On Saturday, October 30, I made a short drive from Memphis down Hwy 61 through the Mississippi Delta to Clarksdale for the 6th Annual Cruzn The Crossroads Car Show. The weather is finally changing here in the South. It was the first weekend where I couldn’t ride with the windows down without my hands freezing to the steering wheel. I love driving through the flat Mississippi Delta (especially this time of year) where you can often see for miles. Once you make your way out of the Memphis suburbs in northern Desoto County, the space between homes increases as cotton fields begin to take up all the valuable real estate. Fields that were green just a few months ago are now either awash in a sea of white or are already stripped bare. Combines are busy driving fore and aft harvesting the crops or turning the soil preparing for the winter slumber. Massive round bails of harvested cotton covered in bright-colored plastic to protect them from the elements sit by the highway waiting to be loaded onto 18-wheelers. As the trucks travel down the road, tufts of cotton fly through the air and create little drifts like snow.
I had never been to Clarksdale before, so I was excited to visit. Though I don’t consider myself an audiophile, I knew Clarksdale was steeped in musical history. Highway 61 is named “Blues Highway” for a reason. Blues music was born from enslaved African-Americans working these very fields in the Deep South, and Clarksdale played an important role in the proliferation of the genre. While Memphis hails itself as “The Home of the Blues,” Clarksdale is the true home of the genre, for it is here at the crossroads of Highway 61 and 49 where Robert Johnson is said to have sold his soul to the devil. While Clarksdale’s heyday has long since passed, it has done a really good job of researching its past and celebrating it, instead of plowing it under. With the promotion of the Delta Blues Museum into the old Illinois Central Railroad depot and the erection of Mississippi Blues Trail Markers, the musical history is being preserved for generations to come.
Located right in the heart of downtown, it was here in the parking lot of the museum at No.1 Blues Alley where the car show took place. It was a perfect place to park and walk around the area, visit the museum, or just sit by your car and enjoy listening to Black Water Trio perform live on the stage. The show is definitely going to outgrow the space in the not-so-distant future, but they managed to find parking for the approximately 100 cars that showed up on a chilly, overcast, and windy day. It was a nice laid-back atmosphere where I got to see some cars I would normally see 1.5 hours north. I took some time to walk around and shoot some photos of the gritty little downtown area, but I would definitely like to come back to take some more time to enjoy the little honky-tonks, including Ground Zero Blues Club, owned by actor Morgan Freeman.
The car show was an open show with a few “People’s Choice” awards and cash drawings. I really enjoy going to quaint small-town shows like this one where people don’t normally get to see a spectacle of paint and chrome. The chief of Police and Fire department were even participants enjoying the festivities. The announcer kept talking about kids participating in a “wet t-shirt contest,” which made me a little nervous until it started and I found out it was kids trying to throw a wet t-shirt into a 5-gallon bucket (Whew!). Around 2:00 pm, the awards and cash drawings were given out. I wish I could have stayed and listened to the band a little longer but I had to skedaddle as soon as awards were given out. Below are some shots from the event, I hope you enjoy them. And remember, as always, prints are available of any photo on my site by going to the SHOP page (just make sure to jot down the name/number of the photo).
