m excited about keeping that vibe going.”

Despite lacking a sound room – the next item on Schneider’s wish list – he says all other phases of production can be completed on site, including prep work, shooting and editing. The studio provides locations, including bamboo groves, swamps (including a “Cajun cabin”), a river, open fields (including a rustic barn from 1915), several old homes, a lake and forests.

The expansive space allows for virtually anything, including buildto-suit sets.

“It’s completely free, creatively speaking,” he said. “Now of course, building does cost money, but it is a place where you don’t have to be afraid to dream.”

On some days it might seem he imagines more projects than he has time for. On every day, he wants to be taken as a serious filmmaker.

Shedding the “Bo Duke” image hasn’t been easy.

He said he learned about fame from friend Johnny Cash.

“We’d be talking backstage about who knows what, about how come he can catch fish in a barrel and I can put a line in the same barrel and can’t even get a bite,” Schneider said. Then, Cash would hear his cue music.

“He’d put on his big black coat and stand up straight, stick his chest out and he’d say, ‘I guess I have to go out and be a legend now.’ And he would go out and become Johnny Cash for an hour, or however long it was for the Man in Black, and then he’d come back off stage and we’d continue our conversation.

“It was great to see that someone as non-normal, non-human as the legendary Johnny Cash was, be every bit as normal and every bit as human as the guy that used to pump your gas at the corner Sunoco,” Schneider said. “That was so refreshing, and you learn from that when you realize that a legend does not think of himself as a legend.”

Schneider became close to Cash and wife, June, after they worked together on the 1987 made-for-TV version of the classic western, “Stagecoach.” He even lived with the couple for a while.

“I no longer saw Johnny Cash, I saw John, who I fished with and chatted with and told stories with and laughed with and ate donuts with,” he reminisced.

“I know that folks are (just) folks,” Schneider said. “But invariably, we all feel there are folks that don’t fit in that mold. They are truly legends, they are truly icons, people who were absolutely undeniably special and legendary.”

While Schneider himself is no Johnny Cash, he’s found a place as an American – and especially Southern – icon.

Leaving the comfort of the porch, the tall, rugged, blonde-haired

S

chneider feels strongly and speaks freely about issues many celebrities won’t

touch. He doesn’t hide that he isn’t always in perfect lockstep with prevailing winds blowing from Tinseltown. His recently released “Smothered” is a comedy horror, but his preference seems to be for tense thrillers with twisted plots and flawed good guys as protagonists.

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Schneider and Allain resurrected the Broadmoor sign, a retro piece he relocated from a now-defunct Baton Rouge landmark. The “Maven” on the marquee is the name of the production company she brought to the table in their film-making collaboration.

Bo Duke posed for photographs with cousin Luke in front of the unforgettable General Lee. It’s damn near as close as one can get to country life in the American South.

22 • APRIL / MAY 2016

For Schneider, it’s just another day, playing the role and dreaming up new projects, at the heavenly place he calls home. L Want to know more? Visit johnschneiderstudios.com

THE INSPIRATIONS OF

SHOW BOAT

SATURDAY, MAY 7, 2016 NATCHEZ NATIVE RETURNS COMPOSER/PRODUCER GRAMMY AWARD-WINNER Composed and produced for Michael Jackson, Alanis Morissette, Stevie Nicks and many more!

SATURDAY, MAY 21, 2016

BROADWAY’S LANDMARK MUSICAL THAT FOLLOWS THE LIVES OF THE CREW OF THE COTTON BLOSSOM, A MISSISSIPPI RIVERBOAT SHOW IN 1887.

SATURDAY, MAY 28, 2016

AN OPERA COMIQUE THE STORY OF DON JOSE, A YOUTHFUL SOLDIER WHO IS SEDUCED BY THE CHARMS OF THE GYPSY, CARMEN.

FOR TICKETS AND MORE INFORMATION VISIT NATCHEZFESTIVALOFMUSIC.COM 800.647.6742

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New South Spirit, Old South Hospitality Opening the doors for more than 30 years to an insider’s view of History and Hospitality “Natchez Style,” Natchez Pilgrimage Tours is your one-stop for the 2016 Natchez Festival of Music in May. Whether you’re traveling alone or as part of a group tour, you’re sure to enjoy any of our 18 events this year, including fully-staged productions of the opera “Carmen” and the musical “Show Boat.”

Visit www.natchezpilgrimage.com to purchase festival or event tickets or to purchase tickets for year-round home tours that are open to the public.

• Musical Events in Historic Properties & Houses • Cooking Classes & Mixology Classes

STANTON HALL

• Wine & Candlelight Tours, Distillery Tours, Carriage Tours, Outdoor Adventure Tours

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BROADWAY’S SMASH HIT MUSICAL

FestivalS uth

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JUNE 9 - 11, 2016

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Soul School JUNE 4, 2016

SHOWBOAT MAY 20 and 21, 2016

CARMEN MAY 28, 2016

CELEBRATING 70 YEARS OF EXCELLENCE IN OPERA

Carmen starring Kirsten Chavez l APRIL 23, 2016

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These events are supported in part by funding from the Mississippi Arts Commission, a state agency, and in part, from the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.

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STORY FROM VIDALIA, LA.

Clean Your Plate at Johnnie Mae’s Alongside the river in Vidalia, Louisiana, Johnnie Mae’s restaurant pays homage to an exceptional woman with its Southern and coastal-inspired cuisine.

By MEGHAN HOLMES Photographs by Marianne Todd

J

ohnnie Mae Hales Lindsey grew up on a Choctaw reservation in the 1920s near the family land of Mary Ann Simons. Born in 1913, an accident in early childhood left Johnnie Mae badly scarred. “She fell into a fire washing clothing in a boiling pot. She was around six and her family thought she was going to die. They took Johnnie Mae to live on the reservation,” says Mary Ann.

Johnnie Mae, an African American, found herself working at the home of Mary Ann’s paternal grandparents as a young teenager. “She was around 14 when she came here,” says Mary Ann, co-owner of Johnnie

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Mae’s restaurant in Vidalia, Louisiana. “My grandmother taught English on the reservation and met Johnnie Mae there.”

Mama Johnnie, as the family called her, became Mary Ann’s best friend and confidant throughout her childhood. “I tell people my life is the true story of “The Help,” because if I was good, I got to go to play at Mama Johnnie’s. I learned to ride a bike with her daughter, Jewel, and now we have a sandwich named after Jewel on the menu.”

A quick look around the restaurant, located just on the Louisiana side of the Mississippi River Bridge opposite Natchez, tells the tale.

OPPOSITE: Crawfish Ravioli, served Johnnie Mae’s style. CLOCKWISE: Johnnie Mae’s dining room; photographs of Johnnie Mae in her younger years; signs with classic Johnnie Mae sayings adorn the restaurant’s walls; Johnnie Mae raised restaurant owner Mary Ann Simons, in a real life story much like “The Help.”

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“M

y gosh, how Johnnie Mae

could cook, and so could my grandmother. They went toe to toe, and I can promise you that they never shared recipes. My grandmother took her buttermilk biscuit recipe to the grave, and Johnnie Mae never told a soul her recipe for turkey dressing.”

– Mary Ann Simons ABOVE: A Johnnie Mae’s burger topped with fried pickles and onion rings. RIGHT: Peach and White Chocolate Bread Pudding is a favorite dessert among customers.

Photographs of Johnnie Mae greet customers as they enter, and her sayings are found literally throughout the restaurant.

“Eat cha chicken and ya peas,” says one sign. “I cooked this just for you,” says another, and another reminds customers, “Clean your plate.”

Stories remembering Johnnie Mae, as well as Mary Ann’s paternal grandmother, Mary Jane, usually involve food. “My gosh, how Johnnie Mae could cook, and so could my grandmother,” says Mary Ann. “They went toe to toe, and I can promise you that they never shared recipes. My grandmother took her buttermilk biscuit recipe to the grave, and Johnnie Mae never told a soul her recipe for turkey dressing.”

Mama Johnnie knew everyone’s favorite foods. “For us it was fried chicken. The best fried chicken you’ve ever eaten, with field peas, deviled eggs, rice and gravy and fried okra. She always made my oldest son sweet potato pies, and he loves them to this day.” For the Simons, memories of Johnnie Mae’s food continue to connect their family, as well as connect them to Mama Johnnie’s living descendants. She had seven children and passed away in 1997.

“I knew the impact Mama Johnnie had on me, and I wanted my children to have that experience,” says Mary Ann, who asked Johnnie Mae to help raise her sons while she ran a flower shop in Natchez. From a young age, Rick and her older son, B.W., were in the kitchen with Mama Johnnie. Rick’s favorite spot was a large drawer on the bottom left-hand side of an avocado green stove. “Mama Johnnie cooked on the opposite two eyes, terrified of burning him after her own experience, and he just sat down there soaking up all her wisdom,” says Mary Ann.

You Best Be Home Before the Streets Lights Come On! 28 • APRIL / MAY 2016

Concordia Recreation District 3 Sports Complex The Concordia Recreation District 3 Sports Complex in Vidalia is drawing a lot of interest and use. Recently the Pearl River Community College and LSU-Alexandria baseball teams played a double-header at the facility.

In addition, the site hosted seven softball tournaments, several state and tri-state tournaments, youth tournaments, tennis matches and lessons, T-ball games and area high school boys and girls’ games. The 50-acre site includes baseball, softball, T-ball, and Coach Pitch fields, 12 tennis courts, three basketball courts, and two soccer fields.

It also offers beach volleyball, a fishing pond and bridge pier, community garden and six+ multi-use acres.

It is rare for a community the size of Vidalia to have such a large, quality recreation complex.

Contact JOHNNY HOFFPAUIR for information on use of Sports complex. (601) 597-8294

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LEFT: Grilled chicken with vegetables in a cream sauce. The dishes are inspired by the way Johnnie Mae used to cook for the Simons family. ABOVE: Traces of Johnnie Mae can be found throughout the building in her written name and in her favorite sayings.

Say Please and Thank You. “My boys learned to count through recipes.”

Rick went to school for sound engineering at Full Sail University in Orlando, Florida, but when he finished, “he wasn’t sure if he was ready to do that full time,” says Simons. He decided to work in a restaurant first, and ended up at a small French bistro on the Gulf Coast. His cooking fuses different genres as a result, with French, Creole, Southern and Cajun influences.

After several years in the restaurant business, Rick decided to attend the Culinary Institute of America in New York, but Hurricane Katrina cancelled his departing flight, and he never left the South. “Fate took a different turn. We stayed in Natchez and that’s when Rick started making his spice blends,” says Simons.

“He wanted to create something he could use for everything, without having to constantly grab things from the pantry, and that’s how the red spice came about,” she says. Slick Rick became the name for Rick’s spice – a nickname he earned working in kitchens on the Gulf

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Coast. The family’s café, Slick Rick’s, grew from a spice business as they attended trade shows and cooking demonstrations, and as Rick created new food preparations for the spices.

“Everyone kept saying – ‘Y’all have to sell this,’ just like they said when Rick started making his red spice. We put one table with four chairs in the building and that’s how our restaurants began,” says Mary Ann. Slick Rick’s grew organically into a 35-seat restaurant when Mary Ann decided to open Johnnie Mae’s across the river.

The menu focuses on fresh seafood as well as American fare like burgers and steaks. Appetizer highlights include fried green tomatoes topped with crawfish sauce, hot crab dip served with toast rounds and Mama Johnnie’s crab cakes with remoulade sauce. Gumbo, étouffée, soft shell crab, Louisiana oysters, shrimp and po’boys remind diners of Rick’s coastal culinary training. The restaurant also offers salads, sandwiches and house specialties, including crawfish ravioli, catfish piquante and Creole shrimp pasta.

Mary Ann and Rick both make desserts. Her specialty is a peach and white chocolate bread pudding and his is peanut butter pie. “The other day I asked him for the recipe for the peanut butter pie and he said, ‘You’re just gonna have to figure it out,’ just like Mama Johnnie would say, and I won’t tell him my recipe for the bread pudding either,” says Mary Ann.

“I remember Johnnie Mae and my grandmother as two strong, Southern women who saw eye to eye. They were both ahead of their time. I want everyone to know the importance of these exceptional women,” Mary Ann says. L

Want to go?

For more information, directions and menus, visit johnniemaes.com.

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VISIT

PHOTO CREDIT: KEITH JACKSON - RIENZI, MS

Download the VISIT CORINTH mobile app today to help you get the most out of your visit to historic Corinth, Mississippi. It’s the perfect way to discover countless attractions and hidden gems nestled downtown and around town.

Let us show you around!

HISTORIC CORINTH, MISSISSIPPI (662) 287-8300 | visitcorinth.com CO R I N T H A R E A CO N V E N T I O N A N D V I S I TO R S B U R E AU

# V I S I TCO R I N T H

FIND US. FOLLOW US. SHARE US.

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Mississippi’s Best Blue Plate Lunches and Road Food D

riving through Mississippi and hungry? You’re in luck! Mississippi has its share of wonderful cooks and eateries.

Here, we share a few of our favorites, whether you’re on the road or just looking for a great home-cooked lunch!

WALNUT HILLS Vicksburg

It doesn’t get more Southern than Walnut Hills. Housed in a beautiful 1880s house in downtown Vicksburg, this award-winning restaurant is known far and wide for its Southern Plantation Cuisine and round-table dining. Friends gather around just as a family at home and spin the lazy Susan to enjoy the signature fried chicken with mashed potatoes, gravy and all the vegetables and trimmings.

Round out the meal with a homemade coconut or chocolate creme pie or specialty cake – or our personal favorite, peach cobbler. We think it was made in heaven. And the best part? This gem is located seconds off I-20. You’ll enjoy the service and atmosphere as much as the delicious food.

1214 Adams St. walnuthillsms.com Hours: Mon-Sat 11-9, Sun 11-2

RUSTY’S RIVERFRONT GRILL Vicksburg

The trouble with going to this riverfront restaurant is what to order when you get there.

We sat for a minute and watched as the cooks loaded plates in the window, and that’s really where the trouble started. See, at Rusty’s, the seafood is scrumptious – but so are the

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steaks and chicken, pasta, appetizers – and the desserts. But we digress. We’re here to talk lunch. Rusty’s is an easy drive just off Interstate 20 – head north by the bridge, whether coming from Louisiana or leaving Mississippi. Choose from a number of offerings as appetizers, salads, seafood and pasta – you’ll be back to work or back on the road in no time flat. The service is impeccable, as are the desserts. We recommend Rusty’s Bread Pudding, made with Makers Mark whiskey sauce. Trust us when we say you’ll be back for more.

901 Washington St. rustysriverfront.com Hours: Tues-Fri 11-2, 5-9:30, Sat 11-9:30 WEIDMANN’S Meridian

This popular restaurant has been perfecting its food and service for almost 150 years – and it shows. Weidmann’s is a timehonored favorite and is nestled in Meridian’s historic downtown, just seconds off Interstate 20 and minutes from the Junction at I-59. This Southern-meets-Creole styled restaurant offers daily specials, a full line of perfectly cooked vegetables and several main courses from which to choose. Offerings include specialty soups, gumbos, seafood, signature sandwiches and entrees, daily quiches, trout, catfish, shrimp and grits, redfish, salmon, ribeye steaks, pastas and numerous

desserts. We give a special nod to the lemon pie with slivered almonds. The service is on par with the finest of big city restaurants, and owner Charles Frazier makes a point to visit each table personally. Comfort food in a cozy and comfortable atmosphere. It’s our kind of place.

210 22nd Ave. weidmanns1870.com Hours: Mon-Thurs, 11-9:30; Fri-Sat, 11-11; Sun 10-2 NEWS RESTAURANT North Meridian

News Restaurant was begun in 1942 as a Shell service station and cafe. Customers enjoyed Mrs. Hattie Jane New’s hamburgers while they had their cars serviced. By the 1950s, News became the gathering spot favored by locals and travelers. Now in its 75th year, News and the newer adjacent Sports Page, is still serving the close friends and customers who have become family. News offers full-service family dining and Southern home-style cooking for lunch and dinner, along with awesome Saturday brunches. Enjoy catfish, shrimp and grits, pork chops and pastas.

If visiting on a Friday, choose from Charleston Chicken Supreme – grilled chicken breast over wild rice with onions and mushrooms in a sour cream sauce – or Revved Up Hamburger Steak, topped with étouffée, grilled onions and mozzarella cheese or Bobby’s Revved Up Ribeye of the same fashion. You’ll also find great sandwiches and hand-cut fries and quite possibly the best cheeseburger anywhere.

5020 Poplar Springs Dr. newsrestaurantmeridian.com Hours: Mon-Sat 10-10

THE GATHERING Flora

If you haven’t yet made the brief drive to Livingston, about 20 minutes north of Jackson, just go on now, gather the family and start driving. This charming restaurant is housed in the Livingston Mercantile, a 1950s-orso vintage inspired general store offering everything from gourmet groceries to gifts, provisions, an upscale convenience store and restaurant and bar, The Gathering. Blue plate specials here, produced with the season’s offerings of local farmers, include fried chicken, hamburger steak, fried chicken, roasted chicken, fried chicken, meatloaf, fried chicken, andouille jambalaya – and did we mention the fried chicken? Fixin’s abound with potato salad, mashed potatoes, smashed sweet potatoes, braised greens, coleslaw, braised green beans, Southern styled peas, and the ever-popular Southern vegetable of macaroni and cheese. Plan to spend some extra time browsing the wares there.

You’ll need it.

106 Livingston Church Road Livingstonmercantilestore.com Hours: Tues, 11-2; Wed-Thurs, 11-9; Fri-Sat, 7 a.m.-9; Sun, 11-9 MARTHA’S MENU Corinth

Blue plate is as traditional as it gets at Martha’s Menu Restaurant, located in historic Corinth. As if this town isn’t darling enough with its railroad and Civil War history, abounding with eateries of all types and cool boutiques too numerous to mention, it also gives its residents and visitors some serious down home cooking, done right, at prices that won’t break the bank. Feast on awesome fried

chicken, pork chops, country ham steak, hamburger steak with onions and gravy, country fried steak, lima beans, mashed potatoes and gravy, homemade coleslaw, corn on the cob, Southern greens, fried okra, cornbread and stews. They also offer awesome breakfast served anytime of day and a Sunday lunch special. Located a few minutes off Highway 45, if you’re going, prepare for some extra time to look around trendy downtown.

702 Cruise St. Hours: Mon-Sat 5 a.m.-8 p.m.; Sun 5-2 GEORGIA BLUE Madison, Flowood, Hattiesburg, Brookhaven

This place is definitely on the beaten path with two locations in the greater Jackson area and just off I-59 in Hattiesburg and I-55 in Brookhaven. No matter which direction you’re traveling, stop in for a blue plate lunch of country fried steak with gravy, baked chicken, meatloaf, pork chop, chicken and dumplin’s, fried chicken, hamburger steak with gravy, fried catfish, spaghetti and on Sunday, prime rib with demi glaze (no, we’re not kidding). Vegetables are yummy and tender.

Choose from traditional mashed potatoes and mac ‘n’ cheese or try cabbage, okra, Vardaman sweet potatoes, squash and zucchini, Southern grits, fried green tomatoes, turnip greens, lima beans, rice and gravy, creamed corn and home style fries. You’ll also want to leave some room for a serving of peach or pecan cobbler.

111 Colony Crossing Way • Madison 223 Ridge Way • Flowood 4404 Hardy St. • Hattiesburg 107 S. Railroad Ave. • Brookhaven Hours: Mon-Wed, 11-10; Thurs-Sat, 11-11; Sun, 11-9 Blue Plate Hours: Sun-Fri, 11-4 GROUND ZERO BLUES CLUB Clarksdale

We were lucky enough to join owners Mayor Bill Luckett and his sidekick actor Morgan Freeman at their famous blues club that serves incredible blue plate lunches during the day.

We were intrigued by Morgan’s plate of fried catfish with a side of spaghetti, but instead we opted for the hot tamales.

Whatever you choose, you can rest assured you’ll dig into your freshly-cooked, Southern home style lunch as soon as it’s placed on your red-checkered tablecloth. All weekday $9 plate lunches are posted daily on the chalkboard and come with tea and dessert.

And if you’re in the mood for juke fare, order a Homewrecker Chicken Sammich, a Crossroads burger, a Howl-N-Mad Cheesesteak Sammich, a Potato Ala Morgan or a Mississippi Delta Catfish Dinner with Myrtis’ turnip greens.

387 Delta Ave. groundzerobluesclub.com Hours: Mon-Tues, 11-2; Wed-Thurs, 11-9; Fri-Sat, 11-10; Blue Plate Hours: Mon-Fri, 11-2

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ROCK STAR ART A modern art celebration in Mississippi

Dusti Bongé, Untitled, 1940.

Helen Frankenthaler, Mount Sinai, 1956. (Photo: Jim Frank)

By Julian Rankin

T

he art world has always had rock stars, those characters whose work intrigued and entranced and whose personas became mythic. Think Leonardo da Vinci; his genius across the spheres of art, design and technology endure as almost supernatural exemplars of human potential. Or Vincent van Gogh, a tortured creator whose exploits (the missing ear) and artworks are still salient in our collective consciousness.

But it wasn’t until the 20th century that the notoriety and impact of contemporary artists exploded as never before. Whereas icons of the more distant past became globally known over periods of decades and centuries, modern artists like Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko and others rose to acclaim in meteoric, accelerated fashion, beginning in the post war era. This was a time of massive societal change in every sector, and the increasingly global interconnectivity and growth of mass media provided a platform of watchful eyes, gazing upon the American Modernist revolution that shook the very earth – and disrupted the country’s understanding – of visual art.

This narrative is one of many present in the Mississippi Museum

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of Art’s 2016 modern art celebration, consisting of exhibitions of work by more than 50 of the 20th century’s most influential artists. When Modern Was Contemporary: Selections from the Roy R. Neuberger Collection, the latest presentation in The Annie Laurie Swaim Hearin Memorial Exhibition Series, and Reflections: Works by Modern Masters from the Collection are both on view at the Museum in Jackson through October 30. These exhibitions bring together the varied manifestations of the changing art world into focus under a shared umbrella of aesthetic revolt.

“Never before in Mississippi have artworks by this inimitable group of creators shared a museum exhibition space,” said Betsy Bradley, director of the Mississippi Museum of Art. “We’re honored to make them available to visual art explorers from across the region and beyond.”

One will see action painting and abstract expressionism by the aforementioned Pollock and de Kooning; sculpture by Calder and Bertoia; collaged imagery by Bearden; brushstrokes of O’Keeffe. In the Reflections exhibition, we find the historical fringe of the modern era, and the transition to Pop Art and Andy Warhol.

Modern art was not homogenous in its break from convention.

Individual artists interpreted this new landscape in dramatically different

Georgia O’Keeffe, Lake George by Early Moonrise, 1930. (Photo: Jim Frank)

ways precisely because they had rejected the unifying and governing in the United States?” By posing the question at all, LIFE made Pollock’s academic model. What did connect them was change; all around in the name a recognized commodity far beyond the art galleries of New York.

‘20s, ‘30s, ‘40s, ‘50s, and ‘60s were shattered and rewritten paradigms, The power of these global modes of communication minted the modern especially in modernist hotbeds like New York City. In addition to the artists as daring heroes and antiheroes. While the artists of yore often progressive changes to social norms, gender roles and died before finding fame and recognition, modern civil rights, perhaps the broadest shift occurred as artists became a part of the living and breathing it pertained to visual language. Where painting had celebrity culture. once been the pinnacle of pictorial communication, Moving into the 1960s, those like Andy mass production and branding had eclipsed it.

Warhol found their own recipes for interpreting Everywhere were signs, directions, logos, lights. Visual the schizophrenic world of image and advertising storytelling was no longer confined to newsprint and created new movements that pushed beyond and canvas, but was now catching eyes on television, modernism. And these artists, too, were made into in glossy color magazines and in every nook and icons. cranny of the bustling urban landscape. Some artists “No seriously taken artist of the 20th century, with responded to this maelstrom of information by the possible exception of Salvador Dali, had devoted rejecting the clutter; others embraced this cacophony. so much time and skill to the cultivation of publicity,” None could escape it. writes critic Robert Hughes of Warhol in his 1980 Milton Avery, Walker by the Sea, 1961.

This same mechanization of society that spurred (Photo: Jim Frank) book, “The Shock of the New.” response from modern artists helped elevate their careers. For Jackson

“What he extracted from mass culture was repetition. Warhol Pollock, one such moment came in 1949, when LIFE magazine profiled loved the peculiarly inert sameness of the mass product; an infinite series the artist and asked the direct question, “Is he the greatest living painter of identical objects – soup cans, Coke bottles, dollar bills, Mona Lisas READLEGENDS.COM •

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or the same head of Marilyn Monroe, silk screened over and over again.”

All of these artists are products of their times, as are we all. It just so happens that their time is among the most rambunctious in human history. Modernism – the advent of the television, the locomotive, the skyscraper was every bit as dramatic in its rewriting of society as anything George Wardlaw, Hudson, Place of the we have seen in the past 40 years, Meeting Waters, 1959. including the internet.

And the internet is the perfect lens through which to examine celebrity and fame. We know the works of Pollock and Calder and Bearden intimately because we hold them in our hands; we can see them on our screens, published and republished in perpetuity. We remember van Gogh’s face and the Mona Lisa because they adorn coffee mugs and inspire shareable memes.

And yet, what of the real thing?

The truth? If everything is a copy, how can I encounter the original?

Jacob Lawrence, In the Evening That elusory thread is precisely Evangelists Preach and Sing on Street Corners, 1943. (Photo: Jim Frank) what modern artists sought to communicate in their own personal ways. Each tangible artwork holds that trial - that grasping effort for honest creativity – in limbo, preserved for the viewer. There are connections to be found, standing in front of the canvas and looking up at a suspended sculpture of twisted metal.

“How many people by now can say that their experience of the Mona Lisa as a painting is more vivid than their memory of it as a postcard?” writes Hughes.

You may know what modern art looks like. The images are all just a click away. The question then, as these artworks hang at the Museum – together in the state for the very first time, is this. How vivid, how deep, how unexpected, do you want your experience to be? L

Writer Julian Rankin is the Marketing Director at the Mississippi Museum of Art. Want to go?

For more information, visit msmuseumart.org.

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World Famous Southern Plantation Cuisine

One of Mississippi’s 10 Best Restaurants, CultureTrip.com Top 10 Places to Eat in Mississippi, DeepSouthUSA.com Best Home Cooking, Vicksburg Post

1214 Adams Street, Vicksburg 601-638-4910 • www.WalnutHillsMS.com

The 13th Annual Juke Joint Festival - April 16 Half blues festival, half small-town fair and all about the Delta!

Join us this year and see why we have visitors from nearly 30 foreign countries and almost all 50 states come to soak in the atmosphere of Clarksdale and Coahoma County during the three days of activities surrounding the Juke Joint Festival. Wander the streets and hear a variety of performers on many different stages around town and shop for interesting items in the vendors’ tents. As you would expect, there’s always lots of wonderful food to be enjoyed, so come to the Crossroads for a memorable treat.

Look for details at jukejointfestival.com 662.627.6149 • visitclarksdale.com READLEGENDS.COM •

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Musical Legacy meets Southern Renaissance at Junction 59/20

By MEGHAN HOLMES Photography by Marianne Todd

STORY FROM MERIDIAN, MISS.

E

ach year, roughly 13 million people drive past Meridian, Mississippi.

Most see gas stations, billboards and fast food restaurants as they drive along Interstate 20/59 – familiar freeway vistas hiding the memorable architecture, dining and entertainment in the state’s sixth largest city. The city is the epicenter of all points from Dallas to Atlanta and New Orleans to Nashville, making it one of the most traversed areas of the country.

But a peek beyond the busy borders of the interstate system will find a charming city, where history meets burgeoning cosmopolitan and music and art abound. Musicians well-versed in multiple genres

perform seven nights a week, and national acts take center stage in century-old venues. The city has a lot to offer, just seconds from its busy thoroughfare.

MUSICAL LEGACY It’s hard to place an exact number on the musicians who are from Meridian.

Longtime residents Kelly and Scott McQuaig begin to add them. There’s Chris Ethridge from the Flying Burrito Brothers, the nationally acclaimed Paul Davis, Nashville’s Steve Forbert, country’s Mo Bandy, Hayley Williams of Paramore, Pat Sansone of the

internationally acclaimed Wilco, the rap artist Big K.R.I.T., David Ruffin of the Temptations. “We have so many celebrated musical artists from Meridian,” says McQuaig. Her husband sitting next to her as they lunch at Weidmann’s restaurant in downtown, is one.

So is her ex. So is the husband of the lady at the table with them – and the waiter – and the bartender. In fact, just in the one room at Weidmann’s, there could be many.

With music offered every night of the week in this city of about 40,000, probably much of any audience is made up of a couple of drummers, a few guitarists, a handful of vocalists and possibly even an accordion player or two. And with a strong camaraderie between them, they’re bound to take turns on any stage. What results is amazing, some of the best licks you’ll hear anywhere, all in synchronicity, trading leads and swapping instruments like they’re all part of one big band. And in a sense, they are.

McQuaig serves on the board of the Jimmie Rodgers Foundation and helps to plan the Jimmie Rodgers Music Festival in the Blue Yodeler’s honor each year. “The festival celebrates Jimmie, but we also want to spotlight Americana music, because it’s a genre made up of so

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many different types of music, and the roots of all that music are in Meridian,” she says.

In its heyday, when Meridian was regarded as the most populated city in Mississippi, Rodgers reigned like a rock star. In 1927, Rodgers recorded Blue Yodel No. 1 (T for Texas), a tune which has since been covered by Waylon Jennings, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Dwight Yoakam, to name a few. As the Father of Country Music, Rodgers was the first figure inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, but his musical legacy has also found a place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Blues Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

This year’s event, slated for May 6-7, boasts Lucinda Williams as the headlining act. Supporting acts include Blackberry Smoke, Keller Williams, Billy Joe Shaver and Cedric Burnside, among others. “The festival brings us international attention, but so does the museum. You wouldn’t believe how many people come from across the world to pay homage to Jimmie Rodgers,” says McQuaig.

The Jimmie Rodgers Museum currently calls the turn-of-thecentury Highland Park home, though plans are in the works to move it downtown along with its other noteworthy neighbor, the Dentzel

“I

n its heyday, when Meridian was regarded as the most populated city in Mississippi, Rodgers reigned like a rock star.

In 1927, Rodgers recorded Blue Yodel No. 1 (T for Texas), a tune which has since been covered by Waylon Jennings, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Dwight Yoakam, to name a few.”

Carousel – in operation since 1909 and the only remaining two-row stationary Dentzel menagerie in the world. “They’re talking about moving us down by the train station,” says museum employee Bill John. “I think that would be appropriate for Jimmie.”

Museum highlights include Rodgers’ famous (and highly valuable) guitar, tucked away in a large safe that John briefly opens at the end of each tour. Along with an impressive guest book with visitors from dozens of countries, the museum is filled with odes to country music’s OPPOSITE: St. Paul and the Broken Bones perform at last year’s Jimmie Rodgers Music festival. RIGHT: Jimmie Rodgers’ famous guitar is tucked away in a safe at the Jimmie Rodgers Museum. BELOW: Museum Host Bill John likes to point out the inspiration behind Rodgers’ music, Elsie McWilliams, whose exhibit is pictured on right.

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ABOVE: A newly-renovated City Hall is seen from the stage of the 59Twenty Music Festival. Festivals like this, and the Jimmie Rodgers Festival, bring thousands to the Queen City each year. RIGHT: Jason Isbell performs at last year’s Jimmie Rodgers Fest.

legends of the past, primarily in the form of artifacts. Clothing, toiletries, letters and furniture owned by the musician and his family make up a large part of the exhibit, and visitors leave understanding more about this early 20th century roots music as well as the legend himself. “Jimmie wasn’t just a country star,” reminds John, “he’s credited with laying the foundation for rock ‘n’ roll.”

“That’s really reflective of the variety of music that’s always been in Meridian,” McQuaig says.

The Jimmie Rodgers Music Festival, which expects to attract more than 7,500 attendees this year, is the longest running country music festival in the country, and this year’s lineup, coupled with the city’s downtown growth, should mean the festival will only continue to grow. “Our musicians and festivals are bringing us international attention,” says McQuaig. “I feel like Meridian is positioned to burst open soon.”

If visiting during summer months, you’ll want to check out the musical lineup for the 59Twenty Music Festival, also held on the Meridian City Hall lawn. The festival’s music genre changes with each year, and this year organizers are paying homage to country music.

“We’ve had everything from blues, rock and reggae to jam bands.

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We’ve mixed it up a pretty good bit,” says co-organizer Josh Waters.

Headliners for 2016, with an estimated audience of 3,500, include John Michael Montgomery, Sunny Sweeney, Luke Combs and Stone Senate.

During fall months, check out Whistlestop Weekend, which includes the Soulé Live Steam Show and Meridian RailFest, both of which are signature events and some of the most unique in the Southeast. The Steam Show, sponsored by the The Mississippi Industrial Heritage Museum, attracts some 2,000 attendees and

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features antiquated steam engines of all types, along with a Vintage Wheels Car Show, a loom show and demonstrations on broommaking. RailFest offers a show of functioning railroad engines and boasts the largest model railroad set in the region. The music is also as unique, coming from the Carousel Organ Association of America and billed as “The Happiest Music on Earth.”

DOWNTOWN REDEVELOPMENT Downtown lies just north of Interstate 20/59, and just east of where the two highways meet. An extensive series of rail lines separate Meridian’s center from the interstate, with roads extending away from the railroad. As a result, downtown’s structure isn’t grid-like. The city grew outward organically with the expansion of the railway system.

“At one point we had five railroads going through town, and the Meridian Hotel was constructed along those lines on Front Street,” says Marty Gamblin, executive director of the Mississippi Arts and Entertainment Experience, currently under construction where the hotel once stood. The original structure had deteriorated beyond repair

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and couldn’t be renovated.

The MAEE, slated to open in 2017, “pays interactive homage to Mississippi creatives,” says Gamblin, meaning guests will, through exhibits, creatively engage with artists, performers, actors, writers – even chefs – all from Mississippi. The $40 million complex utilizes technology to showcase the impact of Mississippians around the world

and in many ways represents the culmination of decades of changes in Meridian. “The completion of the MAEE will feel like a dream,” says Gamblin. “We’ve been trying to change the cassette tape playing in the minds of Meridianites, and it will mean we’ve succeeded.”

The impressively modern center will greet people as they enter downtown across the 22nd Avenue bridge. Gamblin sees Meridian as a city on the brink, poised for further downtown development following the completion of the MAEE. “Changing the cassette tape” means abandoning the negative talk of the past and embracing Meridian’s story as it moves forward.

Mayor Percy Bland agrees and echoes Gamblin’s sentiment that things in Meridian are changing. “It feels like we are finally getting somewhere. We’ve been trying to tell the story of Meridian, and the success of projects like the MAEE makes it easier to do that,” he says.

Some of Bland’s projects are currently of little appreciation by the public for obvious reasons. The current disruption of streets with construction may mean a brief inconvenience, but also that a faltering water and sewage system will be repaired and streets and sidewalks improved. When all is said and done, Bland is seeing Meridian through a sort of renaissance to the heyday it once was.

Take, for example, the prized Art Deco space downtown known as the Threefoot Building that will soon reopen as a Courtyard by Marriott, set to open in conjunction with the Arts and Entertainment Experience complex. Plans are underway to keep the historical architecture intact, while making the interior a first class hotel space.

The Threefoot had been the subject of controversy through several mayoral administrations, with deals being made and then broken for various reasons. The previous administration reneged a deal made by OPPOSITE: Crowds watch as musician Paul Thorn ushers in the groundbreaking ceremony for the Mississippi Arts & Entertainment Experience, a $40 million complex paying homage to the impact Mississippi artists have made on the world. CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Britt Gully with his wife Kimberly at the event.

Gully often portrays Jimmie Rodgers, the Father of Country Music, who hails from Meridian; Johanna Littleton, left, and Kelly McQuaig watch as community leaders break ground at the MAEE site.

READLEGENDS.COM •

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“I

t feels like we are finally getting somewhere. We’ve been trying to tell the story of Meridian, and the success of projects like the MAEE makes it easier to do that.”

- Percy Bland, Mayor of Meridian, Miss.

Meridian Mayor Percy Bland sealed a deal with Birmingham’s John Tampa to renovate the city’s historic Threefoot Building into a Courtyard by Marriott. The building, which can be seen here, has been abandoned for a number of years. The timing of the renovation completion coincides with the completion of the nearby MAEE museum.

the administration before it, citing a lack of money, and at the time that was in fact true. When the offer to purchase and restore the hotel was made by Birmingham’s Marriott owner John Tampa, Bland was quick to seal the deal.

“We were in the library and we came to an agreement, and we didn’t have anything to write the agreement on, so we used a napkin, wrote down the details and signed it, and that became the agreement.

Of course that napkin was taken to the city attorney’s office,” Bland laughs.

50 • APRIL / MAY 2016

Winning over the public hasn’t been an easy task for this first-time mayor. He is the first black mayor of Meridian, and once elected his first job was to prove to the citizens who voted against him that he was, indeed, up for the task. Meridian hasn’t been the easiest of places to do that. It is a city, like many, whose people often see its blemishes rather than its strengths, but Bland says that as the landscape changes for the better, he’s hopeful the vibe will be reflected in its residents’ perceptions.

He’s managed to help change city legislation that allows for open

containers, and the Meridian’s past hosting of monthly free summer concerts in its Dumont Plaza certainly hasn’t hurt visitor numbers, especially during the city’s annual hosting of the State Games.

The City also has planned for its future a children’s museum, which is of particular interest to Bland. “In Jackson, it’s the No. 1 tourist attraction in the state, and now we will have one right in Meridian,” he says, admitting he has a continued challenge in fighting crime and helping people feel safe. In recent years, he has put more patrol units on the street and mandated that cruisers run with static blue lights on for higher visibility. The effort appears to be paying off.

The renovation of downtown, coupled with the construction of the arts complex, swanky new hotel and children’s museum, are all part of a plan to encourage traffic into Meridian and spur economic development, which began in part with the opening of the Mississippi State University Riley Center for Education and the Performing Arts, in 2006. Housed within the Center, the renovation of the city’s historic Grand Opera House, built in 1890, showcased the architectural glory of Meridian’s Golden Age and encouraged musicians around the country to visit a venue known for its sound quality and turn-of-the-century architecture.

“Wynton Masalis played here with one mic, and I couldn’t even count the number of musicians who come through and can’t believe the way this theater sounds,” says Technical Director William Nix. “They knew how to do it right 120 years ago.”

The details of the building’s original architecture also add to the ambience. The wood surrounding the staircases and the railings surrounding each box seat are original. Each level has its own unique hand-painted wallpaper. Restorers removed the decaying patterns and duplicated them exactly. The building’s original chandelier, constructed in France in the late 19th century, also remains, with hand-stenciled stars surrounding it. “The drop above the stage is also original. It has stayed in good condition because no one could touch it, being up so high,” says Nix. Two half-brothers, Israel Marks and Levi Rothenberg, began construction on the building in 1889, choosing a site directly adjacent to their department store on Fifth Street. “Some people might call them carpetbaggers, but they showed up with bags full of New York bank notes and did a lot for this community,” says Nix. The brothers leased the theater to the Saenger Company of New Orleans in the early 1920s, and it closed shortly thereafter as new owners decided to host performances in the nearby, larger Temple Theater instead. The Shriners built the Temple Theater in the 1920s, and silent movies and Vaudeville shows began in 1928.

Today the Temple Theater for the Performing Arts continues to show silent movies, utilizing one of Mississippi’s two Robert Morton pipe organs still in their original locations. The venue feels much smaller than its 1,800 seats, with dark red curtains and carpet in the lobby and READLEGENDS.COM •

51

Egyptian revival Art Deco accents like gold-tone sphinx and heads of pharaohs accenting hallways and stairwells. The Temple Theater is one of several downtown buildings with the feel of another time, and manager Roger Smith gives group tours to those who want to connect with its history. Guests enjoy Smith’s eclectic collections of antiquated juke boxes and cigarette lighters of the period – or Zoltar – the fortune teller in the movie “Big” with Tom Hanks. They also marvel at the catacombs underneath the stately structure. During Prohibition, bootleggers would load illegal whiskey in hearses, then sneak it through the underground catacomb tunnels from a nearby funeral home to the theater’s speakeasy. Today the speakeasy still sits much as it did in the ‘30s.

If visiting in October, you’ll want to take a haunted tour of the Temple, or if in town during September, you’ll want to tour nearby Rose Hill Cemetery, where the Romanian king and queen of the Gypsies are buried along with their clan. Come early for the Rose Hill Cemetery tour, where costumed actors portray the dead as living, as wait lines stretch two blocks at times. During Christmas, you won’t

The photos of celebrity customers adorn the walls of Weidmann’s, the oldest restaurant in Mississippi, known for its Southern and Cajun-inspired cuisine and famous black bottom pie. The restaurant also serves a weekend jazz brunch.

52 • APRIL / MAY 2016

want to miss the Trees of Merrehope, the area’s only antebellum home still in existence. The home played host to Gen. William T. Sherman and his troupes as they burned Meridian to the ground during the Civil War. FOOD IN THE QUEEN CITY

desserts also stand out – pastry chef Marcia Via makes the state’s best lemon pie, according to loyal customers – the meringue has slivered almonds for a perfect textural contrast.

Several other noteworthy locally-owned restaurants have deep roots in Meridian’s culinary scene. Across the street from Weidmann’s, Brickhaus Brewtique offers bar food as well as innumerable craft beers and regular live music, both indoors and out. In north Meridian,

A Swiss immigrant working as a chef on a transatlantic steamship opened Meridian’s downtown restaurant Weidmann’s in 1870. Today owner Charles Frazier keeps the menu fresh but also maintains the traditions that made the restaurant famous. “We want this place to feel like the Weidmann’s people have always known because generations of people come here. There’s times when everyone in the dining room knows each other,” says Frazier.

The restaurant’s signage and décor reflect its mid-20th century prime. Today’s menu reflects contemporary Southern cuisine with a strong emphasis on coastal and Creole traditions – most likely a result of Frazier’s experience working in New Orleans restaurants. Fresh seafood and dishes like gumbo and muffaletta work well alongside Southern plate lunches and the occasional Italian-American dish. The

2206 Front St. • Meridian, MS • 601.490.5242 READLEGENDS.COM •

53

Squealers BBQ has been named the BBQ Capital of Mississippi, by MSN. This family-owned restaurant also boasts music on the “front porch” each Thursday and Saturday nights. Locals take turns on stage, but owner Teresa Cranmore has also been known to bring in touring acts.

For steak, most locals mention the legendary Rustler.

The quaint, casual fine dining restaurant, located in an older Meridian neighborhood on the west side of town, is known for its tender USDA prime and choice cuts of meat, especially the filet and petite filet, as well as its seafood preparations served in a small dining room with a fireplace and candlelight. Owner Mike Partridge works alongside his daughter, Semmes, and most nights both can be found welcoming guests to the charming restaurant laden with black tablecloths and impeccable décor. Although upscale, this famous Meridian landmark is known best for its casual fine dining.

Partridge never pictured himself as a restaurateur, taking over ownership of The Rustler in 1990 and beginning a process of redefining its reputation. Decades before, the building on Old Highway 80 West had seen different brands of clientele as both a hamburger joint and a biker bar. Today, some locals refer to the

hideaway restaurant as one of the best places to eat in the Southeast.

News restaurant in north Meridian is one of Meridian’s oldest. It began in the 1940s with Hattie Jane New cooking hamburgers in the back of her husband Hermon’s Shell service station. Current owner Chris Belvin took over the restaurant from his older brother, Richard.

Their mother, Louise, ran the restaurant prior to Richard, and worked

ABOVE: Rustler owner Mike Partridge and his daughter, Semmes, welcome guests to the popular steakhouse known for its casual fine dining.

54 • APRIL / MAY 2016

READLEGENDS.COM •

55

News Restaurant’s menu is inspired by Southern home cooking. Located at the back of the restaurant is the Sports Page, a local watering hole that offers live music three nights a week. The restaurant, now in its 75th year, and bar, are filled with relics from Meridian’s past.

56 • APRIL / MAY 2016

“B

elvin built the dining room’s counter using material from the floor of the Meridian Opera House. He’s hung a 1920s traffic light from the ceiling in the adjacent Sports Page (the light doesn’t have a yellow signal because traffic then didn’t necessitate one). An 1800s blow whistle, the tin strips lining the building’s back wall – there are antique pieces of Meridian all over the restaurant and bar.”

floor of the Meridian Opera House. He’s hung a 1920s traffic light from the ceiling in the adjacent Sports Page (the light doesn’t have a yellow signal because traffic then didn’t necessitate one). An 1800s blow whistle, the tin strips lining the building’s back wall – there are antique pieces of Meridian all over the restaurant and bar.

The Sports Page bar is a relatively new addition. It’s a venue he built to give back to Meridian’s community of musicians. “I grew up with music in the church. My parents played and now I play. I wanted to pay tribute to my memories of sawdust on the floor, a jukebox and families dancing and listening to music together,” says Belvin.

Locals joke that there must be something in the water, with a musical tradition spanning the birth of Jimmie Rodgers in the late 19th century and continuing to today’s nationally celebrated and local acts, there has to be something generating the talent at the very popular, very creative Junction 59/20. L

as a waitress at News in the 1950s alongside the original owners.

“When I took over I wanted to bring more of Meridian’s history to News,” says Belvin. “We’ve got 30-year regulars here; people who remember when it was still a gas station. That’s who I’m doing this for,” he says.

Belvin built the dining room’s counter using material from the

Want to go?

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57

Temple Theatre for the Performing Arts

B

uilt in Moorish Revival style in 1928, this

historic downtown theater began its heyday during

the silent film era. These days, silent films are

still shown on the silver

screen, accompanied by a rare Robert Morton

pipe organ. Greats such

as Elvis Presley, Roy Clark

and Waylon Jennings have graced the stage. Modern day shows range from the internationally acclaimed

Wilco to Mocow’s Russian Ballet. The theater is also the site of numerous

dance and acting troupes.

Filled with antiquated

and eclectic collector’s

items, the theater offers

daily group history tours.

An adjoining ballroom

Group Tours – Theater Rental – Ballroom Rental – Events & Shows

hosts community events,

weddings and receptions.

2320 8th Street Meridian, Mississippi 601.693.5353

58 • APRIL / MAY 2016

www.meridiantempletheater.com

STORY FROM MERIDIAN, MISS.

The World’s Most Famous “Sinkhole”

THE REAL PEOPLE BEHIND THE STORY

Abdul Lala came to the United States with $8.50 in his pocket. The couple began building their hotel business, Lala Enterprises, after his wife, Farida Lala, bought a 10-room hotel. They were in Birmingham for the birth of their grandson when news of the IHOP cave-in reached them.

By KARA MARTINEZ BACHMAN Photographs by Marianne Todd

I

t’s been in the news. You’ve no doubt seen it in social media feeds. It’s even been talked about on late night TV, with Jimmy Fallon and Saturday Night Live jumping into the fray.

When more than a dozen cars toppled 30 feet into a 13,000-foot crevasse that had formed in the parking lot of a Meridian, Mississippi, IHOP restaurant, the “IHOP sinkhole” story was everywhere. It may have been the brunt of jokes for some, but to the Meridian family who had opened the restaurant three days earlier – and about 100 employees – it was no laughing matter.

But what wasn’t told by the social media feeds and TV jokesters is the touching story of the people behind the headline-making restaurant. It’s a tale of a man and wife who moved to the United States from India, facing cultural differences and competing in a world where they had no particular advantages – aside from a serious worth ethic that wouldn’t quit.

And work, they did. When Abdul Lala came to this country in the early 1970s, he landed at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport with $8.50 in his pocket. Before long, Abdul met and married his wife, Farida Lala, and they found themselves relocating to READLEGENDS.COM •

59

Mississippi. Since then, that minuscule roll of cash has helped shape not only the skyline of Meridian, but the hospitality industry of a city that offered few options when Lala and his wife first arrived.

After arriving in the U.S., Lala briefly relied on the kindness of friends and relatives until he could begin his education. Daughter, Aneesa Lala Singh, tells the story of her parents’ journey.

“They were raised in India,” Singh said. “My Dad went to Texas A&M and got a master’s in petrochemical engineering.” He then returned to Chicago.

While there, Lala met Rep. Charles Young, who wanted Lala to move to Mississippi to work for his company. Singh said the move to Meridian was a shock for her parents. “At that time, it was more of a culture shock to move from Chicago to Meridian than it was to move from India to Chicago,” she said.

For the Lalas, the hustle-and-bustle of Chicago reminded them of home, a country Singh called “beautiful chaos.” But Meridian, which then tended toward the quiet and old-fashioned, was a different world.

“My dad said my mom used to cry every day,” Singh said. “They were the first Indian people to live in Meridian. They struggled initially.”

Then in 1980, something happened that changed their lives - and the local tourism and hospitality climate of Meridian - forever. Farida

60 • APRIL / MAY 2016

Lala decided, with no game plan, to take a gamble on Meridian.

“She saw a small hotel that was for sale,” Singh said. “She didn’t know what it was, but something kind of came over her and she wanted to purchase it.”

Without talking to her husband, Lala went to the bank, took money from her savings account, and bought the 10-room property that had seen better days. Singh’s mother returned home and began telling her husband about her day, adding at the end: “Oh, and by the way, I bought a motel.”

“My dad said to her, ‘I have no interest in any of this. This is all you.’”

And it was.

“My mom was a 24-hour housekeeper, maintenance worker, front desk clerk,” Singh said. “On top of that, she was also a wife and mom.

My mom cleaned those rooms before she delivered me that night,” Singh said, of her own birth.

Soon, another, older hotel was purchased, this time a 15-room model. Then in 1988, because Abdul Lala began to see the potential of investing in Meridian, he opened his first new franchise location, an Econo Lodge. “I still remember our first customer, and how we celebrated that,” Singh said.

“T

he growth and development of this community over the last 40 years goes hand-inhand with the growth and development of Lala Enterprises. It took having to break down a number of barriers to gain this type of success, but we are living proof that hard work pays off. We are humbled to have grown with Meridian, blessed to be surrounded by such a wonderful community and honored to call this city our home.”

– Abdul and Farida Lala

Young Singh was included in the everyday operation of what would eventually become a notable hospitality empire of sorts in Meridian and beyond. “My brother and I were basically born and raised in the hospitality industry,” Singh said. She tells stories of helping her mother strip sheets from beds, power wash walls, even paint stripe parking lots.

Today, the family owns 13 hotels and two restaurants (including the now-famous IHOP and a Holiday Inn) between Meridian and Birmingham, with six in Meridian and another opening in October.

“That impulse decision my mom made driving down the road in 1980 changed our life,” Singh said. These days, Singh and her husband are taking a greater role in the family business. She had moved away for school and to settle with her husband in Atlanta, where she worked as a consultant to various governmental agencies. But the needs of the family business so close to her heart have called her home.

“I had just delivered my son when the sinkhole at IHOP happened,” Singh said. She said her parents were both in “grandparent” mode when out of the blue, three days after the restaurant opened, they received an unexpected phone call in the middle of the night about the dramatic sinkhole.

“At first we were told children were in one of the cars, and I just began to shake,” Farida Lala said. “I couldn’t stop shaking.” Then, little by little the details of the chaotic moment were revealed, and the Lalas learned that no one had been hurt.

“I looked at my wife, and said, ‘What if someone had been hurt?

How could we have dealt with that?’” Abdul Lala said.

Although the couple were grateful that no one was injured, it was months before they could resume businesses. “When it happened we had flown people in from California and were training over 100 employees,” Abdul Lala said. The news of the cave-in spread quickly around the world. Farida Lala said she received calls from relatives in Europe and Canada inquiring about the event. Jokes began to surface on the internet, and although some locals were supportive and generous, the vast majority saw it as an opportunity for a laugh.

“I just had to stop looking at things people were saying,” Farida Lala said. “It hurt too much.”

Singh said the mishap is still being talked about. “Even Jimmy Fallon talked about it, and it was on SNL two weekends ago,” she said.

Farida Lala hugs her daughter, Aneesa Lala Singh, at their home in Meridian. Singh was raised in the Lala’s hotels, cleaning rooms alongside her mother. Today, she manages several properties.

Singh said since the cave-in occurred over the site of a former city drainage culvert, grant money will be used to make the repairs. The restaurant is open, and patrons park in the lot of a hotel next door that is also owned by the Lala family.

Following the incident, Singh said her parents urged her to relocate back to Meridian. The couple did just that, and in February, began assuming management of the hotels and other properties.

Since moving to Mississippi, Singh’s husband, who had no prior hotel experience, set up a rigorous system for his own education in hospitality.

Singh speaks highly of her parents, their close relationship and the unusually rigorous work ethic that brought them where they are today.

Her parents, she said, are still both very frugal, which is a big part of their success.

“My mom drives a 1998 Ford Ranger that is falling apart,” Singh said, laughing. But the example her parents set is one she hopes to pass on to her infant son.

“History is going to repeat itself,” said Singh, who plans for her son to strip beds and paint parking lots just as she did. “My son’s going to learn the same work ethic I learned.” L READLEGENDS.COM •

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STORY FROM GRENADA, MISS.

When dogs howl and nature beckons

Running the Hounds in Grenada

By KARA MARTINEZ BACHMAN Photography by Joe Worthem

J

ust as day broke and the sun peeked over the horizon, a loud racket was heard in Grenada, Mississippi. It was the sound of dogs. Not of strays or mutts fenced into backyards, but of serious sportsmen of the canine type, raring to go and letting out the enlivened woofs and howls of a chase.

“The Master of Hounds says, ‘Cast your dogs!’ You can hear this loud pack of dogs, because for 20 or 30 minutes, all the dogs stay together,” said Charlotte Dailey, Grenada Tourism Commission executive director, describing the opening moments of one of the longest-running and most recognized fox hunt and field-trial events in the nation.

“The All American Running Hound Classic is a part of the National Fox Hunters Preserve Association,” she said, of the event that’s a pretty big deal for her small city about an hour and a half north of Jackson.

For a week every winter, hounds and their owners descend upon the city and take in all things rustic. They socialize. There’s a banquet, a

64 • APRIL / MAY 2016

bench show and dogs are “cast” – set loose to chase – on four different mornings. It culminates in a final cast at the end of the week, where the top 15 percent among hundreds of dogs are allowed to compete. Dailey said the hunts are held on Corps of Engineers land, “on the other side of Grenada Lake.”

“The dog owners, they bring their dogs from all over the country and some are from Canada,” Dailey said. “All of these dogs are bred to hunt fox. They are judged on how well they chase or run the fox.”

Daily said the National Fox Hunters Preserve Association has been in existence for 121 years, and the local classic has been in existence for 49 years.

In an era when hunting for sport may not be favored as it was in the past, the All American flourishes nonetheless. Its mere existence in 2016 is no doubt controversial in some quarters. Some might consider it a bit savage, something that should be left to the past. But in Mississippi, quite often, tradition reigns.

Addressing this point, Dailey said: “They are not supposed to kill the fox, and very seldom do they catch the fox.” She said some hounds do receive scratches from brambles, or are scratched or bitten by coyotes they encounter, and need antibiotics. Sadly, some don’t make it out alive. The hunt can be as dangerous for the dogs as it is for the

“T

hey are not supposed to

kill the fox, and very seldom do they catch the fox.”

- Charlotte Dailey

For a week every winter, hounds and their owners descend upon the city of Grenada, Mississippi, and take in all things rustic for the All American Running Hound Classic, part of the National Fox Hunters Preserve Association.

READLEGENDS.COM •

65

prey, but Dailey says the goal of the contest is to simply observe the dogs for how they chase.

“Twenty judges follow the pack,” Dailey said. “By the end of the five hours, the judges have watched. They are actually scoring points, tracking them and scoring.” For instance, a dog loses points if it gets distracted and attempts to chase a deer chanced upon in the forest.

Daily said at the end of each hunt, some dogs come back on their own, some have to be located in the woods by their handlers, and “some of the dogs are so tired, they just lay down where they are.”

The event is lucrative for local tourism. Dailey said a large number of hotel rooms are booked that week each year, and as a bonus, “they are eating in our restaurants, they are drinking in our bars.”

Some will also take in the nature in and around Grenada Lake.

“Grenada is known as a sportsman’s paradise. Grenada Lake is the number one crappie fishing lake in the nation. It is 36,000 acres,” said Dailey, about the local treasure. “There’s manmade beaches – it has everything.”

For those visiting in September, the spillway of Grenada Lake is the site of a free-admission old time music event, Pickin’ at the Lake.

Guests brings their own folding chairs, and bluegrass, gospel, country and Cajun music (on acoustic instruments only) is enjoyed in the great outdoors. The 2016 fest happens September 23 and 24; both finger pickers and listeners are welcome.

Other sites for nature enthusiasts include Malmaison, a Wildlife Management Area. Contained within the 9,483 acres are woods that are home to wild turkeys, whitetail deer and other wildlife and the Yalobusha River and Oxbow lakes, where bass, bream and catfish proliferate.

“It’s great for hiking – oak, ash, cypress. And people hunt there,” Dailey said.

Grenada offers several hiking, nature and fitness trails. Primitive tent camping, RV camping, and rustic cabin lodging are among other options for those wishing to sleep, eat and relax close to nature during their stay. Many of these options lie within the Hugh White State Park, located six miles from Grenada.

Also in Hugh White State Park is a nationally-ranked golf course on the Magnolia Trace Golf Trail. Those interested in some sporting on the greens might want to play a round at 18-hole championship Dogwoods Golf Course, situated among the pines.

“It is beautiful,” Dailey said. “The 9th hole is especially beautiful, because it is built around the lake. That golf course is beautiful. And I mean, beautiful,” she said.

Once the dogs have had their day, Grenada is waiting with her hills, woods, greens – and a big lake just begging to be fished. L Want to go?

For more information about The All American Running Hound Classic or about Grenada outdoors, visit visitgrenadams.com.

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A banquet and bench show are all part of this yearly Grenada event. The dogs are bred to hunt foxes and they are judged on their ability to give chase.

Whether you are a lover of music, arts & film, an outdoor sporting enthusiast, or looking for family fun; Grenada, MS has a little of it all. Home to unique festivals and events, Grenada is sure to keep every family member or friend engaged throughout your entire visit. Whether its Thunder on Water, the Grenada Heritage Festival, AAHRA Multicultural Rodeo, or the Afterglow Film Festival, a visit to Grenada is a guarantee you will leave with an experience to remember.

662-226-2060 INFO@GRENADAMSTOURISM.COM

W WW.VI S I T GR E N A DA M S .CO M

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Coming Soon!

Any museum can display a few works, but it takes a truly special place to showcase the quirks. Visit the showcase at Greenville - Washington County: Greenville History Museum 409 Washington Avenue, Greenville William Alexander Percy Memorial Library & Delta Writer’s Exhibit 341 Main Street, Greenville “Century of History” Hebrew Union Temple & Museum 504 Main Street, Greenville 1927 Flood Museum 118 South Hinds Street, Greenville The Patriot at Greenville Cemetery South Main Street, Greenville E.E. Bass Cultural Arts Center / Armitage-Herschell Carousel 323 South Main Street, Greenville Highway 61 Blues Museum 307 North Broad Street, Leland Jim Henson Delta Boyhood Exhibit 206 Broad Street North, Leland Mississippi Wildlife Heritage Museum / Outdoor Hall of Fame Leland, (Coming Soon Spring of 2017) Winterville Mounds 2415 Highway 1 North, Winterville Greenville Air Force Base Museum Mid Delta Regional Airport, Greenville

Greenville - Washington County. More than meets the eye. www.visitgreenville.org 1-800-467-3582 68 • APRIL / MAY 2016

Convention & Visitors Bureau

STORY FROM VICKSBURG, MISS.

A VISIT WITH HISTORY

The tale of Vicksburg’s Duff Green Mansion

By RILEY MANNING Photographs by Michael Barrett

I

n Vicksburg, the Duff Green Mansion serves as a temporary lodge for the living and a permanent one for the dead.

The mansion was built by its namesake, Duff Green, in 1856.

The young man came down from Virginia as a riverboat pilot. At the time of his arrival, the railroad from Vicksburg to Meridian was newly completed, and he made a killing brokering and moving cotton.

When he married Mary Lake, daughter of judge William Lake, Green set out to build the finest house money could buy.

“The second and third floor have 15 and a half foot ceilings.

The house is over 42 feet tall,” said Harley Caldwell, who owns

the mansion with her husband, Rick. “It’s gorgeous – drop-dead gorgeous.”

The happiness of the Green-Lake marriage was short-lived, though.

Duff and Mary’s first child, Annie, died at age three of typhoid. Seven years after the mansion was finished, the Civil War reached Vicksburg.

The 47-day Siege of Vicksburg forced the town’s residents into the caves, and Mary had the couple’s second child there. As the fighting went on, Duff set up a makeshift hospital in the mansion, treating Union soldiers on the second floor and Confederate soldiers on the first. The kitchen served as the operating room.

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“Back then the only things they had to treat soldiers with were morphine, chloroform and amputations,” Harley said.

“Duff Green saved the whole neighborhood by getting a message to Union officers telling them his house held Union soldiers. The mansion was right in the way of the courthouse, so he saved it and numerous antebellum homes in the neighborhood.”

Duff leased the house to the federal government for six years as a hospital before moving back in 1880.

History was put to rest as the house was repurposed into a home for orphans, then for destitute widows.

The Salvation Army purchased it in 1939 and used it for 50 years before it was bought by a Florida couple who restored it meticulously through the 1980s and used it as a bed and breakfast.

That’s when they started digging up bones.

“When they were fixing up the rose garden, they found bones of Union soldiers,” Harley said. “They The Duff Green Mansion in Vicksburg, Mississippi, was built in 1856 to entertain, with each floor occupying 3,200 square feet. These days, the home serves as a bed and breakfast, where visitors can connect with its rich history. say it’s only Confederates buried in the Confederate cemetery, but there are parts anyone. She just wants a ride.” of Union soldiers that they found buried at the mansion.”

Harley doesn’t believe in ghosts, exactly, but she has no doubt

Some believe the spirits have stayed. Harley said there have been there’s something spiritual, some kind of aura, that lives at the Duff sightings of a legless Union soldier rocking back and forth in the Green Mansion. Before she and her husband bought it, Harley didn’t mansion’s Dixie Room. The ghost of the Greens’ first child Annie is understand the particular appeal of a bed and breakfast. From the reported to hang out on the home’s staircase, and once attacked a tour management side, though, she’s found she loves the intimacy, the guide. personal interaction she experiences with her guests.

“Well, what my husband thinks is that Duff Green used to carry

“Duff Green built this home to entertain. Each floor is about her on his shoulders up the stairs,” Harley said, “so she’s not attacking 3,200 square-feet. The ballroom, the gentleman’s parlor, they’re all

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VISIT

VICKSBURG AMERICAN HISTORY

THE BAY Be d & Bre a kf a s t

The Bay Bed & Breakfast and Event Space offers over 5,000 square feet of spacious living and outdoor space where guests will discover a cozy atmosphere and gracious style.

103 Sh o r t Bay Stre e t Hatti e s b u rg, M S 39 4 0 1

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huge,” Harley said. “When guests come, they know they’ll never see each other again, so they enjoy each other. They have a great time, and I feel that’s the spirit of Mary Green at work.”

Before purchasing the mansion, the Caldwells lived in the Steele Cottage just up the street. In fact, Harley grew up there, but now they plan to operate it as a bed and breakfast, as well. She said most people stop on the way to somewhere else, but a few trek there as a destination.

“Predominantly we see people (age) 50 and over, but we had a young couple that couldn’t be older than early 20s recently,” she said.

The mansion boasts six rooms running between $85 and $195 per night. Each stay includes a three-course breakfast in the dining room and a complimentary tour. Public tours are given in the morning at 9 and in the evening at 6.

“When it comes to atmosphere and history, it doesn’t get much better than here,” Caldwell said. L

Want to go?

For more information about the mansion, including reservations, visit duffgreenmansion.com. For more information about Vicksburg, visit the River City’s tourism professionals at visitvicksburg.com.

MISSISSIPPI MUSIC

SOUTHERN CHARM

Scan this QR to visit our mobile site and get your keys to Vicksburg.

VisitVicksburg.com /VisitVicksburg

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ALYS BEACH, FLA. Apr 8-10 … The Food and Film Festival, is a signature event in which guests watch award-winning films and documentaries and eat the delicious dishes featured in the movies. The four-day festival offers a VIP “mingle with the stars,” event, a tastings of Southern cuisine event, a “By Land or Sea” event and a bunch with “An American Institution: Grits” event. Admission varies with event. For more info, contact Christine England @ cengland@thelocalpalate.com, (843) 793-4876, or visit foodfilmsowal.com.

CLARKSDALE, MISS. Apr 14-17 … Juke Joint Festival 2016 is dedicated to all the late, great Delta blues performers who have passed away during the past year, including Juke Fest regulars L.C. Ulmer, Elmo Williams and Eddie Cusic, as well as other Mississippi bluesmen, like B.B. King. For more info, visit jukejointfestival.com.

COVINGTON, LA. Apr 6-10 … A Taste of Covington, five-day Food & Wine event, includes wine and food tastings and pairings, art, live music and a champagne jazz brunch. For more info, call (504) 439-2543 or visit atasteofcovington.com or louisiananorthshore.com.

GREENVILLE, MISS. Apr 16 … Winterville Mounds presents Luak Chito: The Great Fire. Visit these historic mounds under the stars as native Americans from the Chickasaw nation of Oklahoma tell stories, dance and chant around the campfire. Food vendors, arts and crafts booths. Free admission. For more info, call (662) 334-4584 or visit visitgreenville.org.

HERNANDO, MISS. Apr 9 … 12th Annual Mudbug Bash, Panola Street off Hernando Town Square, offers crawfish and trimmings with silent and live auctions and samplings from local restaurants and live music benefiting the Palmer Home for Children, a non-profit home for children providing stable homes for children with inadequate family structure. For more info, call (855) 672-5637, or visit palmerhome.org.

LELAND, MISS. May 14 … The 25th Annual Leland Crawfish Festival, the oldest running crawfish festival in Mississippi, celebrating Cajun culture and those who brought it to the Mississippi Delta from the bayous of Louisiana. Proceeds go toward the Highway 61 Blues Museum. Rain or shine, live music, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., $5 admission. For more info, visit lelandchamber.com.

MERIDIAN, MISS. Apr 2 … The Threefoot Arts Festival, food, live music and arts and crafts vendors, downtown Meridian, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more info, visit visitmeridian.com.

April 30 … The Heart Behind the Music with John Berry, Will Champlin, Linda Davis, Billy Dean and special guest Chloe Channel, MSU Riley Center, 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $39, $33. Pre-show part at 6 p.m. For more info, visit msurileycener.com.

May 5 … Creedence Clearwater Revisited at the MSU Riley Center, with pre-show party at 6 p.m. Music begins at 7:30 p.m. Tickets, $59, $53. For more info, visit msurileycenter.com.

May 6-7 … The Jimmie Rodgers Music Festival, the state’s oldest music festival, featuring a number of acts, including Lucinda Williams as headlining act. Gates open at Meridian City Hall lawn grounds at 5 p.m. on Friday and noon on Saturday. Ticket costs vary. For more information visit jimmierodgersmusicfestival.com.

NATCHEZ May 7-28 … The Natchez Festival of Music, opening with a rare performance by Glen Ballard, writer for Michael Jackson, Dave Matthews, Alanis Morrisette, Katy Perry and Aretha Franklin, among others. Natchez Performing Arts Center at Margaret Martin, 8 p.m. Admission: $40, or $125 for post-concert gala reception. For a full festival lineup, visit natchezfestivalofmusic.com.

NEW ORLEANS April 2 … The New Orleans Ragtime Festival at the U.S. Mint from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and The Palm Court from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. Be part of the firstever Ragtime Festival as musicians pay homage to America’s traditional music. For more information, visit theneworleansragtimefestival.com.

SAN DESTIN, FLA. Apr 14-17 … Sandestin Wine Festival, a signature event in which guests choose tastings from hundreds of domestic and international wines.

Representatives from vineyards from across the globe are available for questions. Culinary tents offer samples of delicious fare paired with wine.

For more info, visit sandestinwinefestival.com.

SLIDELL, LA. April 2 – June 25 … Jazz’n in the Vines at Louisiana’s Pontchartrain Vineyards, the NorthShore’s premier music series with food and wine. For a list of scheduled events and performers, visit pontchartrainvineyards.com/jazzn-the-vines or louisiananorthshore.com.

SOUTH WALTON BEACHES, FLA. April 28- May 1 … South Walton Beaches Wine & Food Festival offers four days of wine and food tastings, unique tasting seminars, live entertainment and lifestyle stations. More than 800 exceptional wines will be poured by dozens of celebrity wine makers in attendance. This year’s list includes Mark Perrin of Chateau Beaucastel and Jean-Charles Boisset of Boisset Family Estates and Chef Emeril Lagasse. For more info, visit sowalwine.com.

VICKSBURG, MISS. April 15-16 … RiverFest Music and Arts Festival on historic Washington Street, live music, wood carving exhibitions, amphibious plane rides, dog show, street performers, food and art. For more info, call (601) 63404527, or visit downtownvicksburg.org or visitvicksburg.com.

Apr 23 ... Wine tasting in the gardens of McRaven, one of Vicksburg’s most valued historic tour homes. The event includes the tasting, a McRaven wine glass, a historic tour of the home and a coupon for $5 off a haunted tour. Cost is $35 online or $40 at the door. For more information, call (601) 501-1336, or visit mcraventourhome.com.

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